Abraham Lincoln left Springfield, Illinois on February 11, 1861 for his eleven-day journey to Washington DC. On this day his party reached New York City by train from Albany at 3 p.m. From the Hudson River Railroad station at Tenth Avenue and 30th Street, he traveled in a thirty-five carriage procession, his own the same vehicle that had carried the Prince of Wales a few months earlier. Through packed, orderly, but curiously silent crowds, it went down Broadway to the Astor House on City Hall Square where the presidential party spent the night. (By John Osborne)