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I escaped with John Wilkes Booth - a bit of
an exaggeration since he escaped from Washington DC - after assassinating
President Lincoln - in 1865 and I did it in 2006, along with my son Rick and
grandson Eric, as we took the "John Wilkes Booth Escape Route Tour"
sponsored by the Surratt Society in Clinton, Maryland. Booth escaped on a
rented horse - we escaped on a leased Greyhound.
This report on our Booth escape will only
cover a few highlights of the 12 hour tour we took but I hope it will give you
a sense of what it was like - back then and now on Booth's erratic route.
Obviously much has changed along his fateful
journey from Ford's Theater to Garret's farm over 12 days, however much
remains almost the same especially many of the places he stopped or hid out as
he desperately sought some refuge, trying to reach friendly soil and people.
While our tour began when we got on the bus at the Surratt House early one
Saturday morning, our escape didn't begin until we had first toured Ford's
Theater and the Peterson House across from it where Lincoln died on the
morning after Booth's bullet entered his brain.
Ride with me now as we join Booth, just
minutes after he "heroically" put a derringer behind the left ear of
President Lincoln and pulled its trigger, as he runs out the back door of
Ford's about 10:20 that April 14th night taking the reins of his horse and
riding down Baptist Alley.
After remounting our bus we looked down
Baptist Alley and like Booth proceeded down F St. - with a brief side trip to
what was the Surratt Boarding House at 614 H Street and is now a Chinese
Restaurant. (Seward's attempted assassin, Lewis Powell (Paine) was arrested at
the boarding house). It's believed that
 from F St. Booth cut across Judiciary
Square to Pennsylvania Ave. and then on to the Naval Yard Bridge at the foot
of 11th St. Booth was soon followed by henchman Davy Herold. (Herold, standing
guard outside Seward's house left the scene when bloody chaos erupted inside.)
Assigned Andrew Johnson assassin, George Atzerod, having given up his mission
left DC the next day for his cousin's house where he was arrested on April
20th.)
Booth, stopped by a guard at the bridge, gave
his real name and although after hours was permitted to cross. Herold was also
stopped - he gave his name as "Smith" and was also allowed to cross.
The only one chasing them at this point was John Fletcher, who rented the
horse to Herold. He saw Herold and followed him to get his horse back. He gave
up his pursuit at the bridge. The bridge we cross by bus is not the old one
but crosses almost exactly where the old one did.
After crossing, Booth and Herold still apart
ride though the village of Uniontown (now Anacostia) Maryland turning up
Harrison St. (now Good Hope Road) towards and between Forts Wagner and Baker
finally coming together at their prearranged spot on Soper's Hill. (Exact
location unknown today). From there they rode to Surrattsville (now Clinton)
where they stopped at the Surratt House/Tavern - 10 miles from DC. It was
here, to her tenant, John Lloyd, that Mary Surratt delivered Booth's field
glasses and carbines that afternoon with the instructions, "…have the
shooting irons ready. There will be men here tonight to call for them."
(Actions and words that would later lead to her execution.)
Like Booth, we also stop at the Surratt
Home/Tavern. It is beautifully maintained and well worth a visit on its own
but special on this tour. One of its rooms served as the local Post Office and
tavern. The tour of the home includes the upstairs space where the
"shooting irons" were hidden in the walls.
Booth/Herold arrived at the tavern about
midnight with Herold saying to Lloyd, "Make haste and get those
things." Lloyd knew what things they meant. The fugitives took the field
glasses, ammunition, one carbine
 and a few swigs of whiskey and left after
Booth told Lloyd, "I am pretty sure we have assassinated Lincoln and
secretary Seward." (Booth declined a carbine saying his leg was broken.)
Their immediate route after this stop is not known for sure - either to
Horsehead and Gallant or further south towards Beantown - both routes would
have taken them to their next stop at the home of Dr. Samuel Mudd.
Our tour finds the Mudd house, still in its
rural setting, sitting on a gentle hill looking much as it must have so long
ago. It doesn't take much imagination to picture Booth/Herold riding up to the
door asking for help. The house itself is one of the best maintained historic
homes I've ever been in - we're led through its pristine furnished rooms by a
well informed guide. Among other things, the couch Booth first sat on when
Mudd examined his leg and the bed he slept are still there. I manage to buy a
souvenir from a great granddaughter of Dr. Mudd before we leave for a brief
side trip to St. Mary's Church. It was here that Booth was first introduced to
Mudd and it's here that Dr. Mudd is buried. (Rick, Eric and I return here the
next morning for Sunday Mass.)
