Hi, all.
I was stuck hard on what I wanted to write about tonight. It’s been a while since I did a new fiction piece here. I’ve been focused on my longer work for a while, and I would say short fiction is firmly #3 on my priority list (with #1 being novel-length fiction and #2 being poetry1.
However, a friend of mine I know of from Archive of Our Own, one of the bigger fan fiction sites out there, wrote a bit of alternative history fiction for the site. I’ve liked the alternative history genre, so I decided to use one of the biggest events of American history as the inspiration for this piece.
I hope you enjoy it. And as the title suggests, this is only the first part of the story.
Father Abraham
Part 1: The Thespian Cometh Not (1865)
By Jason Liegois
From Abraham Lincoln: Second Father of His Country (Andrew R. Roberts, 1982).
Abraham Lincoln sits astride the history of the 19th century as, if not its most significant figure, certainly its most significant political figure. While his two terms in office did not see Lincoln make a significant direct impact on foreign affairs, he was the essential figure in not only preserving the only eight decades-old American democratic experiment, but in refining and strengthening that experiment for a century and more to come.
While F. Scott Fitzgerald said there were no second acts in American lives, he inexplicably must not have considered the life of Lincoln before committing the thought to paper. For Lincoln had a second act nearly as comparable to the first after he left the White House in the winter of 1869 (or perhaps a third act, if one was to consider his time spent as a successful Illinois traveling lawyer and a less successful time spent as a politician).
However, it’s almost staggering to consider this second act, and a good portion of the first act, almost was lost from history due to a twist of fate. While the attempted assassinations of four key figures of the United States government had a profound influence on subsequent events in post-Civil War America, one can only consider the resulting chaos if the Confederate conspirators had succeeded with their plans of 14 April 1865.
This sense of disconcertion increases, of course, when considering the only difference between a fresh start for the United States of America and chaos were a few liters of hard liquor.
13 April 1865, Washington, DC
It was around noon that day when John Wilkes Booth had tumbled out of his bed in the boarding room he called his living space and headed over to Ford’s Theater. He’d worked so often at the venue that he even had his mail delivered there.
Much was on Booth’s mind on the thirteenth of April, the culmination of a conspiracy at that point nearly two years in the making. However, a series of recent events had dramatically altered the nature of the plans against the American president from mere kidnapping to assassination.
Just two days previously, Booth, alongside his confidant and former Confederate soldier Lewis Powell, had attended a speech given by the president in Washington. It was on this occasion Lincoln had spoken of the need to give slaves now emancipated by either the Emancipation Proclamation or the Thirteenth Amendment to the First Constitution the right to vote.
Enraged, Booth turned to Powell and hissed, “That means n****r citizenship … That is the last speech he will ever give.”
He then urged Powell to immediately shoot Lincoln. It is unknown exactly why he did not simply make the attempt himself, whether it had to do with him not being armed at that time or that he considered Powell to be a better marksman than himself. However, Powell, too, begged off the attempt, worried about escaping from the crowd after the attack.
The next day, word of the surrender of Gen. Robert E. Lee and his Army of Northern Virginia three days hit the city. With Lee’s surrender, the capture of the Confederate capital of Richmond, Virginia, and the flight of Confederate President Jefferson Davis and his government from Richmond and toward exile, most observers considered the matter of the Southern rebellion all but closed.
For Booth, however, he felt there was one last hand to be played. General Joseph E. Johnson and his men were still at large somewhere between northern Virginia and the Carolinas, and other forces still not surrendered. And at Ford’s Theater on that day, the card dealer of the universe dealt Booth three aces.
It was at the theater that Booth overheard preparations being made for Lincoln, Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant, overall commander of United States’ ground forces, and their wives to attend the next evening’s performance of Our American Cousin. It was a perfect opportunity for him to make his move.
That evening, Booth gathered his conspirators at the boarding house of Mary Surratt, their regular gathering place. As well as Booth, the crew included Lewis Powell, Powell’s fellow Confederate veteran Samuel Arnold, Surratt’s son John, a Confederate spy, David Herold, and George Atzerodt. All has been willing to undertake the kidnapping scheme, and now, with their beloved Confederacy on the brink of collapse, were now willing to undertake assassination.
And not merely a single assassination, either. It was clear to Booth the entire Union political and military leadership needed to be attacked if there was any hope of turning the inevitable tide.
