The Hour of Peril: The Secret Plot to Murder Lincoln Before the Civil War (17 page)

The violence had intensified during the 1856 presidential election: Eight men were killed in the streets and more than 250 others were injured, reducing a proud community to what one observer called “the Pandemonium of American Cities.” Though Mayor George William Brown had launched a series of reforms by the time of the 1860 election, the city’s bloody reputation persisted. Three decades earlier, President John Quincy Adams had praised Baltimore as the “Monumental City.” At the time of Lincoln’s election, it was known far and wide as “Mobtown.”

The city’s prominence as a rail hub guaranteed that it would feature in the planning for Lincoln’s inauguration, since virtually any route that the president-elect chose between Springfield and Washington would necessarily pass through Baltimore. Few people imagined that Lincoln would receive a cordial reception. In April of the previous year, when the Republican State Convention gathered to elect delegates for the Chicago convention, a group of “local roughs” had stormed the meeting and flipped over the desks and benches. The delegates retreated under a shower of ink pots. “The whole scene was extremely disgraceful,” wrote a correspondent for the
New York Times.
“For God’s sake let every man and all parties—religious, political or otherwise—when respectful, entertain and express their own sentiments free from molestation.”

The plea went unheeded. After Lincoln’s nomination, his supporters in Baltimore were subject to further violence, as a diehard Republican named Worthington G. Snethen reported to Lincoln himself. “Our people behaved nobly,” said Snethen, recounting an assault on a torchlight procession of Wide Awake marchers. “There were some 300 of them. They walked their whole distance amid showers of eggs, brick-bats and injurious epithets from the mob.” Snethen refused to be discouraged. Following the election, he wrote again, in the hope that Lincoln would reward his “gallant little band” of supporters with a stop in Baltimore on his way to Washington. Snethen promised a courteous reception, but the city’s treatment of President-elect James Buchanan four years earlier suggested otherwise. Traveling from his home in Pennsylvania, Buchanan was said to have received a merciless heckling from Baltimore’s street gangs, with the result that he cut his visit short and departed for Washington on an earlier train.

Four years on, there was little reason to hope that Lincoln would fare better. “The city of Baltimore was, at this time, a slave-holding city,” Pinkerton noted, “and the spirit of Slavery was nowhere else more rampant and ferocious.” Horace Greeley concurred, adding that the city’s rich and powerful were particularly eager to see the Republican agenda derailed. If the Union were dissolved, he explained, Baltimore would emerge as a dominant power in the new South: “In a confederacy composed exclusively of the fifteen Slave States, Baltimore would hold the position that New York enjoys in the Union, being the great ship-building, shipping, importing and commercial emporium, whitening the ocean with her sails, and gemming Maryland with the palaces reared from her ample and ever-expanding profits.” For this reason, Greely concluded, the city’s upper classes were “ready to rush into treason.”

This created an additional problem for Pinkerton. It would not be enough simply to infiltrate the violent gangs at the lower end of Baltimore’s social strata; he would also have to find a find a way of moving among members of the wealthier classes, who would be likely to provide the money needed for any large-scale plot. Accordingly, Pinkerton decided to set up a cover identity for himself as a Southern stockbroker newly arrived in Baltimore. It was a canny choice, as it gave him an excuse to make himself known to the city’s businessmen, whose interests in cotton and other Southern commodities often gave a fair index of their political leanings.

In order to play the part convincingly, Pinkerton hired a suite of offices in a large building at 44 South Street, at the center of the triangle formed by the city’s three train stations. From this vantage point, he could easily gather reports from all quarters and send instructions to his agents in the field. It would not be seen as unusual for a stockbroker to receive frequent visitors, but Pinkerton took care to select a location that would help to shield the identities of his operatives. The building on South Street had entrances on all four sides and could be accessed inconspicuously through an alley at the back. Pinkerton’s agents would be able to assemble in his office without being seen in one another’s company as they passed in and out of the building. If one agent should be compromised, the others would not automatically fall under suspicion. This feature would become especially important as the operation grew in size; Pinkerton’s first order of business on South Street was to wire to Chicago for an additional force of men.

