Part 3 (2/2)

The Union troops, on the morning of the 4th of April, entered the rebel capital. Among the exulting columns which followed the eagles of the Republic, were some regiments of negro soldiers, who marched through the streets of Richmond singing their favorite song of ”John Brown's soul is marching on.”

On the day of its capture, President Lincoln, with Admiral Porter, visited Richmond. Leading his youngest son, a lad, by the hand, he walked from the James River landing to the house just vacated by the rebel President. From the time of the issuing of his proclamation to this, his triumphant entry into the rebel capital, he had been ever ready and anxious for peace. To all the world he had proclaimed, what he said so emphatically to the rebel emissaries at Hampton Roads. ”There are just two indispensable conditions of peace, national unity, and national liberty.” ”The national authority must be restored through all the States, and I will _never recede_ from my position on the slavery question.” He would never violate the national faith, and now G.o.d had crowned his efforts with complete success. He entered Richmond as a conqueror, but as its preserver he issued no decree of proscription or confiscation, and to all the South his policy was, ”with malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as G.o.d gave him to see the right, he sought to finish the work, and do all which should achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace.”

On the 9th of April he returned to Was.h.i.+ngton, and had scarcely arrived at the White House before the news of the surrender of Lee and all his army reached him. No language can adequately describe the joy and grat.i.tude which filled the hearts of the President and the people.

And here, before the attempt is made to sketch the darkest and most dastardly crime in all our annals, let us pause for one moment to mention that last review on the 22d and 23d of May, of these victorious citizen soldiers, who had come at the call of the President, and who, their work being done, were now to return again to their homes scattered throughout the country they had saved.

These bronzed and scarred veterans who had survived the battle-fields of four years of active war, whose field of operations had been a continent, the brave men who had marched and fought their way from New England and the Northwest, to New Orleans and Charleston; those who had withstood and repelled the terrific charges of the rebels at Gettysburg; those who had fought beneath and above the clouds at Lookout Mountain; who had taken Fort Donelson, Vicksburg, Atlanta, New Orleans, Savannah, Mobile, Petersburg, and Richmond; the triumphal entry of these heroes into the National Capital of the Republic which they had saved and redeemed, was deeply impressive. Triumphal arches, garlands, wreaths of flowers, evergreens, marked their pathway. Acting President and Cabinet, Governors and Senators, ladies, children, citizens, all united to express the nation's grat.i.tude to those by whose heroism it had been saved.

But there was one great shadow over the otherwise brilliant spectacle.

Lincoln, their great-hearted chief, he whom all loved fondly to call their ”Father Abraham;” he whose heart had been ever with them in camp, and on the march, in the storm of battle, and in the hospital; he had been murdered, stung to death, by the fang of the expiring serpent which these soldiers had crushed. There were many thousands of these gallant men in Blue, as they filed past the White House, whose weather-beaten faces were wet with tears of manly grief. How gladly, joyfully would they have given their lives to have saved his.

LAST DAYS OF LINCOLN.

It has been already stated that Mr. Lincoln returned to the Capital on the 9th of April; from that day until the 14th was a scene of continued rejoicing, gratulation, and thanksgiving to Almighty G.o.d who had given to us the victory. In every city, town, village, and school district, bells rang, salutes were fired, and the Union flag, now wors.h.i.+ped more than ever by every loyal heart, waved from every home. The President was full of hope and happiness. The clouds were breaking away, and his genial, kindly nature was revolving plans of reconciliation and peace.

How could he now bind up the wounds of his country and obliterate the scars of the war, and restore friends.h.i.+p and good feeling to every section? These considerations occupied his thoughts: there was no bitterness, no desire for revenge. On the morning of the 14th, Robert Lincoln, just returned from the army, where, on the staff of General Grant, he had witnessed the surrender of Lee, breakfasted with his father, and the happy hour was pa.s.sed in listening to details of that event. The day was occupied, first, with an interview with Speaker Colfax, then exchanging congratulations with a party of old Illinois friends, then a cabinet meeting, attended by Gen. Grant, at which all remarked his hopeful, joyous spirit, and all bear testimony that in this hour of triumph, he had no thought of vengeance, but his mind was revolving the best means of bringing back to sincere loyalty, those who had been making war upon his country. He then drove out with Mrs.

