They Took Our President

By Norman D. Schmidt

ON JANUARY 10, 1865 JOHN WILKES BOOTH, DAVID HEROLD, AND LEWIS POWELL KIDNAPPED PRESIDENT LINCOLN AS HE WALKED FROM THE NEARBY WAR DEPARTMENT OR TELEGRAPH OFFICE TO THE WHITE HOUSE. SEVERAL WEEKS EARLIER BOOTH HAD A NEARBY CARPENTER BUILD TWO LOW SLUNG WAGONS FOR TRANSPORTING THE PRESIDENT TO THE RICHMOND AREA. AFTER MANY MONTHS OF PLANNING IT WAS NOW HAPPENING. THE UPSTAIRS BEDROOM WINDOWS WERE BOARDED OVER. WHEN LINCOLN WOULD GO ON A WALK AROUND THE HOME OR WOULD CUT FIREWOOD, DAVY HEROLD WITH HIS GUN WOULD ALWAYS BE NEARBY. IN MID-FEBRUARY A NEIGHBOR CAME OVER TO BORROW SOMETHING AND WAS INTRODUCED TO LINCOLN AS BEING SOMEBODY ELSE.THE NEIGHBOR ALSO SAW THE UPSTAIRS BEDROOM BOARDED OVER. THE NEXT DAY THE NEIGHBOR TRAVELLED TO THE NEARBY BATTLE BEING FOUGHT AND MET WITH GENERAL SHERIDAN. WASHINGTON QUICKLY MADE PLANS TO RESCUE LINCOLN WHICH THEY DID BUT NOT BEFORE HEROLD AND BOOTH ESCAPED TO THE NEARBY BARN. BOOTH WAS KILLED. LINCOLN HAD ABOUT TWO WEEKS TO WRITE HIS INAUGURAL ADDRESS WHICH HE GAVE.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Dec 6, 2020
• ISBN: 9781728342153

Norman D. Schmidt

I GREW UP ON A FARM NEAR LINCOLN, ILLINOIS. IN 1853 ABRAHAM LINCOLN CHRISTENED THE TOWN WITH THE JUICE OF A WATERMELON. THEN I WENT TO THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS AND AFTER GRADUATING WENT TO A SUBURB NORTH OF CHICAGO AND TAUGHT BIOLOGY FOR THREE YEARS. I ALSO PLAYED A LOT OF BASKETBALL THERE. I WENT TO GRADUATE SCHOOL OBTAINING A MASTERS IN BIOLOGY BUT I NEVER USED IT AS I WAS IN SALES THE REST OF MY LIFE. ONE SALES JOB WHICH I ENJOYED WAS SELLING CREMATORIES ALL OVER NORTH AMERICA AND I WAS ON PROBABLY 1,500-1,600 FLIGHTS. AFTER MY DIVORCE I MET A LOVELY WOMAN NAMED JUDI . WE HAVE BEEN MARRIED FOR 36 YEARS. BETWEEN US WE HAVE SIX CHILDREN AND 9 GRANDCHILDREN. WE ENJOY RETIREMENT AND HAVE TRAVELLED QUITE A BIT AND WE HAVE BEEN TO EUROPE SEVERAL TIMES. I ENJOY PAINTING IN ACRYLICS AND READING HISTORICAL BOOKS, I HAVE BEEN GIVING TALKS ON ABRAHAM LINCOLN FOR OVER 30 YEARS AND HAVE OVER 300 BOOKS ON LINCOLN. I’M A HAPPY CAMPER!

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© 2020 Norman D. Schmidt. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or

transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, names, incidents, organizations, and dialogue

in this novel are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

Published by AuthorHouse  10/26/2020

ISBN: 978-1-7283-4216-0 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-7283-4214-6 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-7283-4215-3 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2020921340

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expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the

views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

CONTENTS

Preface

Chapter 1    The Fourth Year Of Lincoln’s Presidency

Chapter 2    The Kidnapping

Chapter 3    The Other Conspirators’ Activities

Chapter 4    Captivity

Chapter 5    Rescuing Lincoln

Chapter 6    Capture Of The Remaining Conspirators

Chapter 7    Lincoln’s Return To The White House

Chapter 8    Inauguration

About The Author

PREFACE

When I was in early grade school, I read my first book on Abraham Lincoln. I had visited all the Lincoln sites in Springfield, Illinois, many times before I was in high school as I lived nearby in Lincoln. I was hooked on the life of our sixteenth president. Since then, I have been to all the sites associated with Lincoln in Kentucky, southern Indiana, eastern Illinois, and finally central Illinois.

