I Recognized Him as John Wilkes Booth: An Actor Recalls the Lincoln Assassination

It is rare thing that an actor becomes a witness to an event that changed the course of a nation’s life, but on the evening of April 14, 1865, Philadelphia-born actor Harry Hawk had the stage to himself at Ford’s Theater, until President Lincoln’s assassin fell upon the stage and brandished a knife.

"I was playing Asa Trenchard in Our American Cousin; the “old lady” of the theater had just gone off the stage and I was answering her exit speech when I heard the fatal shot fired,” Hawk wrote to his father shortly afterwards. “I turned, looked up to the President’s box, and heard a man exclaim, “Sic semper tyrannis!” I saw him jump from the box, seize the flag on the staff and drop to the stage. He slipped when he gained the stage but got upon his feet in a moment and brandished a large knife saying, “The South shall be free!” He turned his face in the direction I stood and I recognized him as John Wilkes Booth. He ran towards me and I, seeing the knife, thought I was the one he was after so I ran off the stage up a flight of stairs. He made his escape out of the door in the rear of the theater, mounted a horse, and rode off.”

Hawk, who had seen Booth earlier in the day on the steps of Ford’s Theater, gave his testimony to the police but within a few days was on the road again with Laura Keene’s theater company, next stop Cincinnati, Ohio. His letter, sent to his father William J. Hawk in Chicago, first ran in the Chicago Journal but was picked up and reprinted in numerous newspapers.

 

Harry Hawk was standing upon this stage addressing the audience when he heard the shot from Booth's Derringer pistol and saw Booth land upon the stage brandishing a dagger. "He turned his face in the direction I stood and I recognized him as John Wilkes Booth," Hawk said. 

Washington, D.C.

April 16, 1865

Dear father,

          This is the first opportunity I have had to write you since the assassination of our dear President on Friday night as I have been in custody nearly ever since.

I was one of the principal witnesses of that sad affair, being the only one on stage at the time of the fatal shot. On that night, the play was going off so well. In fact, it was one laugh from the time the curtain went up until it fell, and to think of the sorrowful ending. Mr. and Mrs. Lincoln enjoyed it so much. She was laughing at my speech when the fatal shot was fired. I was playing Asa Trenchard in Our American Cousin; the “old lady” of the theater had just gone off the stage and I was answering her exit speech when I heard the fatal shot fired.


I turned, looked up to the President’s box, and heard a man exclaim, “Sic semper tyrannis!” I saw him jump from the box, seize the flag on the staff and drop to the stage. He slipped when he gained the stage but got upon his feet in a moment and brandished a large knife saying, “The South shall be free!” He turned his face in the direction I stood and I recognized him as John Wilkes Booth. He ran towards me and I, seeing the knife, thought I was the one he was after so I ran off the stage up a flight of stairs. He made his escape out of the door in the rear of the theater, mounted a horse, and rode off.

 

“When the pistol shot was heard in the second box on the right-hand stage of Ford’s Theater, persons in the theater imagined that it was part of the play, hence the confusion of the audience. Meantime, the assassin appeared on the edge of box crying “Sic semper tyrannis” and flourishing a dagger, leaped to the stage. He crossed the stage rapidly exclaiming “revenge” and “I have done it!” All started to their feet and there being cries that the President was shot, the first intimation of danger was a call for a surgeon.” ~Daily National Intelligencer and Washington Express, April 15, 1865


The above all occurred in the space of a quarter of a minute and at the time I did not know that the President was shot, although if I had tried to stop Booth he would have stabbed me. I am now under $1,000 bail to appear as a witness when Booth is tried if caught. You may imagine the excitement in the theater (which was crowded) with cries of “hang him!” and “who was he?” from everyone present.

William Henry "Harry" Hawk

About 15 minutes after the occurrence, the President was carried out across the street. I was requested to walk down to the police headquarters and give my evidence. They then put me under $1,000 bond to appear at 10 o’clock the next morning. I then walked about for some time as the city was wild with excitement and then I went to bed. At 3:30 a.m., I was called upon by an aide of the President and asked to go the home where he was lying to give another statement to Judge Carter, Secretary [of War] Stanton, and other high officials assembled there. I did so and went to bed again.

It was the saddest thing I ever knew. The city only the night before was illuminated and everybody was so happy. Now it is all sadness; everybody looks gloomy and sad. It is an episode in my life that I shall never forget. Enclosed is a piece of fringe of the flag the President was holding when he was shot.

