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Lot 128
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New-York Tribune Publishing Numerous Accounts of Death of John Wilkes Booth
New-York Tribune Publishing Numerous Accounts of Death of John Wilkes Booth
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Description:

John Wilkes Booth
New York, NY, April 28, 1865
New-York Tribune Publishing Numerous Accounts of Death of John Wilkes Booth
Newspaper

An issue of the New-York Tribune covering the assassination of President Lincoln and the death of John Wilkes Booth. 8pp, measuring 16" x 21", New York, dated April 28, 1865. Volume XX, No. 2079. The newspaper has flattened folds and creasing, with toning, soiling, and foxing throughout. Tears and chipping at the edges. The subscriber's name has been written in pencil at the top of the first page. Overall very good.

The main headline of the paper dramatically reads, "The Assassination. Booth Found and Shot! His Accomplice, Harrold, Captured. The Dying Words of the Assassin. No Confession or Repentance. A Hardened Wretch. Full Details of the Affair." Interestingly, the paper has published varying accounts of the killing of Booth and capture of Harrold. The paper also includes recent war news, legislation, editorials on the Confederacy, and much more.

Highlights from the paper:
"…Early yesterday morning a squad of about twelve men belonging to the 16th New-York Cavalry, under the command of a Lieutenant whose name we did not learn, succeeded in discovering the fugitive in a barn on the road leading form Port Royal to Bowling Green, in Caroline County, Va. As soon as they were discovered the place was surrounded, and the assassins ordered to surrender. This they both refused to do, Booth declaring that he would not be taken alive, and offering to fight the whole squad if he would be permitted to place himself twenty yards distant from them. His proposition was not, however, acceded to, and as they persisted in their refusal to surrender, the Lieutenant determined to burn them out, and accordingly set fire to the barn. Shortly afterward Harrold came out and gave himself up. Booth remained in the burning building for some time and until driven out by the fire, when he rushed out and was immediately shot through the neck by the sergeant of the squad…"

"Since the above was put in type, we have had an interview with two of the cavalrymen engaged in the capture of the assassins…When Harrold saw the preparations for firing the barn, he declared his willingness to surrender, and said he would not fight if they would let him out. Booth, on the contrary, was impudently defiant, offering at first to fight the whole squad at 100 yards, and subsequently at 50 yards. He was hobbling on crutches, apparently very lame…as soon as the burning hay lighted the interior of the barn sufficiently to render the scowling face of Booth, the assassin, visible, Sergt. Boston Corbett fired upon him, and he fell. The ball passed through his neck. He was pulled out of the barn and one of his crutches and carbine and revolvers secured. The wretch lived about two hours, whispering blasphemies against the Government and messages to his mother, desiring her to be informed that he died for his country..."

"…Booth's body, which we have above described, was at once laid out on a bench, and a guard placed over it. The lips of the corpse are tightly compressed, and the blood has settled in the lower part of the face and neck. Otherwise the face is pale and wears a wild, haggard look, indicating exposure to the elements, and a rough time generally, in his skulking flight. His hair is disarranged and dirty, and apparently has not been combed since he took his flight. The head and breast are alone exposed to view…The shot which terminated his accursed life entered on the left side, at the back of the neck - a point, curiously enough, not far distant from that in which his victim, our lamented President, was shot…"

"Booth's Death: We do not fully share the feeling of regret, which seemed to be general yesterday, that it should have been necessary to shoot Booth instead of bringing him in alive to be tried and hanged. There was a possible chance of confessions and revelations - but only possible, for Booth was a determined villain, and very unlikely to tell anything that could damage his accomplices or help us. And for other reasons, it was just as well he died as he did. It was a dog's death - dog that he was, and fitted him well. The arrest might have been clumsily managed, or the Sergeant who shot Booth might have been hasty, and no doubt it was expected of his captors that he should have been taken alive - but no matter. It is enough that justice has thus swiftly overtaken him, after a pursuit probably unparalleled in its intensity and persistence. The murderer can have had no moment of rest, no instant of fancied security from the time he fired his shot down to his actual capture. If anybody wants to indulge his vindictive feeling, let him imagine what agonies of retribution and of apprehension the assassin has had to live through for ten days past…"

After Booth fatally shot Lincoln, he fled Washington, D.C. into Virginia. He was injured in the escape, having badly fractured his leg, but managed to outwit authorities for 11 days. Booth eventually made it to the farm of Richard H. Garrett, where he was finally tracked down. The soldiers set fire to the barn Booth and Harrold were hiding in, and as Booth moved about inside the blazing barn, Sergeant Boston Corbett shot him. Lieutenant Colonel Everton Conger's report to Stanton stated that Corbett shot Booth "without order, pretext or excuse", and recommended that Corbett be punished for disobeying orders to take Booth alive. Fatally wounded in the neck, Booth was dragged from the barn to the porch of Garrett's farmhouse, where he died three hours later.

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: 16" x 21"
  • Medium: Newspaper

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