Lincoln's Last Days: Part 3

Outside the White House, the Washington weather is splendid, a sunny fifty-degree day.

Robert describes “the stately elegant Lee” and Grant, “the small stooping shabby shy man in the muddy blue uniform, with no sword and no spurs.”

“Oh, it was great!” the normally articulate Robert exclaims, unable to find a more expressive way to describe the event.

“Dundrearyisms” (named for the befuddled character Lord Dundreary), have become part of everyday speech, and several spin-off plays featuring characters from the show have been written and performed.

He wants a message delivered to Ford’s Theatre saying that he will be in attendance this evening if the state box, the special seating section set aside for dignitaries and honored guests, is available.

It is impossible to tell the difference between idle threats and serious ones.

“At least bring a guard with you,” Stanton pleads, once it becomes obvious that Lincoln will not be dissuaded.

Boxes on either side of the stage allow the more privileged patrons to look straight down onto the actors.

The twofold challenge he faces is the traditional assassin’s plight: find the most efficient path into the state box and then find the perfect escape route from the theater.

John Wilkes Booth prowls Ford’s Theatre alone, thinking of how he will accomplish the assassination and make his escape.

He lifts it, nervous but elated, knowing how he will make use of it tonight.

He feels obligated to go.

Grant, who thinks Mary Lincoln is unstable and a gossip, has bluntly refused.

Grant is shown into the room, and his entrance injects a new vitality

So far, the only blemish on Parker’s record while serving the president is a penchant for tardiness, as Crook knows all too well.

Thanks to his military training, Powell knows the value of reconnaissance.

Though Johnson is a vigorous man, he is known to be unguarded and alone most of the time.

The two cavalry escorts trailing the carriage wheel their horses back to their barracks.

Charles Forbes is taking a nap on the driver’s seat of Lincoln’s carriage, oblivious to the fog and drizzle.

The stagehand appears at the back door, visibly distressed about the possibility of missing an all-important stage cue.

Ford’s Theatre is flanked on either side by taverns—the Greenback Saloon to the left and Taltavul’s Star Saloon to the right.

The secretary wears a splint on his broken jaw, which, luckily, deflects the knife away from the jugular vein, but it does little to protect the rest of his skull.

Dr. Joseph Janvier Woodward’s autopsy report, written at noon on April 15 and smeared with Lincoln’s blood, will read, “The ball had entered through the occipital bone about one inch to the left of the median line and just above the left lateral sinus, which it opened.

It then penetrated the dura mater, passed through the posterior lobe of the cerebrum, entered the left lateral ventricle and lodged in the white matter of the cerebrum just above the anterior portion of the left corpus striatum.”

“Freedom!” he bellows down to the audience.

Instead of a gallant two-footed landing on the stage, Booth topples heavily from the state box and lands awkwardly.

He swerves into the alley, spurs his horse down the cobblestones between two large brick buildings, and turns onto F Street, avoiding the procession.

Because he saw that Major Rathbone’s wounds were caused by a knife, and because he hadn’t heard any gunshots during the performance, Leale deduces that Lincoln was stabbed.

Working quickly, he straddles Lincoln’s chest and begins resuscitating the president, hoping to improve the flow of oxygen to his brain.

He shoves two fingers down Lincoln’s throat and presses down on the back of the tongue, just in case food or drink is lodged in the esophagus.

Though they are far more experienced, army surgeon Dr. Charles Sabin Taft and Dr. Albert King defer to their younger colleague because Dr. Leale was first on the scene.

Then, as Leale will one day tell an audience celebrating the one hundredth anniversary of Lincoln’s birth, he performs an act of great and urgent intimacy: “I leaned forcibly forward directly over his body, thorax to thorax, face to face, and several times drew in a long breath, then forcibly breathed directly into his mouth and nostrils, which expanded the lungs and improved his respirations.”

I then pronounced my diagnosis and prognosis.

The pupil of the left eye is severely contracted, and the pupil of the right eye is widely dilated.

“His wound is mortal,” Leale announces softly.

the distraught Mary Lincoln is being comforted by Clara Harris.

Major Rathbone drips blood on the carpet, trying to stanch the flow by holding tight to his injured arm.

Mary is like a child, so forlorn that she lacks the will to protest as others make decisions for her.

A deep, softly sonorous cooing sound at the end of each expiration, audible to bystanders.

The sound is so grotesque that Mary collapses.