Lincoln has his premonitions. Two weeks before the assassination, he has a nightmare which he recounts to his wife and colleagues after a few days: “There seemed to be death-like stillness about me. Then I heard subdued sobs, as if a number of people were weeping. I thought I left my bed and wandered downstairs. There the silence was broken by the same pitiful sobbing, but the mourners were invisible. I went from room to room. No living person was in sight, but the same mournful sounds of distress met me as I passed along. It was light in all the rooms. Every object was familiar to me. ” Lincoln goes on to describe how he reaches the East Room and finds a corpse surrounded by soldiers and mourners. He asks one of the soldiers, “Who is dead in the White House?” Pat came the reply, “The President. He was killed by an assassin.” Thereupon the crowd burst into a loud outpouring of grief.

Bill O’Reilly is a household name in America. Together with Martin Dugard, a historian, he puts together a highly interesting account of the assassination of Abraham Lincoln on 14th April, 1865. The history books had told us the dark deed was done by an actor, John Wilkes Booth. And we knew there were unexplained coincidences and conspiracy theories. This book tells us a lot more. The authors adopt a countdown format, with the narrative beginning six weeks before the assassination. The events of each day are outlined minute by minute. These are the concluding days of the Civil War and there is violence, bitterness and hatred all around.

It wasn’t a lone wolf attack. There were co-conspirators.William Seward, Secretary of State, who was seriously ill was attacked in his bed on the same day at the same time. He was wounded but survived. Seward went on to buy Alaska for the United States.

While Booth was shot dead 12 days later, 4 others were sent to the gallows within 3 months while a few more served prison sentences. Lewis Powell, the man who attacked Seward, was among those hanged. Mary Suratt, who provided arms and lodging to the conspirators became the first and only woman to be hanged in the United States. Whispers were doing the rounds that Edwin M Stanton, Secretary of War, formerly a brilliant Ohio lawyer, was somehow in the know of things. Was he among the conspirators? No evidence could be found.

The Montreal based J J Chaffey Company had paid $15000 to Booth and a whopping $150,000 to one Lafayette Bayer, a former spy, who was hand-picked by Stanton to head the man-hunt for Booth.

A telegram was sent to Chicago from Water Street on April 2nd, 1865, stating, ” J W Booth will ship oysters until Saturday 15th.” Booth never had anything to do with oysters or shipping but he shot Lincoln on April 14th. After his death, 18 pages of his diary mysteriously disappeared. Booth could have been captured alive but he was killed.The diary was found on him, but the contents were revealed only two years later, when Stanton handed it over. Did he remove the missing pages? It is anybody’s guess. Apparently it was Lafayette Baker who had handed it over to Stanton. This was revealed in 1867 when Baker published a book. Baker feared he would be killed – and he was.

Strange coincidences were a dime a dozen. On the day of the assassination, Lincoln’s bodyguard went on a drinking binge leaving the President unguarded at Ford Theatre. And he was never punished! Earlier, Lincoln’s eldest son Robert had been pushed from a railway platform on to the path of an incoming train. And guess who hauled him to safety? It was none other than Edwin Booth, elder brother of John Wilkes Booth. Another twist in the tale: Robert Lincoln was enamoured of Lucy Hale, who had secretly agreed to marry John Wilkes Booth.

Does the book merit a read? You bet!

Killing Lincoln: The Shocking Assassination that Changed America Forever
Authors: Bill O’Reilly and Martin Dugard
Publisher: St. Martin’s Griffin
Publication Date: September 2011

Contributor: Pushpa Kurup lives in Trivandrum, India and works in the IT sector.