On April 14, 1865 President Abraham Lincoln spent his day visiting with callers and attending a Cabinet meeting. Included at this Cabinet meeting was General Ulysses Grant and Lincoln explained to Grant that he was having a recurring dream about a ship “moving with great rapidity toward a dark and indefinite shore.”

Now that the Civil War was over, topics of discussion at the Cabinet meeting were the problems of reconstruction and the treatment of former Confederate leaders.

A Trip To Ford’s Theatre To See A Play

That evening, the Lincolns were planning a visit to Ford’s Theatre to see the play Our American Cousin. Lincoln asked General Grant to be his guest that night, but Grant declined the president’s invitation. Instead, Lincoln and his wife Mary would attend the performance of Our American Cousin accompanied by two other guests, Major Henry Rathbone and his fiancée Miss Clara Harris.

Previously, President Lincoln had found some brief refuge from the Civil War when he attended a play at Ford’s Theatre on November 9, 1863. Lincoln then saw a play named The Marble Heart and cast in this play was a young and well-regarded actor named John Wilkes Booth. Booth would not be acting in Our American Cousin on the evening of April 14, 1865 but he planned to be at Ford’s Theatre during the play’s performance.

The Lincolns, Major Henry Rathbone and Miss Clara Harris, were all enjoying the play. Two of the play’s characters exchange the following lines during the third act:

Mrs. Montchessington: I am aware, Mr. Trenchard, that you are not used to the manners of good society.

Asa Trenchard: Don’t know the manners of good society, eh? Well, I guess I know enough to turn you inside out, old gal – you sockdologizing old mantrap!

A Single Shot From A Derringer

After the above lines in the performance of the play the audience would always burst out loudly in laughter. John Wilkes Booth knew that at this particular moment in this scene of the play the audience’s loud laughter would happen as if on cue. At this time, Booth used a .44 caliber derringer to shoot President Lincoln in the back of his head at nearly point blank range.

Booth slashed Major Rathbone with a knife and then leapt onto the stage as he shouted: “Sic semper tyrannis” (“Thus always to tyrants”). Booth broke his leg as he landed on the stage, but he escaped out of Ford’s Theatre to a back alley and a waiting horse. All this occurred at about 10:15 P.M. It was Good Friday.

President Lincoln was unconscious but still alive. He was moved across the street from Ford’s Theatre to the Peterson house. Taken into a back bedroom, the six-foot-four inches tall Lincoln was placed diagonally upon a bed that was too short for him.

President Lincoln’s head wound was very severe. There was nothing much that could be done for the president now, except to watch and wait.