If you watched Steven Spielberg’s wonderful Oscar-winning movie Lincoln, you may remember that First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln was inconsolable about the death of her 11 year-old son William who succumbed to typhoid fever in 1862. She had already lost her son Edward at the age of three, and she refused to allow her son Robert, a Harvard law student, to risk his life by joining the Union army. This was a political liability for her husband and a personal humiliation for Robert, but she wouldn’t yield.
So it was that in 1863 or 1864, the date is uncertain, Richard Todd Lincoln was trying to board a train in Jersey City when he was very nearly killed. In 1909, Robert described the accident in a letter to the editor of The Century Magazine, Richard Watson Gilder:
The incident occurred while a group of passengers were late at night purchasing their sleeping car places from the conductor who stood on the station platform at the entrance of the car. The platform was about the height of the car floor, and there was of course a narrow space between the platform and the car body. There was some crowding, and I happened to be pressed by it against the car body while waiting my turn. In this situation the train began to move, and by the motion I was twisted off my feet, and had dropped somewhat, with feet downward, into the open space, and was personally helpless, when my coat collar was vigorously seized and I was quickly pulled up and out to a secure footing on the platform. Upon turning to thank my rescuer I saw it was Edwin Booth, whose face was of course well known to me, and I expressed my gratitude to him, and in doing so, called him by name.
The reason Robert knew his rescuer’s face is because Edwin Booth was perhaps the most famous stage actor in the country at the time. In fact, he’s widely considered the best American actor of the 19th-Century, particularly esteemed for his Shakespeare performances.
But, here’s something cool. Edwin Booth did not know who he had saved. He certainly didn’t know that it was the son of the president. He would learn that later in an interesting way.
See, in 1865, mere months before the end of the war, Mary Todd Lincoln finally relented and allowed Robert to enlist. The compromise was that he was posted to the headquarters of Gen. Ulysses S. Grant where he would presumably be safe. It was while serving in that capacity that Richard regaled other officers, including Colonel Adam Badeau, with the tale of his near death in Jersey City and his rescue by the famous Edwin Booth. A good camp story, no doubt.
Now Colonel Badeau knew Booth personally, and he sent him a letter of thanks for saving Abe Lincoln’s son. It was only then that Booth put two and two together and realized what he had done.
This wouldn’t be all that interesting except for one thing. Edwin Booth had two brothers who were also actors. In fact, you can go to Central Park in New York City and see a statue of William Shakespeare that the Booth brothers helped pay for with a benefit performance of Julius Caesar on November 24, 1864.
One of those brothers was John Wilkes Booth, and he would assassinate President Lincoln at the Ford Theater in Washington, DC, on April 14, 1865.
I want you to consider the odds.
Even when tragic, history can be fun.
Nice trivia!
One more note: during Act 2 of the Booth Brothers’ production of “Julius Caesar”on Broadway, <a href=”https://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/25/nyregion/as-booth-brothers-held-forth-1864-confederate-plot-against-new-york-fizzled.html”>Confederates staged an attack on several nearby hotels and theatres</a>.
Fascinating! Thank you for this.