John Wilkes Booth (May 10, 1838 – April 26, 1865) is a famous American stage actor who assassinates President Abraham Lincoln at Ford's Theatre, in Washington, D.C., on April 14, 1865.
Booth is a member of the prominent 19th century Booth theatrical family from Maryland and, by the 1860s, is a well-known actor.
He is also a Confederate sympathizer vehement in his denunciation of the Lincoln Administration and is outraged by the South's defeat in the American Civil War.
Booth and a group of co-conspirators had originally plotted to kidnap Lincoln, but later planned to kill him, Vice President Andrew Johnson, and Secretary of State William Seward in a bid to help the Confederacy's cause.
Although Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia had surrendered four days earlier, Booth believes the war is not yet over because Confederate General Joseph E. Johnston's army is still fighting the Union Army.
Of the conspirators, only Booth is completely successful in carrying out his respective part of the plot.
After Booth shoots him once in the back of the head, Lincoln dies the next morning.
Seward is severely wounded but recovers.
Vice-President Johnson is never attacked and is therefore unharmed.
Following the assassination, Booth flees on horseback to southern Maryland, eventually making his way to a farm in rural northern Virginia 12 days later, where he is tracked down.
Booth's companion gives himself up, but Booth refuses and is shot by a Union soldier after the barn in which he is hiding is set ablaze.
Eight other conspirators or suspects are tried and convicted, and four are hanged shortly thereafter.
Over the years, various authors have suggested that Booth had escaped his pursuers and subsequently died many years later under a pseudonym.
