John Wilkes Booth

One of the most promising American actors of his time, John Wilkes Booth (1838-1865) was the assassin of President Abraham Lincoln in 1865.

John Wilkes Booth was born in Bel Air, Maryland, and attended school sporadically. A strikingly handsome youth, he attracted many people, and early decided to try the stage. Although unwilling to work at his parts, native talent enabled him to win acclaim as a Shakespearean actor, especially in the Richmond, Virginia stock company. In 1860—the year Lincoln was elected president—Booth achieved recognition across the country and played to approving audiences. Contemporary actors praised him as a "comer," and his reputation seemed assured.

A respiratory problem in 1863 forced Booth to leave the stage temporarily, and he began conceiving a romantic "conspiracy" to abduct President Lincoln and deliver him to Richmond for a ransom of peace or an exchange of Confederate prisoners.

Sympathized with the South

Unlike the rest of the Booth family, John had always been a Southern sympathizer. He believed the Civil War to be a simple confrontation between Northern tyranny and Southern freedom. He enrolled six other Confederate sympathizers in his kidnapping scheme. Their efforts in March 1865 to capture Lincoln on the outskirts of Washington, D.C. were foiled by the President's failure to appear. Booth's frustration undoubtedly contributed to his decision to assassinate Lincoln.

Booth learned at noon on April 14 that Lincoln would attend Laura Keene's performance of Our American Cousin at Ford's Theater in Washington that evening. Vice President Andrew Johnson and Secretary of State William Seward were also to be killed, but Booth's confederates failed to carry out these murders. Booth went to the theater in the afternoon and fixed the door of the President's box so that it could be barred behind him. At about ten o'clock Booth entered the theater, shot Lincoln, and jumped to the stage, shouting "Sic semper tyrannis! (Thus ever to tyrants!) The South is avenged!"

Pursued and Killed

Breaking a leg in his leap to the stage, Booth dragged himself from the theater to a waiting horse. The pain slowed him, and he and another conspirator were forced to seek a doctor. Dr. Samuel A. Mudd set the leg and fed the fugitives. For several days they tried to cross the Potomac, and when at last they succeeded, they journeyed to the farm of Richard H. Garrett, south of the Rappahannock River. Pursuers found them in Garrett's barn on April 26. When Booth refused to surrender, the barn was set afire. His figure was glimpsed briefly just as a shot was fired. Although one of the pursuers claimed to have shot Booth, it is unclear whether he was killed or committed suicide.

Booth's accomplices were rounded up and tried in one of the wildest travesties of justice ever perpetrated. Four of the conspirators were condemned to death. Dr. Mudd received a life sentence, as did two of Booth's accomplices. One accomplice died in 1867; the other and Mudd were pardoned by President Johnson in 1869.

Booth's tragedy lay in his twisted vision of patriotism. He never understood the horror caused by his act, and he died with these last words: "Tell Mother … I died for my country."

Further Reading

Lewis, Lloyd, and Mark Neely, Jr., The Assassination of Lincoln: History and Myth (1994). □

Booth, John Wilkes (1839–65). actor. The youngest and handsomest son of the elder Junius Brutus Booth, he was born in Belair, Maryland, and made his debut in Baltimore in 1857 as Richmond in Richard III. His New York debut came in 1862 when he assumed the lead in the same play. According to the Herald, he created “a veritable sensation. . . . His face blackened and smeared with blood, he seemed Richard himself; and his combat with Richmond . . . was a masterpiece.” With the outbreak of the Civil War, he played largely in the South but did cross the lines, ostensibly to act in the North, although quite possibly to transmit secret messages. Among his parts were Hamlet, Marc Antony, and other then‐standard romantic and tragic roles. Perhaps out of jealousy of his brother Edwin Booth, he affected a style much closer to the old school of his father than to the newer, more tempered acting. One Cleveland theatre manager wrote of him that he “has the fire, the dash, the touch of strangeness.” How greatly his art would have developed was left unanswered by his death following his assassination of Lincoln. Booth shot Lincoln while the president was watching a performance of Our American Cousin from a box at Ford's Theatre in Washington on April 14, 1865. Jumping from the box, he is said to have shouted, “Sic Semper Tyrannis!” But in his jump he caught his leg and was injured in the fall. Grabbing a horse that had been kept waiting in the alley by the theatre, he eluded pursuers until he was caught on April 26 in a barn on the Richmond and Fredericksburg Railroad. He was shot but refused to leave the barn, and since he was known to be armed, the building was set afire. Only after he was badly burned did he come out. He died shortly thereafter. Biography: The Man Who Killed Lincoln, Phillip Van Doren Stern, 1939.

Booth, John Wilkes (1838–65), son of Junius Brutus Booth and brother of Edwin Booth, was also a noted actor. During a performance of Our American Cousin at Ford's Theatre in Washington (April 14, 1865), he shot President Lincoln, and while escaping shouted “Sic semper tyrannis! The South is avenged!” A fortnight later at Bowling Green, Va., after the barn in which he was hiding was set afire, he was shot while attempting to escape. He often figures in fiction about Lincoln, and novels specially directed toward him include David Stacton's The Judges of the Secret Court.

Booth, John Wilkes (1839–65), American actor, younger brother of Edwin Booth, who at 10.22 p.m. on 14 Apr. 1865 assassinated Abraham Lincoln in Ford's Theatre, Washington, during a performance of Tom Taylor's Our American Cousin. There are two theories as to the reason for this act, one asserting that Booth, an indifferent actor, was jealous of his elder brother's success and sought notoriety through crime, the other ascribing his action to mistaken patriotism. The whole question is systematically surveyed in The Mad Booths of Maryland (1940) by Stanley Kimmel.

Booth, John Wilkes (1838–65) actor and assassin of President Abraham Lincoln, born in Harford County, Maryland. Booth was the first assassin of a U.S. president. An accomplished Shakespearean actor from a family of actors, Booth plotted to kidnap or assassinate Abraham Lincoln to avenge the South. He shot Lincoln at Ford's Theatre in Washington on April 14, 1865, shouting, “Sic semper tyrannis (thus always to tyrants)! The South is avenged!”

Booth, John Wilkes (1838–65) US actor and assassin of Abraham Lincoln. He was a Confederate sympathizer. On April 14, 1865, during a performance at Ford's Theater, Washington, D.C., he shot Lincoln, who died the next day. Booth escaped but was either shot, or killed himself, two weeks later.