With this in mind, Booth gave himself the task of entering the theater and then assassinating first Lincoln and then Grant as they watched the play. With his status as an actor who’d performed at Ford’s previously, he would have the least difficulty of gaining entrance to the theater and getting close to Lincoln and his party. Arnold would accompany him, wait outside, and then serve as a backup in case either Lincoln or Grant were able to escape the theater unharmed.
Meanwhile, Powell, accompanied by Herold, would go to the home of Secretary of State William Seward, the most prominent member of Lincoln’s cabinet, to assassinate him. Finally, Atzerodt would go to the Washington residence of Vice President Andrew Johnson and end his life.
John Surratt would be responsible for arranging funds and papers for the conspirators after the assassinations, to avoid the inevitable hunt by Federal authorities. Surratt and Powell’s connections to the Confederate Secret Service extended all the way to one man: Confederate Gen. Braxton Bragg, the former commander of the Army of the Tennessee and former chief military adviser to Jefferson Davis himself. Long disgraced in field command for his failures at Perryville, Stones River, and Chattanooga, his close friend Davis had given him the face-saving position of military adviser, but he’d been eased out of even this position with the naming of Robert E. Lee as the overall Confederate commander and the installation of one of Bragg’s multiple enemies, John C. Breckinridge, as Secretary of War.
Eager to prove his worth to his friend Davis, he began to involve himself in the plots to kidnap Lincoln, even going so far as to siphon funds away from the defense of Richmond to help pay the expenses of the conspirators.
Both Davis and Lee were aware of Bragg’s machinations. Davis was in favor of anything that would preserve the Confederacy, so he gave his unqualified assent to Bragg’s efforts. Lee was not as accepting of Bragg’s efforts as Davis, and informed the president of his misgivings, but in the end he did nothing to stop or hinder the efforts of the conspirators. Having limited dealings with subterfuge, Lee deferred whatever misgivings he had to his president’s judgement, right or wrong.
It would prove to be a fateful decision among all three men.
14 April 1865, Washington, DC
John Wilkes Booth
He was alone in the tavern at noon except for a few derelicts, the barkeep, and a glass with a whiskey bottle in front of him.
Anything to chase away the blues.
Over the past three days, his mood had veered from manic excitement to deep depression, from a knife-point focus to a scattered hopelessness. There were times when he vibrated with energy and purpose, certain that he and his co-conspirators were the only defense against losing the Southern way of life. But there were other times, more frequently now, where he sensed everything was lost.
He refilled his glass and took another shot. Regardless of whether he could save the Confederacy or it was beyond help, he felt in some ways he’d reached the end of his road at just twenty-seven years old. He’d been part of a storied acting family and had found both fame and fortune on the stage. However, he hadn’t stepped on a stage for a month and had no desire to. He’d joked to one of the borders at the Surratt house who’d asked about his absence that the only play he wished to star in was Venice Preserv’d. The man missed his attempt at humor – the play was about an assassination plot.
There was a letter in his coat pocket addressed to Lucy Hale, daughter of a US Senator from New Hampshire. They’d been secretly engaged two months previously. She had little knowledge of his support of the Confederacy and none of the depths of his hatred toward Lincoln.
He’d last seen her at Lincoln’s second inauguration last month. The last letter he’d sent her was at the end of the previous month. He was already mourning the loss of his love, just as he mourned the estrangement from his brother and fellow actor Edwin.
Even if he and his collaborators fully succeeded in their plans, at the very least they would all be on the run, If they were lucky they might be able to make it to overseas, maybe Mexico, the Caribbean, or Brazil. They even still had slavery in the last country. If not, perhaps Britain would give them asylum, or at worst look the other way. The worse scenario, of course, was him getting shot right after he shot the president and Grant. In any case, the well-crafted life and career he’d built over the past decade would be blown to pieces, at the very least.
He’d been preparing himself for the event for some time. He already had the derringer and dagger he planned to use on the president and Grant. But now, just hours before Our American Cousin was to start, he found preparing himself mentally for the task was, to use an analogy, a long leap.
He started at the bottle. He’d not slept, by his own reckoning, for a day and a half. With a deep sigh, he fumbled for some coins and bought a second whiskey bottle to take with him along with the half-filled first one. His intention was to go back to his room, get a drink, lay down for a few hours and wake up refreshed for the task ahead.
He managed to consume two-thirds of one bottle before passing out.