I grew up on a farm about thirty miles north of Springfield near a town called Lincoln. In fact, in 1853, Abraham Lincoln was the lawyer for some of the developers of the area, and they were discussing what to name the town. They suggested Lincoln. Lincoln retorted that he’d never known anyone named Lincoln who had amounted to anything. The developers couldn’t find any water to christen the site, but they did find a watermelon. They cut it, and thus they christened the town Lincoln with the juice of a watermelon. There are now twenty-four cities in the United States named Lincoln.

In the city of Lincoln, Illinois, there are several historical sites, for example, a reproduction of the Postville Courthouse, which was on the Eighth Circuit (the original is in Dearborn, Michigan, near Detroit). A historical plaque on the south side of the square indicates that Lincoln owned the site when he was assassinated. One block west is another historical plaque indicating that on the second floor was a saloon, where a plot was hatched to take Lincoln’s body from Springfield, bury it in the sand dunes along Lake Michigan, and use it as ransom to get the plotters’ counterfeiter friend out of prison.

After high school, I attended Lincoln Junior College in Lincoln, which was called Lincoln University in Lincoln’s time. He was supposed to dedicate it in May of 1865, but unfortunately he was assassinated.

Over the years I have met many wonderful scholars on Lincoln who have inspired me, and for that I am grateful.

I am also grateful for my best friend and wife for tolerating my many hours in front of the computer screen. I thank you, Judi.

CHAPTER 1

THE FOURTH YEAR OF

LINCOLN’S PRESIDENCY

T HE SUMMER OF 1864 SEEMED MUCH like the two previous years. There were enormous casualties on both sides, either dead or wounded. Many families were impacted with either a wounded loved one or, worse, a death. If it wasn’t a family member, then it was a neighbor. Thousands were dying, but that’s the way wars go. The horrors of war! Would it ever end?

Throughout the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln’s interest in new technology played a significant role in bringing about Union victories on the battlefield. Lincoln worked closely with the innovative Captain John Dahlgren, chief of ordinance at the Washington Navy Yard. Inventions of all kinds were coming into Washington frequently. The president was notified of some and saw many of them, especially if they were for military use. Robert Bruce, an authority on Lincoln’s interest in weapons, stated that during the Civil War, The nearest thing to a research and developmental agency was the president himself. There is strong evidence to suggest that without Lincoln’s personal intervention, the use of ironclad gunboats in the river campaigns might not have occurred.

There was the hot-air balloon, from which one could see for miles. How great to see the enemy in the distance from an elevated point and be able to tell what he was doing. What an advantage that was.

There was the telegraph, which really opened up communications. Prior to that, the horse and its rider were the quickest way to convey a message between two points.

Occasionally in the daytime, but generally at night, around 9:00 or 9:30, the president would walk to the nearby telegraph office at the War Department to see the latest dispatches from the front and also learn of what was going on in the field of battle. From there, he was able to communicate with his generals readily. He would return an hour or two later to the White House. The telegraph was one of the greatest inventions up to that time.

Lincoln enjoyed the banter with the operators, talking with them, telling jokes, and just relaxing. They were ordinary young men, not politicians. There was one particular young man Mr. Lincoln became fond of: Thomas Eckert from Ohio. Early in the war Eckert was called to take charge of the military telegraph office of General McClellan and had the title of captain and assistant quartermaster. In September of 1862, he was called to Washington to establish the military headquarters in the War Department. From that time on, he was on intimate terms with the president and Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. In 1864, he was appointed lieutenant colonel and later brigadier general.

Lincoln would always walk alone on this short jaunt from the War Department to the White House. At this late hour, Mrs. Lincoln did not wait up for her husband’s return. They had separate bedrooms next to each other. Thus, he would not wake her.

