Chasing Lincoln’s Killer: Chapter 9 Summary & Analysis

In the woods, Booth and Herold looked like the dirty, hunted fugitives that they were. They had planned to travel light and move quickly, not to camp out for an extended period in the words. After crossing the river, Booth had planned to charm people into sheltering him in their Virginia households—but this would be dependent on his good looks and fine clothing, and these assets were slipping away with each day passed in the woods.

Booth was also shocked and disappointed by the coverage of the assassination in the newspapers that Jones brought him on his third visit to the thicket. He was roundly condemned for killing the president. Worse, whereas Lincoln had been a controversial president while he was alive, in death he was hailed as a martyr. Booth was also horrified by the details he read about Powell’s savage attack on the members of the Seward family.

Booth found no sign of the letter he had entrusted to a friend to be delivered to the newspapers. He believed that the newspapers were suppressing this letter, but, in fact, his friend had feared being implicated in Booth’s crime and had burned the letter instead of giving it to the papers. Booth opened a small notebook and began to write his own personal account of why and how he had killed Lincoln.

On Tuesday, April 18, the manhunters finally followed up on the tip they had received from George Mudd. George Mudd had already told them all he knew, so the manhunters took him with them to see Samuel Mudd. At the farm, the soldiers interrogated Mudd and his wife. Mudd gave vague answers, saying he had not known the identity of the man with the broken leg. He then told the manhunters that the strangers had gone west, sending them in a wrong direction. Although the investigator could not yet prove it, he suspected Mudd was guilty of something and planned to arrest him later.

In Washington, the presidential funeral procession created a solemn spectacle. Every building on Pennsylvania Avenue was wrapped in black crepe, and thousands came to see the president’s open casket in the Capitol dome. At day’s end, Lincoln’s remains were loaded onto a special train bound for his hometown of Springfield.

On April 20, 1865, detectives arrived at the house of George Atzerodt’s cousin Hartmann Richter. Atzerodt should have realized that his room at the Kirkwood would have been searched and his connection to Booth uncovered. Instead he had spent time at his cousin’s house in Maryland, unaware that he was in danger of being arrested. Richter at first told the detectives that Atzerodt was not there, but when they said they would search the house, he confessed that his cousin was upstairs. Atzerodt made a full confession. He gave details about the kidnapping plot and the conspirators’ meeting on April 14. He also described Mary Surratt and Samuel Mudd’s involvement in the scheme.

With two of the four central conspirators in captivity, Stanton issued a proclamation. He would pay $100,000 for Lincoln’s killers: Booth, Herold, and John Surratt. Posters with the men’s photographs and the amount of reward money went up across the country.