Lot 84

John Wilkes Booth Writes from New Orleans to Admirer During Civil War

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Lot 84
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John Wilkes Booth Writes from New Orleans to Admirer During Civil War
John Wilkes Booth Writes from New Orleans to Admirer During Civil War
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John Wilkes Booth Writes from New Orleans to Admirer During Civil War

Estimate: $15,000 - $20,000

Current Bid: $6,500

(4 Bids)
June 17, 2026 10:00 AM EDT
Live Auction
Wilton, CT, US
Description:

John Wilkes Booth
New Orleans, LA, April 4, 1864
John Wilkes Booth Writes from New Orleans to Admirer During Civil War
ALS

JOHN WILKES BOOTH, Autograph Letter Initialed, to "Dear Miss," April 4, [1864], St. Charles Theatre, [New Orleans, LA]. 2 pp., 4" x 6".

In this brief letter to an admirer, John Wilkes Booth sends a picture and tells her he will leave for Boston the following Saturday. Booth had been performing at the St. Charles Theatre in New Orleans for three weeks when he wrote this letter in early April 1864. During his time in New Orleans in the spring of 1864, Booth developed even stronger pro-Confederate, anti-Lincoln sentiments.

Both his father and older brother had performed at the St. Charles Theatre in New Orleans in the 1840s and 1850s, and his father delivered his final performance there before his sudden death on a steamboat in November 1852 en route to Cincinnati. John Wilkes Booth's performances at the St. Charles Hotel were part of the theatre's reopening after having been closed for three years due to the pressures of the war. The former Confederate city had been occupied by the Union Army for nearly two years. During his engagement, Booth performed from his repertoire in Shakespeare (including Richard III, Hamlet, Othello, Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet, Merchant of Venice) and contemporary melodrama (The Corsican Brothers, Richelieu, Money, the Robbers, The Lady of Lyons, The Marble Heart). Some critics in the New Orleans newspapers criticized him harshly, while others were positive or lukewarm, though all compared him to his family. Due to illness, he shortened his entire engagement from five to three weeks, giving his last performance on April 3, the day before he penned this letter.

Booth tells his correspondent that he will soon leave for Boston. There, he met sixteen-year-old Isabel Sumner (1847-1927) and began a romantic relationship. They exchanged photographs, and he gave her a ring, set with a pearl and bearing the inscription, "J.W.B. to I.S." In August 1864, Isabel even traveled to New York City, where she saw Booth as he lay sick at his brother's house. Whether this letter to "Dear Miss" was to Isabel Sumner remains unclear.

Complete Transcript
St Charles Theatre
April 4th
My Dear Miss
I recd yours yesterday, but was kept (by business) from answering till now.
I have come to the conclusion that a noncompliance with your request would be a crime, especially if my not refusing will afford you the pleasure you mention. I therefore enclose (with my best wishes for your future) a picture of my humble self. I start next Saturday for Boston.
With all respect / I remain yours to command
J.W.B.

Historical Background
John Wilkes Booth fascinated many of his contemporaries, especially women. Clara Morris, who as a young teenager had acted with Booth in Cleveland, later recalled admiringly, "He was a gentleman in speech, manner and thought as he was in bearing. He was a great favorite with the men, and the women adored him." While denouncing Booth's assassination of Lincoln, Morris declared, "In his soul the fires of genius burned brightly, and he promised to top them all in the profession into which he was born." She described his power over women in his audiences: "let me tell you there were many handsome, well-bred and wealthy ladies in the land, married as well as unmarried, who would have done many foolish things for one of those kisses. Booth's striking beauty was something which thousands of silly women could not withstand. His mail each day brought him letters from women weak and frivolous, who periled their happiness and their reputations by committing to paper words of love and admiration which they could not, apparently, refrain from writing."

On June 7, 1864, Booth wrote a long letter from New York City to Isabel Sumner in Boston, asking "How shall I write you; as lover, friend, or brother[?]" and concluded to write her as "dearest friend." He continued, "May God bless you, as I am wishing him to do with every breath and protect you from the wiles of this bad world of ours, keeping you ever, good and pure as, you are, (in my eyes) beautiful. I wish I could have seen more of you, or not have seen, at all, for our short acquaintance has set me thinking wildly." His letter continued in expressions of affection that must have profoundly affected his teenage correspondent. Ironically, he admonished her, "Dearest Isabel never, never trifle with anothers heart, or try to cheat your own." He concluded by urging her not to show his letters to anyone. Booth wrote several more letters to Isabel Sumner, but their relationship broke off later in 1864, when he became more consumed with kidnapping President Abraham Lincoln.


John Wilkes Booth (1838-1865) was born in Maryland as the illegitimate son of the British Shakespearean actor Junius Brutus Booth and his mistress, Mary Ann Holmes. He began his theatrical career at age 17 in Baltimore in August 1855, with a supporting role in Richard III, but did not begin regular appearances until two years later. He was soon acting in scores of plays and earning enough to become wealthy. Between August 1857 and May 1864, Booth gave hundreds of performances in cities throughout the dividing and divided nation. During the first half of 1862, he made his stage debut in leading roles in Chicago, New York, and Boston. When family friend John T. Ford opened his new theatre in Washington in November 1863, Booth was one of the first leading men to appear there. He delivered the final performance of his acting career there on March 18, 1865. A strong opponent of abolitionists and supporter of an independent Confederacy, Booth formulated a plan to kidnap President Abraham Lincoln and recruited Confederate sympathizers in 1864. When Union forces captured Richmond and Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia surrendered, Booth's kidnapping plan was no longer feasible, and he changed his goal to assassination. He shot Lincoln in the back of the head on the evening of April 14, 1865, then fled on horseback into Maryland. Twelve days later, Union troops surrounded Booth at a farm in Virginia and killed him.

This item comes with a Certificate from John Reznikoff, a premier authenticator for both major 3rd party authentication services, PSA and JSA (James Spence Authentications), as well as numerous auction houses.

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  • Dimensions: 4" x 6"
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Bid Increments
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$100 $299 $20
$300 $499 $25
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$1,000 $1,999 $100
$2,000 $2,999 $200
$3,000 $4,999 $250
$5,000 $9,999 $500
$10,000 $19,999 $1,000
$20,000 $49,999 $2,500
$50,000 + $5,000