In 1863–1864, the Confederates had suffered a very hard winter with a shortage of rations. Furthermore, their manpower was much less than that of the Union forces. The Confederates abolished conscription and required soldiers whose three-year enlistments were about to expire to remain in the army. The age range of soldiers was also expanded from seventeen to fifty. Despite these efforts, the numbers of Confederates was about half the number of Yankees and thus they were woefully undermanned. In mid-April, General Ulysses S. Grant ordered the exchange of prisoners halted.

The Union also had their problems during this time. They had to detach many divisions as occupation forces to police about a hundred thousand square miles of conquered territory to guard their supply routes against cavalry and guerrilla raids. In General William Tecumseh Sherman’s raid on Atlanta in 1864, the number of men protecting the rail communications back to Louisville nearly equaled the number of frontline soldiers engaged against the enemy.

A Massachusetts officer reported that 40 of the 146 substitutes, bounty jumpers, thieves, cutthroats, and roughs who had been assigned to his regiment disappeared the first night after they arrived. A Pennsylvania officer wrote that the gamblers, thieves, and pickpockets would have disgraced the regiment beyond all recovery had they remained, but thanks to a kind providence, they kept deserting, a dozen at a time, until they were nearly all gone.

Grant felt that out of five who reported as having enlisted, we don’t get more than one effective soldier.

In Richmond, a War Department official believed that if we can only subsist until the Northern election, giving an opportunity for the Democrats to elect a president, we may have peace.

If Southern armies could hold out until the election, war-weariness in the North might cause the Northern voters to elect a Peace Democrat who would negotiate with the Confederacy.

General Robert E. Lee stated, If victorious, we have everything to hope for in the future. If defeated, nothing will be left for us to live for.

How much lower could a Southern master’s pride sink than when as a prisoner, his former slave, now a Northern soldier, called out, Hello, massa. Du yew vant the top or buttum? Another Southern master stated, I was guarded by Negro soldiers, which was rather galling to my Southern pride.

One newspaper reported the killed and wounded of the South as follows:

It takes but small space in the columns of our paper to report the killed and wounded from our country, but oh, what long household stories and biographies are every one of these familiar names, as we read anxiously, never, never to forget. Wounded and killed, some eye reads the name to whom it is as dear as life, and some heart is stricken or broken with the blow made by that name among the list. It’s our Henry, or our John, our William, or our Charles, that lies dead on the battlefield, or with his poor broken limbs in our hospital. As for the eyes that read: alas for the desolate hearts that, innocent of any crime, suffer the stroke that should fall on the demons who tramp unoffending fathers, husbands, and sons into dust. Alas for them! They unjustly feel the horrors of this inhuman and brutal war. He is my pretty boy, whom Ihom sung to sleep so many times in my arms, says the poor mother, bowing her head in anguish that words cannot utter. He was my brave noble husband, the father of my little orphan child, sobs the stricken wife. He was my own darling brother, whom I loved so much, my own darling brother, murmurs the sister, amid her tears. And so the terrible stroke falls on homes, sad and gloomy homes throughout the land! Every name in the list is a lightning stroke to some fond heart, and it breaks like thunder over some home, and then there falls a long dark shadow upon the future of an innocent life.

One day two women came to see the president about a problem they had, hoping he would intercede for them. Well, ladies, what can I do for you? After he’d given them a favorable response, the younger of the two women kneeled in thanks, and the president responded, "Get up. Don’t kneel to me, but thank God and go."

Goodbye, Mr. Lincoln. I shall probably never see you again till we meet in heaven. He took her right hand in both of his and, escorting the two of them to the door, said, I am afraid with all my troubles, I shall never get to the resting place you speak of, but if I do, I am sure I will find you. Goodbye.

Joshua Speed, the attorney general and Mr. Lincoln’s friend of many years from Springfield, was present when the women were with Mr. Lincoln. Speed remarked, Lincoln, with my knowledge of your nervous sensibility, it is a wonder that such scenes as this don’t kill you.

Pondering the statement a moment, Mr. Lincoln said, "Yes, you are right to a certain degree. I ought not to undergo what I so often do. I am very unwell now; my feet and hands of late seem to always