Henry Reed Rathbone was a United States military officer and lawyer who was present at the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln; Rathbone and his fiancé Clara Harris were sitting with Lincoln and Lincoln's wife Mary Todd Lincoln when the president was shot by John Wilkes Booth at Ford's Theatre. When Rathbone attempted to apprehend Booth, Booth stabbed and seriously wounded him. Rathbone may have played a part in Booth's leg injury. Although he recovered, Rathbone's mental state deteriorated afterwards, and in 1883, he murdered his wife, Clara, in a fit of madness, later being declared insane by doctors and living the rest of his life in a lunatic asylum.
1865 Mathew Brady photograph of Rathbone
Dagger used by Booth to attack Rathbone.
Assassination of Abraham Lincoln
On April 14, 1865, Abraham Lincoln, the 16th president of the United States, was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth while attending the play Our American Cousin at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C. Shot in the head as he watched the play, Lincoln died of his wounds the following day at 7:22 am in the Petersen House opposite the theater. He was the first U.S. president to be assassinated. His funeral and burial were marked by an extended period of national mourning.
John Wilkes Booth assassinating Abraham Lincoln in Ford's Theatre
Carte de visite of the actor John Wilkes Booth, c. 1865
The Surratt boarding house, where the conspirators planned
Ford's Theatre