Record Data
Source citation
Reprinted in Clara E. Laughlin, The Death of Lincoln: The Story of Booth's Plot, His Deed and the Penalty (New York: Doubleday, Page and Company, 1909), 297.
Recipient (to)
Henry C. Jarrett
Type
Letter
Date Certainty
Exact
Transcriber
John Osborne, Dickinson College
Transcription date
Transcription
The following text is presented here in complete form, as it originally appeared in print. Spelling and typographical errors have been preserved as in the original.
Henry C. Jarrett, Esq.
My Dear Sir:
With deepest sorrow and great agitation I thank you for relieving me from my engagement with yourself and the public. The news of the morning has made me wretched indeed, not only because I have received the unhappy tidings of the suspicions of a brother's crime, but because a good man, and a most justly honoured and patriotic ruler, has fallen, in an hour of national joy, by the hand of an assassin. The memory of the thousands who have fallen in the field, in our country's defence, during this struggle, cannot be forgotten by me, even in this, the most distressing day of my life. And I most sincerely pray that the victories we have already won may stay the brand of war and the tide of loyal blood. While mourning, in common with all other loyal hearts, the death of the President, I am oppressed by a private woe not to be expressed in words. But whatever calamity may befall me and mine, my country, one and indivisible, has my warmest devotion.
Edwin Booth.