Lincoln alone, and during the drive he dwelt upon the happy prospect now before them, and contrasting the gloomy and distracting days of the war with the peaceful ones now in antic.i.p.ation, and looking beyond the term of his Presidency, he, in imagination, saw the time when he should return again to his prairie home, meet his old friends, and resume his old mode of life. In fancy, he was again in his old law library, and before the courts: with these were mingled visions of a prairie farm, and once more the plow and the ax should become familiar to his hand.

Such were some of the incidents and fancies of the last day of the life of Abraham Lincoln.

THE a.s.sa.s.sINATION.

From the time of the election of Mr. Lincoln to the Presidency, many threats, public and private, were made of his a.s.sa.s.sination. An attempt to murder him would undoubtedly have been made, in February, 1861, on his pa.s.sage through Baltimore, had not the plot been discovered, and the time of his pa.s.sage been antic.i.p.ated. From the day of his inauguration, he began to receive letters threatening a.s.sa.s.sination. He said: ”The first one or two made me uncomfortable, but,” said he, smiling, ”there is nothing like getting _used_ to things.” He was const.i.tutionally fearless, and came to consider these letters as idle threats, meant only to annoy him, and it was very difficult for his friends to induce him to resort to any precautions.

It was announced through the press that on the evening of the 14th of April, Mr. Lincoln and General Grant would attend Ford's Theater. The General did not attend, but Mr. Lincoln, being unwilling to disappoint the public expectation, accompanied by Mrs. Lincoln, Miss Harris, and Major Rathbone, was induced to go. The writer met him on the portico of the White House just as he was about to enter his carriage, exchanged greetings with him, and will never forget the radiant, happy expression of his countenance, and the kind, genial tones of his voice, as we parted _for the night_ as we then thought--_forever_ in this world, as it resulted.

The President was received, as he always was, by acclamations. When he reached the door of his box, he turned, and smiled, and bowed in acknowledgment of the hearty greeting which welcomed him, and then followed Mrs. Lincoln into the box. This was at the right hand of the stage. In the corner nearest the stage sat Miss Harris, next her Mrs.

Lincoln. Mr. Lincoln sat nearest the entrance, Major Rathbone being seated on a sofa, in the back part of the box. The theater, and especially the box occupied by the President's party, was most beautifully draped with the national colors. While the play was in progress, John Wilkes Booth visited the theater behind the scenes, left a horse ready saddled in the alley behind the building, leaving a door opening to this alley ready for his escape.

In the midst of the play, at the hour of 10.30, a pistol shot, sharp and clear, is heard! a man with a b.l.o.o.d.y dagger in his hand leaps from the President's box to the stage exclaiming, ”_Sic semper tyrannis_,” ”the South is avenged.” As the a.s.sa.s.sin struck the stage, the spur on his boot having caught in the folds of the flag, he fell to his knee.

Instantly rising, he brandished his dagger, darted across the stage, out of the door he had left open, mounted his horse and galloped away. The audience, startled and stupefied with horror, were for a few seconds spell-bound. Some one cries out in the crowd, ”_John Wilkes Booth!_”

This man, an actor, familiar with the locality, after arranging for his escape, had pa.s.sed round to the front of the theater, entered, pa.s.sed in to the President's box, entered at the open and unguarded door, and stealing up behind the President, who was intent upon the play, placed his pistol near the back of the head of Mr. Lincoln, and fired. The ball penetrated the brain, and the President fell upon his face mortally wounded, unconscious and speechless from the first. Major Rathbone had attempted to seize Booth as he rushed past toward the stage, and received from the a.s.sa.s.sin a severe cut in the arm.

No words can describe the anguish and horror of Mrs. Lincoln. The scene was heart-rending; she prayed for death to relieve her suffering. The insensible form of the President was removed across the street to the house of a Mr. Peterson. Robert Lincoln soon reached the scene, and the members of the cabinet and personal friends crowded around the place of the fearful tragedy. And there the strong const.i.tution of Mr. Lincoln struggled with death, until twenty-two minutes past seven the next morning, when his heart ceased to beat. The scene during that long fearful night of woe, at the house of Peterson, beggars description.

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