Arnold
He was in a bar he frequented many times in recent months, not to drink but to listen. It was a haunt of many of General Grant’s junior staff officers, and Arnold made a point of trying to unobtrusively listen in to the Union men’s conversations. He’d hoped to get a meal and perhaps some new information to pass along to his Confederate handlers, assuming they were still able to receive information while on the run from Union soldiers.
“…damndest thing, having to make plans for the old man to travel at the last minute,” he heard one young lieutenant say.
“Wasn’t he going to the theater tonight with the President?” a fellow lieutenant said.
“They said they had to visit some of Mrs. Grant’s relations, but in all frankness, I don’t know if the wives get on.”
“The number of people on friendly terms with the First Lady might be counted in two hands,” the second lieutenant said.
“Anyway, they’re on the train to New Jersey tonight. Place will be quiet the next couple of days.”
It took every amount of restraint for Arnold to finish his meal and his pint of beer and not immediately take his leave. His mind was racing, however.
Booth planned to kill both Lincoln and Grant but now it will be just Lincoln. I could either go wait for Booth as planned. But wouldn’t it make sense for me to try and see if I can get the drop on Grant? By himself, Grant might be enough to hold things together. And Booth should be able to get into Ford’s unaided, which is more than I could do.
In fifteen minutes, by the time he finally took his leave, Arnold had made his decision. Fingering the loaded pepperbox revolver he had in his coat pocket, he started to walk over to the New Jersey Avenue station to see when the next train to Jersey left.
#
Just before 10 p.m. that evening outside William Seward’s Lafayette Square home, Lewis Powell entered the home, attempting to claim he was delivering medicine to the Secretary of State, recovering from a fall from a carriage. Herold waited outside.
At the same moment, George Atzerodt went to the Kirkwood House, where Vice President Andrew Johnson was staying. Atzerodt stopped at the downstairs bar and had the first of several glasses of gin.
#
Arnold had found out the train to New Jersey was leaving at 10:15 p.m. The station was close to empty except for a few travelers, more than a couple of whom were soldiers apparently headed off on leave. He hid in the shadows behind a brick column on the train platform, his Colt Walker pistol drawn but hidden behind his back.
He saw a man and woman headed for the platform, the man in an officer’s overcoat and hat, and a dark-haired woman in a gray dressed who, to his surprise, appeared to be cross-eyed.
The lit end of a cigar illuminated the man’s face as they walked past him. Grant.
He waited until they walked past him, then eased behind the man, as soft-footed as possible. Arnold brought the revolver up to the back of Grant’s head. The first click of the gun cocking echoed across the platform.
Suddenly, the shorter man whirled to the right and Arnold could hear the scrape of steel. The general’s dress saber flashed through the air and struck his forearm, but the blade was at an uneven angle and did not cut deep. Regardless, it spoiled Arnold’s shot.
The ball whizzed between Grant and the woman’s heads, splintering the side of a nearby train car. Despite the ache in his arm, he tried to cock the revolver again for another shot.
With a lunge, Grant drove the point of his saber in the center of his gut. Gasping for breath, Arnold was driven to the ground by the older man.
Leaping up, Grant sprinted to the woman. “Julia! Julia! Are you all right?” He wrapped his arms around her shoulder as she knelt on the ground.
“I’m all right, Ulysses,” she whispered, choking back a sob. “I’m fine.”
It started getting darker for Arnold. Grant then knelt over him. “Who are you?” he shouted. “Who sent you? Who sent you?”
He couldn’t catch his breath. With a gasp, Arnold said, “You’re too late. The Illinois ape’s dead.”
His consciousness faded to black.
#
The screams from Seward’s house frightened Herold from tarrying around outside. A bloodied and manic Powell fled outside through the front door and exited into the night.
Atzerodt left the Kirkwood House without seeking out Johnson at all.
Booth still slept.
15 April 1865
Booth
It was morning. Oh my God, it’s morning.
Booth had fallen asleep on top of his bed. It’s morning? What happened? Damn me, I know what happened.
He ran out of the room and the house after gathering what money he had and a suitcase with some random clothing. Booth started to make his way to the train station.
At the first streetcorner, he saw a paperboy hawking the morning papers. He gave the boy a penny, walked down the streets, and gawked at the headlines:
ASSASSINS IN WASHINGTON
GRANT, SEWARD ESCAPE DEATH; SEWARD, SONS WOUNDED
PRESIDENT LINCOLN SUSPECTED TARGET
As he walked rapidly to the station, one thought came to mind: All is lost.
