1865
President Lincoln Dies
At 7:22 a.m., Abraham Lincoln, the 16th
president of the United States, dies from a bullet wound inflicted the night
before by John Wilkes Booth, an actor and Confederate sympathizer. The
president’s death came only six days after Confederate General Robert E. Lee
surrendered his massive army at Appomattox, effectively ending the American
Civil War.
Booth, who remained in the North during the
war despite his Confederate sympathies, initially plotted to capture President
Lincoln and take him to Richmond, the Confederate capital. However, on March
20, 1865, the day of the planned kidnapping, the president failed to appear at
the spot where Booth and his six fellow conspirators lay in wait. Two weeks
later, Richmond fell to Union forces. In April, with Confederate armies near
collapse across the South, Booth hatched a desperate plan to save the
Confederacy.
Learning that Lincoln was to attend Laura
Keene’s acclaimed performance in Our American Cousin at Ford’s Theater
on April 14, Booth plotted the simultaneous assassination of Lincoln, Vice
President Andrew Johnson, and Secretary of State William H. Seward. By
murdering the president and two of his possible successors, Booth and his
conspirators hoped to throw the U.S. government into a paralyzing disarray.
On the evening of April 14, conspirator Lewis
T. Powell burst into Secretary of State Seward’s home, seriously wounding him
and three others, while George A. Atzerodt, assigned to Vice President Johnson,
lost his nerve and fled. Meanwhile, just after 10 p.m., Booth entered Lincoln’s
private box unnoticed and shot the president with a single bullet in the back
of his head. Slashing an army officer who rushed at him, Booth jumped to the
stage and shouted “Sic semper tyrannis! [Thus always to tyrants]–the South is
avenged!” Although Booth had broken his left leg jumping from Lincoln’s box, he
succeeded in escaping Washington.
The president, mortally wounded, was carried
to a cheap lodging house opposite Ford’s Theater. An hour after dawn the next
morning, Abraham Lincoln died, becoming the first president to be assassinated.
His body was taken to the White House, where it lay until April 18, at which
point it was carried to the Capitol rotunda to lay in state on a catafalque. On
April 21, Lincoln’s body was taken to the railroad station and boarded on a
train that conveyed it to Springfield, Illinois, his home before becoming
president. Tens of thousands of Americans lined the train’s railroad route and
paid their respects to their fallen leader during the train’s solemn
progression through the North. Lincoln was buried on May 4, 1865, at Oak Ridge
Cemetery, near Springfield.
Booth, pursued by the army and secret service
forces, was finally cornered in a barn near Bowling Green, Virginia, and died
from a possibly self-inflicted bullet wound as the barn was burned to the
ground. Of the eight other persons eventually charged with the conspiracy, four
were hanged and four were jailed.
Bonus Story
1947
Jackie Robinson Breaks Color Barrier
On this day in 1947, Jackie Robinson, age 28,
becomes the first African-American player in Major League Baseball when he
steps onto Ebbets Field in Brooklyn to compete for the Brooklyn Dodgers.
Robinson broke the color barrier in a sport that had been segregated for more
than 50 years. Exactly 50 years later, on April 15, 1997, Robinson’s
groundbreaking career was honored and his uniform number, 42, was retired from
Major League Baseball by Commissioner Bud Selig in a ceremony attended by over
50,000 fans at New York City’s Shea Stadium. Robinson’s was the first-ever
number retired by all teams in the league.
Jack Roosevelt Robinson was born January 31,
1919, in Cairo, Georgia, to a family of sharecroppers. Growing up, he excelled
at sports and attended the University of California at Los Angeles, where he
was the first athlete to letter in four varsity sports: baseball, basketball,
football and track. After financial difficulties forced Robinson to drop out of
UCLA, he joined the army in 1942 and was commissioned as a second lieutenant.
After protesting instances of racial discrimination during his military
service, Robinson was court-martialed in 1944. Ultimately, though, he was
honorably discharged.
After the army, Robinson played for a season
in the Negro American League. In 1945, Branch Rickey, general manager of the
Brooklyn Dodgers, recruited Robinson, who was known for his integrity and
intelligence as well as his talent, to join one of the club’s farm teams. In
1947, Robinson was called up to the Majors and soon became a star infielder and
outfielder for the Dodgers, as well as the National League’s Rookie of the
Year. In 1949, the right-hander was named the National League’s Most Valuable
Player and league batting champ. Robinson played on the National League
All-Star team from 1949 through 1954 and led the Dodgers to six National League
pennants and one World Series, in 1955. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall
of Fame in 1962, his first year of eligibility.
Despite his talent and success as a player,
Robinson faced tremendous racial discrimination throughout his career, from
baseball fans and some fellow players. Additionally, Jim Crow laws prevented
Robinson from using the same hotels and restaurants as his teammates while
playing in the South.
After retiring from baseball in 1957, Robinson
became a businessman and civil rights activist. He died October 24, 1972, at
age 53, in Stamford, Connecticut.