Sources:

Letter from William Henry “Harry” Hawk, Waukegan Weekly Gazette (Illinois), April 29, 1865, pg. 2

“The president was received with great furor,” Daily National Intelligencer and Washington Express (District of Columbia), April 15, 1865, pg. 2

Comments

Post a Comment

Most Popular Posts

Arming the Buckeyes: Longarms of the Ohio Infantry Regiments

Image
     A common question that comes up in conversation about Civil War Buckeye regiments is "What were they armed with?" We are fortunate in that the state of Ohio kept good records of how the regiments were armed when they went into service, this being especially true for those regiments which went into service in 1861 and 1862. The state adjutant general's reports for 1861 and 1862 have been heavily drawn upon to construct this article, as well as consultation with Phil Spaugy who has done extensive research on how Ohio's troops were armed during the war.      Buckeyes carried a fairly wide variety of weapons into the field, and the below article breaks this down into weapons of both domestic manufacture and imported arms. The early days of the war found the state of Ohio practically bereft of longarms; as an example, when the 1st and 2nd Ohio Volunteer Militia left the state in late April 1861, they left unarmed, being armed at Lancaster, Pennsylvania on t...
Read more

Bullets for the Union: Manufacturing Small Arms Ammunition During the Civil War

Image
       Civil War bullets are perhaps the most common item collected from the era; the two armies expended bullets by the millions during the four years’ conflict and spent or deformed bullets of all shapes and sizes have made fascinating and affordable collectibles since the guns went silent in 1865.       I recently acquired a display piece featuring 35 different types of small arms ammunition used during the Civil War, including everything from a small .28 caliber ball up to a .69 caliber three-ring Minie and it triggered some questions: how did the Federal army obtain its small arms ammunition during the war? Where did the lead come from to make the bullets, and where and how was the ammunition manufactured? This post seeks to answer those questions. A typical .58 caliber 3-ring Minie bullet   “Whenever the blasts of war blow in the ears of men who trade in the implements of destruction, they are apt to experience more joy than the true ...
Read more

Dressing the Rebels: How to Dye Butternut Jeans Cloth

Image
     In the early days of the Civil War,  the Southern states found themselves with an abundance of cotton but a shortage of cloth with which to make army uniforms. The trade in cloth prior to the war had largely been to send raw cotton or wool north to New England (or Great Britain) where it was converted into usable cloth; but now that trade was broken and the Southern states were thrown upon their own resources in their efforts to properly clothe the Confederate army.  This collection of Confederate enlisted men's frock coats and shell jackets gives some indication of the variety of shades of butternut worn during the war. All of them are shades of yellow brown, some heavier on the yellow and some heavier on the brown. The blue used around the collar or as rank insignia indicates that the soldier was in the infantry. Surviving Confederate uniforms are considered rather rare and command quite a healthy price in the collecting market. For an in-depth study of h...
Read more

The Vaunted Enfield Rifle Musket

Image
     The English-made Model 1853 .577 caliber Enfield Rifle Musket was widely regarded as the best infantry arm in the world at the outbreak of the Civil War in April 1861. Favorable international press describing its efficiency in the Crimean War and in suppressing the Indian rebellion led to the widespread desire of American infantrymen (both Federal and Confederate) to be armed with these accurate and well-made arms. The lock plate of this well-worn P1853 Enfield rifle musket produced in 1862 shows the typical markings of a British-made weapon that made it through the Federal blockade.  ( Army of Tennessee Relics ) Enfield-pattern weapons were imported into the states by the tens and hundreds of thousands during the war years; one estimate stated that the Federal government purchased 500,000 while the Confederates purchased another 400,000. The Confederate government dispatched Captain Caleb Huse to Europe in April 1861 to purchase weapons and Huse focused on se...
Read more

Cotton Burning on the Levee: A Civilian Witnesses the Federal Seizure of New Orleans

Image
F or one Ohio-born resident of New Orleans, the arrival of Admiral David Farragut’s fleet on April 25, 1862, marked a day of liberation. “Yesterday about half past 1 o’clock, the cry was raised that the Yankees were upon us,” wrote Louis M. Beyers in a letter to his mother. “I started toward the levee where the Federal vessels were said to be lying. Reaching the river, what a sight breaks upon my view. The steamboat William Morrison was one mass of flames. All the shipping was sending forth the most dense black smoke. The Mississippi , a ram which was nearly finished and which, if completed, would have demolished the whole fleet in one hour, floating slowly by with the smoke issuing from every opening and several other important like vessels in various parts of the river, all showing that the torch has been applied to them.” “Together with the thunder which came peal after peal gave a scene of the utmost grandeur. There proudly floating in the smoke and rain were the glorious old ...
Read more

