THE ESCAPE
Booth passed out by the right side of the stage and through the passage in the rear of the theatre,
mounted his horse which Burroughs was still holding, hit him a blow with the handle of his knife, fled
across the Navy Yard bridge, and arrived at Lloyd's Tavern, Maryland, about 12 o'clock at night. On the way,
he had been joined by Herold.
Stopping at Lloyd's Tavern in Surrattsville, Herold dismounted and went into the house, saying to Lloyd,
"For God's sake, make haste and get those things!"
Lloyd, understanding what he wanted from the notification
given him by Mrs Surratt on the day previous, without making any reply, went and got the carbines which
he had placed in his bedroom that they might be handy, and brought them to Harold together with the
ammunition and field-glass that had been deposited with him, and the two bottles of whiskey that
Booth had ordered through Mrs Surratt the day before.
Herold carried out to Booth one of the bottles of whiskey, drinking from his own bottle in the house
before going out. Booth declined taking his carbine, saying his leg was broken and he could not carry it.
As they were about leaving, Booth said to lloyd, "I will tell you some news if you want to hear it. I am pretty
certain that we have assassinated the President and Secretary Seward."
The moon was now up and shining brightly. The next heard of them was at the house of Dr. Samuel A. Mudd, near
Bryantown in Maryland and about thirty miles from Washington, where they arrived about four o'clock on the
morning of the 15th.
Booth's leg had been broken by a fracture of the fibula, or small bone, of the left leg when he fell on the
stage on leaping from the President's box, and by this time had become very painful. He needed rest and
surgical treatment but he could get neither; for although he had reached the house of a co-conspirator who was a country
doctor and well disposed to render him all the aid he could, he appeared to have made a very bungling operation,
dressing the broken limb with some pasteboard and a bandage which gave but a very imperfect support.
As for the rest he required, that was impossible, for although Mudd placed him in an upstairs room and kept him until the
afternoon, he was admonished by seeing a squad of soldiers under Lieutenant Dana passing down past [Mudd's]
place which was a quarter of a mile off the road to Bryantown, that there was no rest for him; and as quickly as
it could be done, after the soldiers passed, Mudd got rid of his dangerous charges by sending by an
unfrequently used route to the house of his friend and neighbor Samuel Cox, about six miles nearer to
the Potomac.
Booth was on no new ground, neither among strangers either to his person or to his wicked purpose. He had
spent a good deal of his time during the previous fall in that part of Maryland, preparing a way for his escape
after accomplishing his purpose. His way had seemed clear to him in advance; his route had been selected; his
friendly acquaintances secured. But alas! The broken leg.
Under the guise of looking at the country with a desire to purchase lands, he had perfected all his arrangements,
and had expected to pass swiftly over his route, accompanied by Atzerodt (whose home was in that neighborhood
and who knew all about the contraband trade with the rebel capitol, the underground mail route between Richmond
and Washington, and all of the people engaged in these operations, and also the place and facilities for
crossing the Potomac.) He had purposed to be safe on the soil of the Old Dominion ere this time. Instead
of realizing all this, he found himself a cripple, scarcely able to travel, and closely pursued by those
whom he knew to be on his trail, with no other companion than his devoted, but inefficient, friend Herod.
Mudd had done all he could to relieve him, but dare not try to keep concealing him. He could only
forward him to the next stage of his journey and to a safe place of concealment. This he faithfully did.
Cox lived near Port Tobacco, the home of Azerodt; and as his was too public a place to afford safety to the fugitives, he turned them over to his neighbor, Thomas Jones,
a contraband trader between Maryland and Richmond who, in the midst of a constant scouring of the country
by pursuing parties, kept his charge concealed in the woods near his house, supplying them with food and
doing everything he could for their comfort, waiting and watching constantly to find an opportunity to get
them across the Potomac. They were hunted so closely that they could hear the neighing of the horses of
the troopers and, fearing they might be betrayed by their own horses answering the calls, Herold led
them into a swamp near where they lay concealed in the pines and shot them.
The river was being continually patrolled by gunboats, and the task of getting his wards across proved both
difficult and dangerous to Jones. The proclamations offering one hundred thousand dollars for the
capture of Booth and warning all persons from aiding the fugitives in any way in making their escape
had been published broadcast, yet Jones was true to his trust. Neither the offered rewards nor the
warnings of the proclamation had any effect on him; for a whole week he kept them secreted in the pines
on his premises where Booth lay night and day wrapped in a pair of blankets that had most likely been
furnished him by Dr. Mudd. Finally, being furnished by Jones with a boat, they took their own risks
and effected a crossing; but they were seen by a colored man through whose report General Baker got on
their track and finally effected their capture.
