Could John Wilkes Booth Have Committed Suicide at Garrett’s Farm? by William Lee Richter and Joseph E. “Rick” Smith III.
It is a familiar story told repeatedly by historians. Early on the morning of April 26, 1865, noted actor John Wilkes Booth, the man who assassinated President Abraham Lincoln, was shot while in a blazing tobacco barn on the farm of Richard Garrett near Port Royal, Virginia. Rescued from the fire by the Union cavalrymen who had pursued him, Booth was removed to the Garrett’s front porch where he died just after dawn, paralyzed below the neck, his nerves severed by the bullet that had passed through his cervical spine, asphyxiated by the fluids that his failing heart could no longer remove from his lungs. [1]
Even before Booth died, the question arose as to who killed him. History tells us it was Sergeant Boston [born Thomas H.] Corbett from Company L of the 16th New York Volunteer Cavalry. [2] A self-castrated religious mystic, Corbett came forward (“Who fired that shot?”) and told his commanding officer and the two civilian detectives with him, that he fired contrary to orders to take Booth alive, because he believed that Booth was about to shoot one of them. As Corbett succinctly put it: “Providence directed my hand.”
But did He? Or did the Almighty direct some other “hand” to commit the deed? Evidently Lt. Byron Baker and Lt. Col. Everton Conger, the two detectives from Col. Lafayette C. Baker’s National Detective Police leading the cavalry patrol, thought so. Each accused the other of shooting Booth, even though they could not see each other when the shot was fired. Conger then concluded that Booth might have shot himself. Baker demurred and opined that the man who shot Booth ought to go back to the District under arrest for violating orders. Despite Corbett’s confession as to being the shooter, he was not arrested. Indeed, he became a hero. [3]
But the actual account is not as simple as modern commentators would like us to believe. As pointed out by historian H. Donald Winkler, there are at least four scenarios that could have taken place at the Garrett’s tobacco barn. [4] First, Booth shot himself. No one really examined Booth’s weapons to see if one of the revolvers had been fired, even though Baker had to twist one revolver from the fallen actor’s hand. Booth had told Willie Jett, one of the Confederate soldiers who brought him to Garrett’s, that he would not be taken alive to be marched through Washington like some Roman captive from centuries before. [5]
Others who are against this theory point out that Booth had a carbine in his right hand and a crutch under his left arm. But Col. Conger said that Booth had thrown down the crutch and had the carbine in both hands. The only weapon inspected after the fight was the carbine, which was done at Secretary Stanton’s bidding. It was found to have a cartridge jammed in its breech. [6] Hence Booth’s desperate need for a properly functioning weapon casts doubt on Private Emory Paraday’s statement that the actor was too loaded down with extraneous items in his hands to have committed suicide. [7]
Second, some thought that Conger was the one who shot Booth under orders from Union Secretary of War Edwin McMasters Stanton. He and Baker argued the point at the door when Conger returned from starting the fire that eventually gutted the barn. But how could Conger have shot an upright Booth in such a manner as to cause the bullet to travel downward through the neck, unless Booth was bent over? [8] The same problem faces us in the third scenario, that Corbett shot Booth. Again, to achieve the proper trajectory, Booth had to be bent over sideways from the waist. He was an athlete, not a contortionist.
There is also another problem with the theory that Corbett made the shot. Researcher Col. Julian E. Raymond, a combat veteran of World War II, maintains that Corbett and the other troopers were armed with carbines, not pistols. Booth was wounded by a ball fired from a .44 caliber handgun as opposed to the standard .52 caliber carbine round. [9]
Fourth, it is possible that someone completely unrelated to the pursuing Federals shot Booth. Winkler believes that Booth was headed toward Milford Station to join up with Col. John S. Mosby’s command. The three Confederate soldiers who had guided him from Port Royal to Garrett’s farm were members of Mosby’s command. Another Confederate soldier home from the war, Enoch Mason, had ridden the ferry across the Rappahannock with Booth, his companion David E. Herold, and the three Confederate cavalrymen. Mason had immediately galloped out of Port Royal southward upon landing. The suspicion is that he went to inform Mosby of Booth’s presence.
Several local boys home from the war were present at dinner at Garrett’s the day before Booth was shot. If they were informed of the presence of Union troops on the road past Garrett’s, it may have been decided that Booth had to be killed to prevent him from talking and telling all he knew of the plots against Lincoln, be they abduction or assassination. [10]
The most recent approach as regards who shot Booth is an article by Blaine V. Houmes and Steven G. Miller, which asserts that Booth committed “suicide by cop.” Not an unheard of concept nowadays, and becoming more popular or perhaps more notable, theirs is the notion that a malefactor unable to commit his own suicide forces the police to shoot by threatening them with a weapon. In Booth’s case, if this is so, he becomes one of the first to be so categorized. One does have some misgivings that, given the weapons available in 1865, Booth was taking a great chance at being horribly wounded, which is exactly what happened, rather than instantly killed. [11]
Houmes and Miller are probably correct in theorizing that Booth wanted to commit suicide by cop. Historian James L. Swanson related how Booth dared the Yankees to back off 100 yards and form a skirmish line and that he would come out of the barn and take them all on.