Arming the Union: Federal Contract Model 1861 Springfield Rifle Muskets

Image
A t the outset of the Civil War, the Federal government ran into a serious issue when the Confederacy occupied Harper’s Ferry, Virginia, the home of one of the nation’s two armories, and carted the gun making equipment off to Richmond, Virginia. This left just the Springfield Armory in Springfield, Massachusetts as the sole government-operated entity to produce longarms for the Union army.           But it quickly became apparent that production at Springfield would have to be supplemented, so the War Department pursued two tracks to increase the weapons supply. Agents were dispatched to Europe to purchase suitable weapons from England, France, Austria, Belgium, and Prussia. Over time, these agents acquired hundreds of thousands of European arms of different designs and origins that equipped Federal regiments in the first years of the war.           In the meantime, operations at the Springfiel...
Read more

With the U.S. Christian Commission at Gettysburg

Image
U pon arriving at Gettysburg on Friday, July 10, 1863 with a U.S. Christian Commission delegation from Philadelphia, Reverend W.D. Siegfried’s first task was to escort a mother to find her son’s grave on the battlefield. “We had some little idea of the locality of it given by a comrade of the fallen soldier,” he noted. “After traveling on foot over the battlefield some 6 miles, we came upon a cluster of graves of men from the 72 nd Pennsylvania regiment which suffered terribly. The undaunted mother stood weeping while I read the names of those buried there, marked on rough boards placed at the head of the grave. At last, the name of her son met my eye. I could scarcely pronounce it. But when she heard it- oh, what an expression of grief!” Reverend Siegfried would spend the rest of the day assisting at the 11 th Corps hospital and recorded his impressions of aftermath of Gettysburg in this extraordinary letter which first appeared in the July 18, 1863, edition of the Zanesville Da...
Read more

The Wizard of Oz and the Civil War

Image
T he 1939 film The Wizard of Oz has delighted viewers for 85 years and ranks as a personal favorite, especially during the Halloween season. While watching it with the family the other night, I wondered if there were any connections between the film and the Civil War. Not surprisingly, the answer is yes and those connections touch both the blue and the gray.           Interestingly both “witches” in the film not only had Civil War ancestors but had connections with Civil War soldiers from Ohio. Margaret Hamilton, the “Wicked Witch of the West,” was born in Cleveland, Ohio on December 9, 1902, to attorney Walter Jones Hamilton and his wife Mary Jane Adams; Margaret’s grandfather was Judge Edwin Timothy Hamilton. Judge Hamilton had served as a private in Co. D of the 84 th Ohio Infantry during the summer of 1862. The 84 th Ohio, a three months’ regiment, served nearly the whole of its service attached to the Railroad District in western Ma...
Read more

Hallowed So Much My Throat was Sore: Victory Atop Missionary Ridge with the 2nd Ohio

Image
P ositioned on the far right of the Union assault on Missionary Ridge, Private William Van Horne of the 2nd Ohio described the elation of victory as the men of his brigade overwhelmed the Confederate line with but slight loss.     " I do not think that I ever heard as much noise in my life as there was that night," Van Horne wrote to his parents. "We cheered every general and everybody else. I do not believe I felt in better spirits that I ever did before and hallowed so much that my throat was sore and I believe everyone else’s was the same. Our regiment only lost one or two men wounded. I do not know how so many of us escaped for the bullets were flying so thick that you could almost see them. There was almost no end of shells flying all around us but striking very few."     During the Chattanooga campaign, the 2nd Ohio was Under General William P. Carlin's command of the First Brigade, First Division, 14th Army Corps. Following the losses at Chickamauga, the ...
Read more

Top Posts of 2024

Image
L et’s take a moment to review 2024 on Dan Masters’ Civil War Chronicles.        2024 marked another very busy year with 157 new blog posts, up from 114 last year. The year also saw the publication of two new books, Echoes of Battle Volume 2 and my new campaign study Hell by the Acre: A Narrative History of the Stones River Campaign .        The blog is currently at 955 posts and is fast approaching 1,000 post mark; will probably reach that sometime this spring. Blog traffic continues at a very impressive pace for which I am very grateful.        The blog’s focus remains centered on telling the story of the common soldier in the Civil War, North and South. Over the past year, I devoted more page space to telling some of the stories of our Civil War veterans who received the Medal of Honor but the western theater remains my prime focus. I’m excited to share new discoveries with you. The process of research and study remai...
Read more