There can be no doubt that Booth had selected this as the route for his escape months before, and that
all of his visits to this part of Maryland had been made with reference to this plan. Being at length
across the Potomac, even though under such unfavorable auspices, Booth no doubt drew a free and exultant breath at having been
permitted to set his foot at last on the soil of the Old Dominion. He felt that he was now among friends --
who would aid him in his flight, or help him by concealment, and his friend Jones no doubt breathed with a
freedom he had not known for some days at finding himself relieved from his most dangerous charge. Both was greatly
disappointed at the cold reception given him by the people on whom he had counted so much after crossing
into Virginia. He had expected to be lionized and honored as the hero of the age; but instead of that he received
a comparatively cold reception that stung his vanity like the poison of an asp.
It is true the people showed no disposition to betray him: but, at the same time, they manifested a disposition to enter
into no compromising friendship with him, and in a limited way only to assume any responsibility on is
behalf by helping him to escape. Bad indeed, was Booth's condition at this time. More than a week had
elapsed since he had perpetrated his great crime and commence his guilty flight, and now he found himself on foot, so lame and
in such pain, as scarecely to be able to walk, even with the help of a crutch, and scarcely more than
fifty miles from his starting point. His companion in crime, Herold, was now the only human being on
whose friendship and fidelity he could certainly rely.
By the aid of this blind follower, he was able to maintain his concealment, and after a wretched fashion to resume
his flight in an old wagon drawn by two miserable horses and driven by a negro. In this state he reached
Port Conway, on the Rappahannock, in King George County, Virginia. Here his driver refused to take him further.
It is just at this juncture and in this dilema that they were met by three confederate soldiers, Major
Ruggles, Lieutenant Bainbridge and Captain William Jett, the latter of Moseby's command.
Herold, thinking they were recruiting for the rebel service, was quick to see in them a means of assistance
in getting South, and under the protection of the stars and bars, and so revealed their identity, appealing to them
for assistance. A little later Booth, getting out of the wretched conveyance, came forward, and to assure
himself of their disposition toward him, accosted them with the interrogatory, "I suppose you have been told
who we are?" then throwing himself back on his crutch, and straightening himself up with pistol locked
and drawn, he said, "Yes, I am Wilkes Booth, the slayer of Abraham Lincoln, and I am worth just one
hundred and seventyfive thousand dollars to the man that captures me." His attitude and speech was dramatic and
that of a man at bay, under the power of a desperate purpose never to be taken alive.
These three officers of the confederate army, whilst mildly protesting that they did not sanction his acts as
an assassin, assured him that they did not want blood money, and promised to render him all the assistance
in their power in making his escape, a promise which they faithfully kept. Major Ruggles dismounted and
placed Booth on his horse, when the whole party crossed over the Rappahannock from Port Conway, in King George, to Port Royal,
in Caroline County, Virginia, and after an ineffectual effort to find quarters for Booth in the town, they took
him three miles on the road to Bowling Green, the county seat of the latter county, where they succeeded in getting
a man by the name of Garrett to take him in, with the understanding that he would do all he could
for his comfort and safety. Garrett took Booth and Herold in with a full knowledge of all the facts in
the case, and with some manifest reluctance from a knowledge of the danger he would thus incur.
CONTINUE
-
A Lawyer/Soldier Called To Serve
- Colonel Burnett,
Mood of the Time,
Deathbed
- What Was Known
- Investigation,
Assassination,
Seward's Attack,
Other Attempts
-
The Investigation
- First Steps,
Military Court
-
The Conspiracy
- Planning,
14 April 1865,
The Escape
-
The Search Tightens
- Cornered,
Garrett's Barn
-
The Trial and Its Aftermath
- The Sentences,
Habeas Corpus,
Gen. Hancock,
Mrs Surratt,
An Inhuman Crime?,
Pres. Johnson and Gen. Holt,
Military or Civil
-
Lincoln
- A Man for the Ages,
Lincoln Links,
Lincoln Books,
Newspaper Accounts
Assassination Microfilm
-
Brig.Gen. Henry L. Burnett
Copyright © 1998, Mary S. Van Deusen
On the evening of the 14th of April, 1865, Major Rathbone and Miss Harris of Washington joined the President
and Mrs Lincoln and drove with them in the President's carriage to Ford's Theatre, reaching there about
half past eight. When the President reached the theatre and the fact became known, the actors stopped
playing, the band struck up Hail to the Chief, and the audience rose and received him with cheers and shouts
of applause. The party passed to the right into the President's box in the second tier which was on the
left of the stage. The President seated himself in an armchair which had been provided for him that afternoon
by Mr Ford to the left of the box,and nearest the audience. Mrs Lincoln sat next on the right of the President
and on her right was Miss Harris,and immediately behind her sat Major Rathbone.
About nine o'clock of that evening, Booth rode into the alley in the rear of the threatre and called
upon Spangler, a stage carpenter employee of the theatre, to hold his horse. Spangler sent a young man named
Burrows, another employee. Booth stepped into the theatre through the rear door, took a brief survey of
the house, passed out the same way, and soon after appeared at the front.
