Today marks the 143rd anniversary of the assassination of Abraham Lincoln (tomorrow marks his death), and a friend and I went to the National Portrait Gallery for a talk on “The Lincoln Assassination in Memory and Myth.” The speaker was James L. Swanson, who wrote a book I haven’t read called: Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln’s Killer. Swanson was a good speaker and told the story of the assassination through a series of vignettes surrounding the event. He laid out the scenes in vivid detail and quoted contemporary figures at length, both to great effect. Through the first part of his talk at least I don’t think I moved, listening right down to my toes.
I didn’t appreciate many of his conclusions, though. Not because I questioned his history. I wouldn’t and couldn’t presume to do so. And nor do I think any of his history was bad. But I did question his motives. He seemed to want to set the record straight, not so the facts would be clear, but so his audience would feel the way he wanted them to feel about the assassination and the assassin.
The aim of the talk was to bust many of the myths surrounding Lincoln’s death, and the “myth” he thought most damaging was the aura surrounding John Wilkes Booth himself. Swanson lamented the fact that it was Booth’s face and not Lincoln’s he saw pointing tourists toward the Ford’s Theatre. “We wouldn’t put Lee Harvey Oswald’s face on signs directing us to the Book Depository in Dallas,” he chided us. “We wouldn’t put a picture of James Earl Ray outside the Lorraine Hotel,” he shamed. Well, I think that’s probably true. But does Swanson think we are intrigued by the story and personality of Booth because we are somehow misremembering our history? Does he think we forgot he was the bad guy?
Americans positively revere Abraham Lincoln. And we are fascinated by John Wilkes Booth. Our simultaneous attraction to both these men is not in the least inconsistent. Swanson worried that his own book, which largely focused on the killer and not on Lincoln, might have leant more credence to the “myth” of Booth. That he was what? Human? Possibly admirable? Probably sympathetic? And what if he was? We do no dishonor to Lincoln by wondering about the life and mind of Booth. And really we do no disservice to ourselves by tying our history up in myth and legend.
After all, Lincoln himself exists as much in legend as in reality. As far as I’ve read, he split rails to build a total of one fence, he grew that beard because it was all the rage in Washington, and he was a mild racist who thought we should colonize Central America with our newly freed slaves. And he was a genuinely good man and a political genius whom we have to thank for the very existence of our country. And his story does not exist without that of John Wilkes Booth. So be it.
