“This is the private box in Ford’s Theater, Washington, where
President Lincoln was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth, on the
night of April 14, 1865. “ For another perspective on that
evening, see the District of Columbia Metropolitan Police
blotter of April 14, 1865. During their presidencies, both
Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis suffered the death of a
child—a not uncommon event for most American parents in the 19th
century. Starting with the death of Willie Lincoln in 1862 and
the tragic accident that befell Joseph Davis in 1864, Catherine
Clinton explores Victorian mourning and the embrace of rituals
of grief and symbols of remembrance during the Civil War. Join
us at noon on March 29 in the McGowan Theater at the National
Archives Building in Washington, DC, or watch online at our
Ustream channel. Image: Abraham Lincoln and his youngest son Tad
(ARC 52628). While Lincoln was President, Tad’s older brother
Willie—the middle child—died of typhoid fever while living in
the White House. Tad himself died