Swanson correctly understands the Booth mind-set when he compares this to a Shakespearean drama or perhaps a knight jousting at a medieval tournament, throwing down the gauntlet to any who would accept his challenge, romanticism versus realism. Booth later gallantly halved the distance and offered to do combat at fifty yards. But the Union officers were not about to allow Booth the chance to kill or wound any of their men. Besides, they wanted Booth alive. Secretary of War Stanton had so willed it. In Booth’s mind the Union men had no pride, realism versus romanticism. [12]
This stance of the cavalry patrol commanders put Booth in a quandary. He had to surrender and face arrest and an eventual hanging for killing Lincoln. Or he could end the whole thing immediately by committing suicide. It was a choice Booth addressed in a typically Southern fashion—humiliation or honor. These things were important in the Old South—or to medieval England and its chronicler, the playwright William Shakespeare, whom Booth and his neighbors revered. [13]
In our mind, Booth did that which had to be done. It was already scripted; he had penned it in his diary: “Who can read his fate? God's will be done. I have too great a soul to die like a criminal. Oh, may He, may He spare me that, and let me die bravely." [14] Booth simply decided to blow his brains out. But in throwing down his carbine and crutches and drawing his revolver, he underestimated the weakness of his broken leg and the weight of the weapon’s barrel. Instead of shooting himself behind the ear, he stepped forward, wincing in pain and off balance, the barrel sliding down his neck as he fired, mortally wounding himself.
Notes:
1. Francis Wilson, John Wilkes Booth: Fact and Fiction of Lincoln’s Assassination (Houghton Mifflin Co., 1929), 180-82; Michael W. Kaufman, American Brutus: John Wilkes Booth and the Lincoln Conspiracies (Random House, 2004), 321-23; Edward Steers, Jr., Blood on the Moon: The Assassination of Abraham Lincoln (University of Kentucky Press, 2001), 203; James L. Swanson, Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln’s Killer (HarperCollins, 2006), 334-35, 339-40; & Bill O’Reilly, Killing Lincoln: The Shocking Assassination that Changed America Forever (Henry Holt and Co., 2011), 275-76 & Rob Wick, “Why Did Everton Conger Burn Down Richard Garrett’s Tobacco Barn?” Surratt Courier, 33 (May 2008), 6-7.
2. On Boston Corbett, see Richard F. Snow, "Boston Corbett," American Heritage, 30 (June-July 1980), 48-49; and Laurie Verge, "The Killer of John Wilkes Booth," in Michael W. Kauffman (ed.), In Pursuit of . . . : Continuing Research in the Field of the Lincoln Assassination (The Surratt Society, 1990), 111-12. Corbett's own intriguing tale is in Steven G. Miller (ed.), "Boston Corbett's Long-Forgotten Story of Wilkes Booth's Death," Surratt Courier, 26 (May 2001), 5-7; ibid., 26 (June 2001), 4-6.
3. U.S., 40th Cong., 1st Sess., 1867, House Reports, No. 7/2, “Impeachment: Testimony before the Judiciary Committee of the House of Representatives in the Investigation of the Charges against Andrew Johnson,” 323-33, 479-90. A good summary of the “Impeachment Testimony” as regards the shooting of Booth and the pursuers’ response is William L Reuter, The King Can Do No Wrong (Pageant Press, 1958), 43-51. One of the best accounts, unfortunately unpublished, is Jeanine Clarke Dodels, "The Last Days of John Wilkes Booth," 15-28.
The number of sources commenting on the death of Booth includes but is not limited to Jacob Mogelever, Death to Traitors: The Story of General Lafayette C. Baker, Lincoln's Forgotten Secret Service Chief (Doubleday & Company, 1960), 357-60; Roy Z. Chamlee, Jr., Lincoln's Assassins: A Complete Account of their Capture, Trial, and Punishment (McFarland & Company Inc., Publishers, 1990), 155-57; Theodore Roscoe, Web of Conspiracy (Prentice-Hall, 1959), 387-98; Osborn H. Oldroyd, Assassination of Abraham Lincoln: Flight, Pursuit, Capture, and Punishment of the Conspirators (O. H. Oldroyd, 1901), 70-78; Laughlin, Clara E. Death of Lincoln: The Story of Booth's Plot, His Deed and the Penalty (Doubleday, Page & Co., 1909), Death of Lincoln, 147-53; George A. Townsend, Life, Crime, and Death of John Wilkes Booth, 32-39; Michael W. Kauffman, “Booth's Escape Route: Lincoln's Assassin on the Run,” Blue and Gray Magazine, 7 (June 1990)[Special Issue], 49-50; David Rankin Barbee, "Lincoln and Booth" (Unpublished ms. in the David Rankin Barbee papers, Georgetown University), 959-84, passim, DRB papers, GU.
See also, Lt. L. B. Baker's testimony, Trial of John H. Surratt, in the Criminal Court for the District of Columbia (2 vols., Washington: Government Printing Office, 1867), I, 315-23; Lt. E. Doherty's "Official Report on the Capture of John Wilkes Booth," Surratt Courier, 25 (May 2000), 3-7; L. B. Baker, "An Eyewitness Account of the Death and Burial of J. Wilkes Booth," 425-46; Statement of Miss Holloway, in Francis Wilson, John Wilkes Booth: Fact and Fiction of Lincoln's Assassination (Houghton Mifflin, 1929), 171-93, 208-22; Otto Eisenschiml, "Death Visits Garrett's Farm," Why Was Lincoln Murdered? (New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1937), 153-61; Steven G. Miller (ed.), "A Trooper's Account of the Death of Booth," Surratt Courier, 20 (May 1995), 5-9; Betsy Fleet (ed.), "A Chapter of Unwritten History: Richard Baynham Garrett's Account," Virginia Magazine of History and Biography, 71 (October 1963), 388-407, more easily accessed in Richard Baynham Garrett, "End of a Manhunt," American Heritage, 17 (June 1966), 40-43, 105.
Rick Stelnick - Rick Stelnick is a superannuated political scientist, crime historian and historical detective.
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