Dr. Mudd treated Booth's broken left fibula,
cutting off his boot to do so. The boot was later found by the Cavalry chasing
Booth. He told Mudd it was broken when his horse fell on him - later he wrote
in his diary that he broke it jumping to the stage. Mudd's treatment of Booth
- who he knew was a wanted man - and his attempts to arrange transportation
for him - while never turning him in - as well as his past association with
Booth's conspiracy, will later earn him a prison term.
 I don't think that Mudd had anything to do
with the assassination. It becomes very clear as we follow Booth's frantic
escape that he had no preconceived plan for his escape other than picking up
weapons at the Surratt House and getting to Virginia. - perhaps confirming
that it was a sudden decision to assassinate Lincoln. While he may have had
help during his escape from people that would have helped him in getting
Lincoln to Richmond if kidnapped none of these people were expecting him after
the assassination. He was a ticking bomb that no one wanted to spend much time
with.
Our bus follows the assassins' trail as they headed toward the home of William
Buttles, a Confederate agent southwest of Bryantown. However they got lost
along the way and ended up at the home of Oswell Swann, a black tobacco
farmer. After first asking him to take them to Buttles house, they change
their minds and ask to be taken to the home of Samuel Cox. Swann took them
south by way of Dentsville and then across the Zekiah Swamp to the Cox
plantation call Rich Hill near the present town of Alton. Swann later reported
that Booth/Herold were permitted to enter the Cox home but had to leave within
four hours with one of them complaining, "I thought Cox was a man of
southern feeling." (They then paid Swann $12 for his services.)
We then visited the pine thicket area outside
Alton where Booth/Herold hid out after leaving Rich Hill. While Cox may not
have wanted them in his home, he did provide them with help sending food,
newspapers (Booth learns he's not a hero) and other information about the
search. He also arranged for another Confederate agent, Thomas Jones, to help
get them across the Potomac into Virginia. Jones came for the fugitives on the
night of the 20th taking them to his home, Huckleberry. Their horses had been
abandoned (some say shot and sunk in the swamp) so as not to give their
hideout away so booth rode Jones' horse while he and Herold walked.) After
getting food for them from his home Jones took them to an inlet and a small
boat - Booth paid Jones $18 for the boat (20 years later Jones will tell his
story in a book.)
 We stopped to visit this area - now behind a
religious retreat house. From its hill we could see the small inlet and
Virginia two miles away across the Potomac River. We had to speak softly
because of those praying and meditating on the retreat grounds - as softly as
Booth and his cohorts must have spoken that night to avoid detection. It was
easier to see and understand from our vantage point how Booth/Herold could
have headed for Virginia and ended up back in Maryland - as they did that
night.
Booth/Herold made it across on their second
attempt the night of April 22nd arriving in Virginia where they are helped
first by John Hughes with food and then by Confederate agent, Thomas Harbin.
He arranges with another man to get them horses and to take to Cleydael, the
summer home of Richard Stuart who was recommended to them by Dr. Mudd. Our bus
makes a stop here. Dr. Hughes, a wealthy man and Confederate supporter, knew
of the assassination and wanted nothing to do with Booth/Herold but he did
give them some food and directed them to the cabin of a William Lucas, a free
black. Under duress, Lucas agreed to have his son, Charles, take Booth/Herold
by wagon to the Port Conway ferry for $20 the following morning - April 24th.
 At Port Conway, Booth/Herold encounter three
Confederate soldiers to whom, after some discussion, they give their real
names. The soldiers agree to help them cross the Rappahannock River to Port
Royal - a colonial port town dating back to the Revolutionary War as we see
when we visit there on out tour. Here they were taken to the Peyton House, the
home of Randolph Peyton and his two sisters, Sarah and Lizzie. Randolph is not
at home and Sarah refuses to take them in without her brother there. One of
the soldiers then decides to take them down the road towards Bowling Green. He
believes that Richard Garrett will put them up on his farm along the way.
The final stop on our tour is what was once
the Garrett farm property. The Garrett house was left to rot in the 1920s and
its last remnants removed just before WWII. The land on which the farm house
stood is now between a divided highway (301) but its former location is well
marked. Booth gave his name as James W. Boyd to Garret and was taken in for
the night (Herold would leave for the night for some partying with the
soldiers in Bowling Green). The following night Booth /Herold were asked to
sleep in the barn - their last stop. It was here the pursuing cavalry found
them (another story - well told in "The Manhunt") leading to the
surrender of Herold and the shooting of Booth after the barn was set ablaze
the morning of April 26.
As we leave it's easy to picture ghosts:
Booth dying (Sic semper assassinus) paralyzed on the front porch of the
Garrett house; Herold tied to a tree in the front yard with tired men in blue
standing by. We return the Surratt House ending a wonderful historic day - one
of my best experiences of many as a student of the Civil War.
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