John Wilkes Booth shot Abraham Lincoln.

Quick Scoop

Abraham Lincoln, the 16th president of the United States, was assassinated on the night of April 14, 1865, at Ford’s Theatre in Washington, D.C., while watching the play Our American Cousin. The shooter was John Wilkes Booth, a well‑known actor at the time and a passionate Confederate sympathizer who opposed Lincoln and the Union victory in the Civil War.

Booth entered the presidential box from behind and shot Lincoln in the back of the head with a small single‑shot derringer pistol, timing the shot to coincide with audience laughter to muffle the sound. Lincoln was carried across the street to the Petersen House, where he died in the early morning hours of April 15, 1865.

Booth immediately fled the theater, starting a dramatic multi‑day manhunt that stretched across Maryland and Virginia. Union soldiers finally cornered him in a barn in Virginia, where he was fatally shot on April 26, 1865, after refusing to surrender.