Bloody Times by James L. Swanson

mourners had arrived near the White House as early as sunrise to stake out the best viewing positions. By 10:00 A.M. there were no more places left to stand on Pennsylvania Avenue. Faces filled every window, and children and young men climbed lampposts and trees for a better view. By the time the funeral services ended and the procession to the Capitol got under way, they had already been waiting for hours.
    It was a beautiful day. At 2:00 P.M. soldiers in the East Room surrounded the coffin, lifted it from the platform, and carried Abraham Lincoln out of the White House for the last time. They placed the president in the hearse.
    Cannon fire announced the start of the procession; guns boomed. Every church and firehouse bell in Washington tolled. Witnesses remembered the sound of the day as much as the sight of it. Tad Lincoln joined the procession, and he and his brother Robert rode in a carriage behind the hearse. The procession was huge. Among the marchers were members of the army, navy, and Marine Corps, and judges, diplomats, and doctors. One group of marchers suggested the cost of the war: wounded and bandaged veterans, many missing arms or legs, many on crutches.

    The hearse that carried Lincoln’s body down Pennsylvania Avenue.
    When the procession reached the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue, soldiers carried the flag-draped coffin up the steps of the Capitol. The crowds watched in silence as the soldiers carried the coffin inside and laid it upon a platform. It was left under the dome with a guard of soldiers keeping watch over the dead president.

Chapter Nine
    When Jefferson Davis rode into Charlotte, the people there were not happy to see him. Only one man would allow the president of the Confederate States of America to set foot in his home. An officer explained why to Burton Harrison: “The major then took me aside and explained that, though quarters could be found for the rest of us, he had as yet been able to find only one person willing to receive Mr. Davis, saying that people generally were afraid that whoever would entertain him would have his house burned by the enemy.”
    Not long after his arrival in Charlotte, Davis gave a speech to an audience that included a number of Confederate soldiers:
     
    “My friends, I thank you for this evidence of your affection. If I had come as the bearer of glad tidings, if I had come to announce success at the head of a triumphant army, this is nothing more than I would have expected; but coming as I do, to tell you of a very great disaster . . . this demonstration of your love fills me with feelings too deep for utterance . This has been a war of the people for the people . . . and if they desire to continue the struggle, I am still ready and willing to devote myself to their cause. True, General Lee’s army has surrendered, but the men are still alive, the cause is not yet dead; and only show by your determination and fortitude that you are willing to suffer yet longer, and we may still hope for success.”
     
    At the end of Davis’s speech, somebody handed him a telegram from John C. Breckinridge. Davis read the words in silence: “President Lincoln was assassinated in the theatre in Washington.”
    A few minutes later Davis spoke to his secretary of the navy, Stephen Mallory. In a sad voice, Davis said, “I certainly have no special regard for Mr. Lincoln; but there are a great many men of whose end I would much rather have heard than his. I fear it will be disastrous to our people, and I regret it deeply.”
    Jefferson Davis tried to understand what Lincoln’s murder would mean for himself and his cause. Who had killed him, and why? What did this news mean for his retreat, and for his plans to continue the war? Davis would have found it hard to imagine the strength of emotions the assassination had stirred up across the country. Had he known, he might have decided to travel south more quickly.
    Despite the disturbing news of Lincoln’s death, there