Petersen House (Washington, D.C.)
The Petersen House is a 19th-century federal style row house in the United States in Washington, D.C., located at 516 10th Street NW, several blocks east of the White House. It is known for being the house where President Abraham Lincoln died on April 15, 1865 after being shot the previous evening at Ford's Theatre located across the street. The house was built in 1849 by William A. Petersen, a German tailor. Future vice-president John C. Breckinridge, a friend of the Lincoln family, rented this house in 1852. It served as a boarding house in 1865 and has been a museum since the 1930s, currently administered by the National Park Service. Lincoln assassination On the night of April 14, 1865, Lincoln and his wife Mary Todd were attending a performance of ''Our American Cousin'' when John Wilkes Booth, an actor and Southern sympathizer, entered the box and shot the President in the back of the head. Henry Rathbone and Clara Harris were also in the box with the Lincolns, ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Our American Cousin
''Our American Cousin'' is a three-act play by English playwright Tom Taylor. It is a farce featuring awkward, boorish American Asa Trenchard, who is introduced to his aristocratic English relatives when he goes to England to claim the family estate. The play premiered with great success at Olympic Theatre, New York, Laura Keene's Theatre in New York City in 1858, with Laura Keene in the cast, the title character played by Joseph Jefferson, and Edward Askew Sothern playing Lord Dundreary. The play's long-running London production in 1861 was also successful. The play quickly rose to great renown during its first few years and remained very popular throughout the second half of the 19th century. Despite achieving critical and audience acclaim throughout its production history, ''Our American Cousin'' is best known as the play that U.S. president Abraham Lincoln was attending in Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C. when Assassination of Abraham Lincoln, he was assassinated by John W ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Henry Wager Halleck
Henry Wager Halleck (January 16, 1815 – January 9, 1872) was a senior United States Army officer, scholar, and lawyer. A noted expert in military studies, he was known by a nickname that became derogatory: "Old Brains". He was an important participant in the admission of California as a state and became a successful lawyer and land developer. Halleck served as the General-in-Chief of the Armies of the United States from 1862 to 1864, and then became Chief of Staff for the remainder of the war when Ulysses S. Grant was appointed to that position. Early in the American Civil War, Halleck was a senior Union Army commander in the Western Theater. He commanded operations in the West from 1861 until 1862, during which time, while the Union armies in the East were repeatedly defeated and held back, the troops under Halleck's command won many important victories. However, Halleck was not present at those battles, and his subordinates earned most of the recognition. The only operation ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Charles Sumner
Charles Sumner (January 6, 1811March 11, 1874) was an American lawyer and statesman who represented Massachusetts in the United States Senate from 1851 until his death in 1874. Before and during the American Civil War, he was a leading American advocate for the abolition of slavery. He chaired the Senate Foreign Relations Committee from 1861 to 1871, until he lost the position following a dispute with President Ulysses S. Grant over the Proposed annexation of Santo Domingo, attempted annexation of Santo Domingo. After breaking with Grant, he joined the Liberal Republican Party (United States), Liberal Republican Party, spending his final two years in the Senate alienated from his party. Sumner had a controversial and divisive legacy for many years after his death, but in recent decades, his historical reputation has improved in recognition of his early support for racial equality. Sumner began his political activism as a member of various anti-slavery groups, leading to his elec ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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United States Senate
The United States Senate is a chamber of the Bicameralism, bicameral United States Congress; it is the upper house, with the United States House of Representatives, U.S. House of Representatives being the lower house. Together, the Senate and House have the authority under Article One of the United States Constitution, Article One of the Constitution of the United States, U.S. Constitution to pass or defeat federal legislation. The Senate also has exclusive power to confirm President of the United States, U.S. presidential appointments, to approve or reject treaties, and to convict or exonerate Impeachment in the United States, impeachment cases brought by the House. The Senate and the House provide a Separation of powers under the United States Constitution, check and balance on the powers of the Federal government of the United States#Executive branch, executive and Federal judiciary of the United States, judicial branches of government. The composition and powers of the Se ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Robert Todd Lincoln
Robert Todd Lincoln (August 1, 1843 – July 26, 1926) was an American lawyer and businessman. The eldest son of President Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd Lincoln, he was the only one of their four children to survive past the teenage years and also the only one to outlive both his parents. Robert Lincoln became a business lawyer and company president, and served as both United States Secretary of War (1881–1885) and the U.S. Ambassador to Great Britain (1889–1893). Lincoln was born in Springfield, Illinois, and graduated from Harvard College. He then served on the staff of General Ulysses S. Grant as a captain in the Union Army in the closing days of the American Civil War. After the war was over, he married Mary Eunice Harlan, and they had three children together. Following completion of his law school studies in Chicago, he built a successful law practice, and became wealthy representing corporate clients. Lincoln was often spoken of as a possible candidate for n ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Lewis Powell (conspirator)
