Who assassinated Abraham Lincoln?

John Wilkes Booth assassinated Abraham Lincoln. On the night of April 14, 1865, Booth entered Lincoln’s presidential box at Ford’s Theatre in Washington, D.C., and shot the president while he watched the play Our American Cousin.

Booth was a famous actor and a committed Confederate sympathizer from Maryland. He originally supported a plan to kidnap Lincoln and take him to the Confederacy, but after the South’s military defeat became imminent, the plot turned into a plan to assassinate Lincoln and attack other senior government officials.

Lincoln was carried across the street to Petersen House, where he died at 7:22 a.m. on April 15. Booth escaped on horseback with help from David Herold and remained on the run for 12 days. Union soldiers found them at Garrett’s farm in Virginia on April 26; Booth was fatally shot after refusing to surrender.

Several conspirators were later tried. Four—including Mary Surratt, Lewis Powell, David Herold, and George Atzerodt—were hanged in July 1865, although Booth himself never faced trial.