President Lincoln's
Assassination and
Death Bed Details by Surgeon Dr. Charles Leale
 Below is the original handwritten four page
manuscript on onionskin paper from Dr. Charles Leale
describing the events of April 14th, 1865 at Ford's
Theater and the night that followed after the
assassination of the President. The letter is
dated Nov. 3, 1866 and is in response to a request
by John H. Littlefield for details of those two days.
He apparently used this information in engraving
"Death Bed of Lincoln", published in 1868 and shown
above.
On the evening of April 14,
1865, President Abraham Lincoln attended a play at Ford’s Theatre in
Washington, D.C. Sometime between ten and ten-thirty, John
Wilkes Booth - one of the most popular actors in the country -
slipped unnoticed into the Presidential box and, standing four feet
away from the President, discharged the bullet from a single-shot
derringer into the back of Lincoln’s head. The short-barreled pocket
pistol shot a round lead ball at a very low muzzle velocity — about
that, say, of today’s air guns. It was enough, however, to render
Lincoln unconscious and paralyzed.
As Booth escaped from the
theater, a young Army surgeon, Charles Leale, made his way through
the audience to Lincoln’s side. He determined that the wound was
mortal, and ordered the stricken President carried across the street
to a neighboring boarding house.
More on Dr. Leale:
https://www.civilwarprofiles.com/charles-a-leale-the-first-doctor-to-aid-lincoln-following-the-assassination/
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Hon. John H. Littlefield,
670 Fulton Street
Brooklyn, New York
Dear Mr. Littlefield,
In
accordance with your request, please find a
brief statement of the last hours of
President Lincoln. I sincerely hope that
you will meet with perfect success.
Very Truly Yours,
Charles A. Leale
November 30, 1865 |
Page 1
Page 2
Page 3
Page 4 |
Page 1
After
Persident Lincoln had been fatally wounded,
it was fortunate for the nation that Mrs.
Lincoln was able so soon to secure the
services of an experienced young Army
surgeon, who by his prompt and efficient
action prevented the immediate death of the
president, and prolonged his lifge for eight
hours at a time when the sympathy for the
dying martyr overcame much of the malice of
the enemies of our country.
These
eight hours gave the Cabinet Officers time
to carefully consider the duties they so
faithfully performed in continuing in
office, unbroken by a single day as
president of the United States. I allude to
Dr. Charles A. Leale, who was then stationed
in Washington in charge of the ward
containing the wounded officers and was
executive officer of Armory Square
Hospital. He was the first surgeon to reach
the President after he was shot, and at the
special request of Mrs. Lincoln took charge
of him. Explained the fatal extent of his
injury and did all possible to restore the
feeble heart’s action and by the immediate
application of his knowledge of gunshot
wounds soon overcame the shock and relieved
the brain pressure,
Page 2
Thereby
preventing the death of the President in the
theatre. In response to many inquiries Dr.
Leale then said that the wound was mortal,
and that recovery was impossible. As soon
as Mr. Lincoln had partially recovered from
the shock, Dr. Leale began his removal from
the scene of the tragedy to a place of
safety. Dr. Leale carried the head and
shoulders of the President, and with the
assistance of others, reached the streets,
where the surging excited populace crowded
forward and obstructed the exit from the
theatre. He called out three times,
“Guards, clear the passage!” and with the
assistance of a captain present who reported
for duty. Almost immediately two lines of
soldiers, with drawn swords, bayonets,
pistols and other weapons, stood in the
position of present arms and cleared a space
about five feet wide across the street,
through which the bleeding form of the
prostrate president was carried, amid the
most profound and solemn silence.
Page 3
Not a
voice was heard, or a shout from the
soldiers as their beloved Commander in Chief
who so often had visited and comforted them
in weary camp life and hospital sickness,
was now borne, insensible and dying, to a
place of quiet, to a bed in the nearest
house. Dr. Leale was several times asked if
he would take Mr. Lincoln to the White
House, and each time said “no”, inasmuch as
death would probably occur before reaching
it. After placing the President in bed, Dr.
Leale again found it necessary to remove the
coagulation from the opening in the cranium,
where oozing of blood relieved the brain
pressure and breathing was re-established,
this is repeated on several occasions and
when Dr. Stone and the Surgeon General
arrived Dr. Leale explained the good effects
which followed these reliefs from brain
pressure, and the operation was continued at
intervals during the night.
Page 4
During
the course of the night there were present
Dr. R.K. Stone, Surgeon General J.K. Barnes,
Assistant Surgeon General C. Crane, Dr. C.S.
Taft, Dr. A.F.A. King and others (in the
picture). Mrs. Lincoln was attended by Mrs.
Senator Dixon who on her last visit to her
husband was carried from the room in a
fainting condition. The protracted death
struggle lasted until twenty minutes past
seven o’clock on the morning of April 15,
1865. At the moment of dissolution Dr.
Leale held the right hand of the martyr and
closed his eyelids in death, after which the
few remaining knelt down around the lifeless
form of the patriot and hero, while the Rev.
Dr. Gurley earnestly supplicated to God in
behalf of the distracted family and our
afflicted and sorrowing country.
“What a
scene for memory and history.” |
Dr.
Charles Leale letter concerning General Grant
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605 Madison Avenue
Major General W.S. Hancock, US Army
Commander in Chief of the Military Order
of the
Loyal Legion United States of America:
I have the honor to accept the
appointment in the Medical Department of
the Loyal Legion to attend the funeral
of our late beloved and honored New York
State Commander, General U. S. Grant and
await your orders
President of the New York Count
Medical Association and Companion
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Other
Lincoln assassination connections on this website:
On April 14, 1865, the assassin John Wilkes Booth
shot President Abraham Lincoln during a performance at Ford's
Theatre in Washington, DC. After the President passed away on
the following morning, his body was placed in a temporary coffin
covered with an American flag, and returned by hearse to the White
House, accompanied by a cavalry escort. At the White House, an
autopsy was performed by Army Surgeons
Edward Curtis and
Joseph Janvier Woodward. Also in attendance were
Surgeon
General Joseph K. Barnes and a few military officers, medical
men and friends.
Edward Curtis, M.D. was a pathologist at the Army Medical Museum. He
was commissioned assistant surgeon and saw field service with the
Army of the Potomac, and with General Sheridan in the Shenandoah
Valley. Returning to the Army museum in the fall of 1864 he
assisted with the autopsy on the body of President Lincoln, April
15, 1865
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