The White House
A young man approached one of the sentries on duty at the north side of the residence. “Excuse me, sergeant?”
“What’s your business?”
“My name’s John Surratt,” the man said. “I have information regarding the attacks on Gen. Grant and Sec. Seward.”
July 1865
Old Capitol Prison, Washington, DC
He walked through the gates with barely a word. He let Col. Rawlins and the three stars on each of his shoulders do the talking.
The orderlies led him to the door of the cell and unlocked it for him.
Lt. Gen. James Longstreet sat in a wooden chair at a dining table, staring through the barred window to the outside. There was a writing desk in one corner, a washbasin in another corner, and a modest cot on the other side of the room.
Dressed in a clean Confederate officer’s uniform, Grant’s former West Point classmate appeared paler than he recalled, but the bigger man’s hair and bushy beard reaching to his chest appeared well-groomed. He saw him pick up his right arm by the wrist and lay it down on the table with his left, and Grant remembered the wound from Petersburg.
“Afternoon, Sam,” Longstreet said. “Here to visit?”
“Actually, I am, Pete. I am,” Grant said.
Pete waved to a wooden chair on the other side of the table. “Make yourself comfortable.”
Grant nodded and sat down. “How have things been with you?”
Longstreet crossed his legs at the ankles as he leaned back and sighed. “In all truth, I would prefer to be back with my wife and children, but I cannot complain about the circumstances of my captivity. I doubt our troops in Camp Douglas had access to coffee,” he concluded, nodding at the tin mug of now-cold coffee on the table. He referred to an infamous camp for Confederate prisoners.
“Glad to hear it, Pete.”
“I’m assuming you had news for me, Sam? You didn’t want to share this with my counselor?”
“This news, I reckon, needed to be given in person.”
Longstreet fixed Grant with a dark stare. “Who’s getting hung, Sam?”
“Davis, Lee, and Bragg. Bragg for arranging it, Davis and Lee for agreeing to it.”
“Gen. Lee never agreed to anyone being assassinated, Sam.”
“He never objected, either, and he had the ability to stop it.” Grant’s expression twisted as if he was in pain. “All the living conspirators captured, of course: Booth, Powell, Herold, Atzerodt.”
“Not the Surratts, according to what I read in the papers?”
“Young Mr. Surratt gave us Davis, Lee, and Bragg in exchange for not charging his mother and leniency for himself – five years imprisonment.”
“Anyone else facing the noose?”
“Some for charges not related to the conspiracy. Gen. Forrest and some of his men have been charged in connection with the murder of Negro prisoners after Fort Pillow. The Swiss colonel in charge of Andersonville in Georgia and his men, too.”
“Maybe you should bring up the commandant of Camp Douglas up on charges, as well.”
“Turns out that possibility is being considered.”
There was a small quiver in Longstreet’s voice. “Am I under consideration?”
“No hanging. There’s a … consensus that those academy graduates who left the US forces to join the Confederacy deserve prison time.”
“Hell of a thing to be going back on your word you gave at Appomattox.”
“I didn’t know there were people hunting for me and my president when I gave that word. It would have been neighborly for Gen. Lee to have given me fair warning about it at the time.”
“I knew nothing about it.”
“And that’s why you’re not getting hung,” Grant shot back. “Those bastards came within an inch of murdering my wife! Every other night I have visions of her getting shot in the chest and having to explain to my children why their mother can’t be with them. Pete, nothing ever shook me like this, not Mexico, not Tennessee, Mississippi, or Virginia. Nothing.”
There was a long silence between them. “How long for me?”
“No more than five years, though even now the president is looking to reduce sentences and I’m putting in a word for you. Voting rights restored after your release, but you’ll be prevented from holding elected office. The enlisted men, the non-commissioned officers, they’ll be left alone. But there has to be a price paid for going against your oath.”
Longstreet gazed out through the window, a blank expression on his face. “Any other surprises?
“The old man’s pushing through a land reform act, breaking up the big plantations, trying to get some of the land to the former slaves.”
“How in the hell is he going to get support for that?” Longstreet scoffed.
“He’s planning on including the white sharecroppers in on the deal, at least a good portion of them,” Grant responded.
Longstreet had a good laugh at that. “Probably a good thing I never got into the plantation business, then.”
“You want to see if I can get you and myself some fresh coffee, Pete?”
“Wouldn’t mind it.”
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