Soon enough, Pinkerton was trading under the name of John H. Hutchinson—which he originally spelled as Hutcheson, Hutchesontown being the name of a district in the Gorbals. By all accounts, he played the role with convincing gusto. To all outward appearances, he was now “an outgoing gentleman of southern birth,” with a resolved but sympathetic demeanor that would encourage people to confide in him. “The detective must
always
be an actor,” Pinkerton wrote, “and nine-tenths of the actors on the stage today would do well to take lessons in their own profession from him.”

From the office on South Street, Pinkerton assigned new identities to each member of his team. “I distributed my Operatives around the City,” he recalled, after giving each one a distinct set of characteristics “for the purpose of acquiring the confidence of the Secessionists.” Harry Davies, the aristocratic former seminarian, was to assume the character of “an extreme anti-Union man” newly arrived from New Orleans, and put himself up at one of the best hotels in the city. From this platform, Davies was to make himself known as a man willing to pledge his loyalty and his pocketbook to the interests of the South. Kate Warne was to assume the identity of “Mrs. Barley,” passing herself off as a visitor from Montgomery, Alabama—drawing on knowledge gained during the Adams Express robbery case. “Mrs. Warne displayed upon her breast, as did many of the ladies of Baltimore, the black and white cockade,” Pinkerton wrote, “which had been temporarily adopted as the emblem of secession.” Her job was to cultivate the wives and daughters of suspected plotters. “Mrs. Warne was eminently fitted for this task,” Pinkerton noted. “She was a brilliant conversationalist when so disposed, and could be quite vivacious, but she also understood that rarer quality in womankind, the art of being silent.”

Not all of Pinkerton’s agents were comfortable with their assigned roles. One operative, to whom Pinkerton gave the name of Charles Williams, was instructed to pass himself off as a transplant from Mississippi. He promptly hit a snag when he ran across a native of Jackson who appeared determined to engage him in a lengthy discussion of their home state. Fearful of being exposed, Williams excused himself and made his way back to South Street, where he duly recorded the incident in his field report. “I was afraid I could not play my part,” he wrote, but Pinkerton assured him that “there was no danger, and all I wanted was self confidence.” After receiving a few additional pointers, Williams squared his shoulders and returned to work. Pinkerton himself suffered no qualms about playing his role. For the moment, the task at hand appeared relatively straightforward. His goal, as he had described it to Samuel Felton, was to forge a relationship with anyone suspected of belonging to a secessionist group of any kind. The next step would be to “apply the necessary test” by expressing opinions and sympathies designed to tease out any plans for violence. Such methods had worked well in the past, he explained, allowing him “to penetrate into the abodes of crime in all classes of society.”

Even as Pinkerton wrote these words, however, the focus of his operation began to shift beneath his feet. From the first, Pinkerton’s plan of action rested on the assumption that Baltimore’s secessionists intended to attack the railroads as part of a larger plan to capture Washington. Many believed that if Lincoln could be prevented from taking the oath of office in the capital, even if he were to be sworn in at Philadelphia or New York, the Union cause would be lost before the new administration had begun. By keeping Felton’s “road” open, Pinkerton would be doing his part to ensure an orderly inauguration, sending a strong message of Lincoln’s resolve. Even as Pinkerton made his initial report to Felton, however, he caught the first scent of a darker design. On January 27, in Springfield, the president-elect offered up the first details of the itinerary for the forthcoming trip to Washington. Until that moment, the specifics of Lincoln’s journey to the capital had been a subject of furious speculation and debate. Would the newly elected president be able to make a public procession to Washington, as his predecessors had done? Would he be able to set foot in his native Kentucky? Would he even dare to show his face in a slaveholding state? Now, with the date of the inaugural fast approaching, Lincoln announced that he would travel in an “open and public” fashion, with frequent stops along the way to greet the public.

The message was clear: Lincoln was standing firm in the face of the secession crisis. As the
Baltimore Sun
reported:

It is now positively settled that Mr. Lincoln will depart for Washington on the 11th of February. He will go hence via Lafayette to Indianapolis, where he will receive the hospitalities of the Indiana Legislature; thence he will proceed, probably, by way of Cincinnati to Columbus, Cleveland, Buffalo and Albany. From Albany he intends to make for Harrisburg direct, thence to Baltimore and the Federal Capital; but a tour to New York and Philadelphia is not impossible.