Lewis Thornton Powell (April 22, 1844 – July 7, 1865) was an American Confederate States Army, Confederate soldier who attempted to assassinate William Henry Seward as part of the Lincoln assassination plot. Wounded at the Battle of Gettysburg, he later served in Mosby's Rangers before working with the Confederate Secret Service in Maryland. John Wilkes Booth recruited him into a plot to kidnap Lincoln and turn the president over to the Confederacy, but then decided to assassinate Lincoln, Seward, and Vice President Andrew Johnson instead, and assigned Powell the task to kill Seward. Co-conspirator David Herold was to guide Powell to Seward's home, then help him escape, but fled before Powell was able to exit the Seward home. Powell arrived at the boarding house run by Mary Surratt, mother of co-conspirator John Surratt, three days later while the police were there conducting a search, and was arrested. Powell, Mary Surratt, Herold, and George Andrew Atzerodt, George Atzerodt w ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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William H
William is a masculine given name of Germanic origin. It became popular in England after the Norman conquest in 1066,All Things William"Meaning & Origin of the Name"/ref> and remained so throughout the Middle Ages and into the modern era. It is sometimes abbreviated "Wm." Shortened familiar versions in English include Will or Wil, Wills, Willy, Willie, Bill, Billie, and Billy. A common Irish form is Liam. Scottish diminutives include Wull, Willie or Wullie (as in Oor Wullie). Female forms include Willa, Willemina, Wilma and Wilhelmina. Etymology William is related to the German given name ''Wilhelm''. Both ultimately descend from Proto-Germanic ''*Wiljahelmaz'', with a direct cognate also in the Old Norse name ''Vilhjalmr'' and a West Germanic borrowing into Medieval Latin ''Willelmus''. The Proto-Germanic name is a compound of *''wiljô'' "will, wish, desire" and *''helmaz'' "helm, helmet".Hanks, Hardcastle and Hodges, ''Oxford Dictionary of First Names'', Oxfor ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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United States Cabinet
The Cabinet of the United States is the principal official advisory body to the president of the United States. The Cabinet generally meets with the president in Cabinet Room (White House), a room adjacent to the Oval Office in the West Wing of the White House. The president chairs the meetings but is not formally a member of the Cabinet. The Vice President of the United States, vice president of the United States serves in the Cabinet by statute. The heads of departments, appointed by the president and confirmed by the United States Senate, Senate, are members of the Cabinet, and acting department heads also participate in Cabinet meetings whether or not they have been officially nominated for Senate confirmation. Members of the Cabinet are political appointees and administratively operate their departments. As appointed officers heading federal agencies, these Cabinet secretaries are executives with full administrative control over their respective departments. The president ma ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Charles Sabin Taft
Charles Sabin Taft (August 1835 – December 18, 1900) was a bystander physician who was pressed into service during the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln's assassination On April 14, 1865, Taft was watching '' Our American Cousin'' at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C., which President Abraham Lincoln was attending. Taft had a good view of those in the presidential box. He observed that First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln Mary Ann Todd Lincoln (Birth name, née Todd; December 13, 1818July 16, 1882) was First Lady of the United States from 1861 until the assassination of her husband, President Abraham Lincoln, in 1865. Mary Todd was born into a large and wealthy ... often called her husband's attention to aspects of the action onstage, and "seemed to take great pleasure in witnessing his enjoyment". After Lincoln was shot, Taft was boosted up from the stage to the president's box.Kunhardt. ''Twenty Days''. Pg. 42 See also * Anderson Ruffin Abbott * Joseph K. Barnes * Ju ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Charles Leale
Charles Augustus Leale (March 26, 1842 – June 13, 1932) was a surgeon in the Union Army during the American Civil War and the first doctor to arrive at the presidential box at Ford's Theatre on April 14, 1865, after John Wilkes Booth fatally shot President Abraham Lincoln in the head. His prompt treatment allowed Lincoln to live until the next morning. Leale continued to serve in the army until 1866, after which he returned to his home town of New York City where he established a successful private practice and became involved in charitable medical care. One of the last surviving witnesses to Lincoln's death, Leale died in 1932 at the age of 90. Early life Dr. Leale was born in New York City March 26, 1842, the son of Captain William P. and Anna Maria Burr Leale. He was a grandson of Captain Richard Burr, who, in 1746 sent a cargo of corn to famine-stricken Ireland. Leale began his medical studies at 18, the private pupil of Dr. Austin Flint, Sr., in diseases of the heart and l ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Clara Harris
Clara Hamilton Harris (September 9, 1834 – December 25, 1883) was an American socialite. She and her then fiancé, and future husband, Henry Rathbone, were the guests of President Abraham Lincoln the night he was shot at Ford's Theatre. Rathbone's mental state deteriorated after the assassination, and in 1883, Harris was murdered by him. Early life and family Harris was born in Albany, New York,Thomas 1904 p.27 one of four children of U.S. Senator Ira Harris of New York, and his first wife Louisa Harris (née Tubbs). Harris' mother Louisa died in 1845. On August 1, 1848, Ira Harris married Pauline Rathbone (née Penney), the widow of Jared L. Rathbone, a successful merchant who later became the mayor of Albany. Jared and Pauline Rathbone had four children (two of whom, Anna and Charles, died in infancy) including sons, Jared Jr. and Henry. Although Harris and Henry Rathbone were raised in the same household and were related by their parents' marriage, they fell i ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |