Early Years
Born in Maryland in 1838, his parents, Junius Brutus Booth and Mary Ann Holmes, were British Roman Catholics who immigrated in 1821. They were a family of actors and John Wilkes Booth was named after the British radical, John Wilkes, who was claimed to be a distant relative. Oddly, there was a family precedent for naming male children after statesmen and assassins! Junius Booth was both a respected actor and a drunken eccentric, and John Wilkes Booth's brother, Edwin Booth, was considered the most influential Shakespearean actor of his day.
John Wilkes Booth had a happy childhood and received an education in the classics and particularly, Shakespeare. When he was 13, John Wilkes Booth attended a military academy near Baltimore and met Samuel Arnold and Michael O' Laughlen, two men who would become his co-conspirators. In 1858, John Wilkes Booth joined the Richmond Theater and his acting career flourished. He performed as JW Booth, so the public would separate his acting abilities from those of his family.
Perry Cuskey"> The Civil War
John Wilkes Booth's family was divided in their loyalties and although a northerner by birth, his sympathies lay with the South and slavery and against what he saw as northern abolitionism. John Wilkes Booth considered Lincoln's declaration of martial law throughout Maryland as an abuse of executive power and his hatred for Lincoln festered like an open wound throughout the war years. By 1864, John Wilkes Booth began devising a plan to kidnap President Lincoln and exchange him for Confederate soldiers held captive in Union prisons. When this attempt was foiled, kidnap changed to assassination, not only of Lincoln but also of Secretary of State, William Seward, and Vice President Andrew Johnson.
Assassination, Escape and Death
On April 14, 1865, a little past ten PM, John Wilkes Booth, armed with a 44 caliber Derringer, entered the presidential box at Ford's Theater and shot Abraham Lincoln in the head. Leaping to the stage below, his spur became entangled in the American flag draping the balcony, and John Wilkes Booth broke his leg. His accomplice, Davy Herold, assisted him to the home of Dr. Samuel Mudd, who set and spllnted the fractured leg. Pursued by Union cavalry, the two men made their way to a farm in Caroline County, Virginia. On the morning of April 26, 1865, the soldiers found them. John Wilkes Booth refused to surrender and they set fire to the barn, Sergeant Boston Corbett shooting John Wilkes Booth against orders.
