The Assassination of President Lincoln

At approximately 10:15 p.m., during the second scene of the third act, John Wilkes Booth slipped into the presidential box and fired his .44-caliber single-shot derringer into the back of Lincoln’s head. Booth timed his attack so that his movements and the sound of the shot would be masked by the laughter of the audience as one character called another a “sockdologizing old mantrap!” At the shot, Mary Lincoln screamed. Major Rathbone rushed Booth, who cut him with a hunting knife before making his escape. This hand-colored lithograph by Currier & Ives is one artist’s version of the scene in the presidential box.