Arrangements for special trains all the way through are making. No military escort will be accepted.

In the days to come, the itinerary would be fleshed out and elaborated upon until every moment of Lincoln’s time was cataloged for the public. By the date of departure, it would be known that Lincoln intended to arrive at Baltimore’s Calvert Street Station at 12:30 on the afternoon of Saturday, February 23, and that he would depart from the Camden Street Station at 3:00. “The distance between the two stations is a little over a mile,” Pinkerton noted darkly. “No provision for his reception had been made by any Public Committee in Baltimore. The few Union men that were there at the time were over-awed by the Secessionists, and dared not make any demonstration.”

Instantly, the announcement of Lincoln’s imminent arrival became the talk of Baltimore. Of all the stops on the president-elect’s itinerary, Baltimore was the only slaveholding city apart from Washington itself, and there was a distinct possibility that Maryland would vote to secede by the time Lincoln’s train reached her border. In that case, what sort of reception might the president-elect expect? The
Baltimore Sun
expressed a hope that the city would rein in any hostile impulses:

It is of great concern to all who love and would honor the State of Maryland and the city of Baltimore that no demonstration whatsoever should be made, even by a single individual, inconsistent with our self-respect. We would a thousand times rather see the most elaborate exhibition of official courtesy, unbecoming as it would be in such a case, than that the slightest personal disrespect should mar the occasion, or blur the reputation of our well-ordered city.… Let it be the part of every man to sustain the honorable status we profess; and so to illustrate before the eyes of the President elect the self-respect of a people who cordially dissent from his political opinions.

No doubt there were many in the city who shared this noble sentiment. As Pinkerton would soon learn, however, there were some who saw Lincoln’s passage through Baltimore as an open challenge, a red rag trailed before a stirring bull. As of yet, Pinkerton had no idea if the angry talk would resolve itself into a credible threat, or what form that threat might take, but he was now convinced that Baltimore’s secessionists could not be ignored. “Every night as I mingled among them I could hear the most outrageous sentiments enunciated,” he wrote. “No man’s life was safe in the hands of those men.”

CHAPTER NINE

SUSPICIONS OF DANGER

You are respectfully invited to participate in the courtesies extended to Hon. Abraham Lincoln, President elect, by the several Railroad Companies, from Springfield to Washington.

—Inscription on the official train pass issued to riders of the Lincoln Special

ON HIS LAST FULL DAY
in Springfield—Sunday, February 10, 1861—Abraham Lincoln paid a final visit to his law partner, William Herndon, at the office they had shared in the town’s Capitol Square. Having done no legal work for several months, Lincoln had promised to have “a long talk” with Herndon before setting off for the White House.

Lincoln’s final days in Springfield had been hectic. Two days earlier, he and his family had vacated their house at the corner of Eighth and Jackson streets, the only home Lincoln had ever owned, and moved into a two-dollar-a-day hotel suite. Most of the family furniture had been sold off to friends and neighbors, and the house had been rented. The extra cash would be needed in the days to come, as the government at that time did not underwrite a president-elect’s travel expenses. Lincoln made a withdrawal of four hundred dollars at the Springfield Marine and Fire Insurance Company to see him safely to Washington.

Now, sitting in the cluttered law office with Herndon, Lincoln went over the firm’s books and reviewed unfinished case files. In a few instances, he gave instructions to his younger partner on “certain lines of procedure,” which Herndon dutifully recorded in his ledger. When his business was finished, Lincoln seemed reluctant to leave. He threw himself down on a battered sofa, now so decrepit that it stood braced against a wall for support, and lay there for some moments, telling stories of the “ludicrous features” of his early days on the law circuit. “I never saw him in a more cheerful mood,” Herndon reported, but by the end of their interview, Lincoln’s mood had darkened. “He said the sorrow of parting from his old associates was deeper than most persons would imagine,” Herndon recalled, “but it was more marked in his case because of the feeling which had become irrepressible that he would never return alive.”