This Day in History:, John Wilkes Booth Shoots
Abraham Lincoln.
April 14, 1865.
Booth shot President Abraham Lincoln in the head
during a performance of 'Our American Cousin,'
at Ford's Theater in Washington D.C.
The Confederate sympathizer then jumped from the
balcony of Lincoln's booth, yelling "Sic semper
tyrannus," Latin for "Ever thus to tyrants.".
Booth injured his leg on the jump, and hobbled
out of the theater to his getaway horse.
Lincoln was carried to a
boardinghouse across the
street, where he died the next morning.
His assassination was part of a broader conspiracy
to kill the major heads of the Union government,
throwing the nation into disarray.
Hiding out in a Virginia barn,
Booth was shot and killed by Corporal Boston Corbett
on April 26 after Union troops set the barn on fire