David Healey - Rebel Train

The first leg of the journey, from where the trains had collided to the spur at Weverton that ran north, had taken hours. The train rolled backwards, slowly, because operating too fast in the mountains at night would have been disastrous.

The train stopped briefly during the early morning hours in what Percy guessed was Hagerstown. Another car was added, evidently so that Lincoln could ride comfortably, instead of in the locomotive’s cramped cab. Percy considered carrying out the assassination while the train was stopped, but the station was pitch black and he heard the voices of many men on the platform. He could only imagine himself stumbling around in the dark, trying to find the Yankee president. Under those circumstances, he doubted that he could succeed.

Wait , he told himself. Be patient .

The train would stop again at Gettysburg, and there would be no mistaking Abraham Lincoln by the light of day.

The day dawned sunny and unseasonably warm for November, perfect for the crowds that would gather to hear the president’s remarks. The pleasant weather seemed to be at odds for the dedication of a national cemetery where thousands of Union dead lay buried at the edge of town. The new national cemetery was an attempt to bring an added measure of dignity to all those who had sacrificed themselves in that decisive battle.

That wasn’t to mention the more practical reasons for the cemetery. In the wake of the battle, nearly every field around town had become a boneyard. Something had to be done.

The cemetery was laid out on a low ridge within sight of where the center of the Union lines had withstood the high tide of the Confederacy. It was arranged something like a Greek amphitheater, with designated sections for each Union state. At the center, where an amphitheater’s stage would be, there was instead a towering monument. The new headstones were flush with the newly turned earth. It was ground steeped in men’s blood, and dignitaries like Lincoln and the scheduled orator, the famed Edward Everett, could say little to further consecrate the cemetery. Those buried there had already done that.

Percy had little room in his mind for such grandiose thoughts as the train steamed into Gettysburg. He hadn’t slept all night. He was cold and stiff, and he wondered how in hell he was ever going to extricate himself from the iron skeleton of the train’s tender without being seen.

When the train finally arrived in Gettysburg, the platform was nearly empty because almost everyone had gone to see the ceremony at the cemetery. In fact, the whole town was deserted. No one was there to meet the train except a handful of soldiers left behind on guard duty.

Once the train stopped, Percy slowly freed himself from his hiding place. He felt like a snail sliding from its shell, so tightly was he wedged beneath the car. His feet, when they touched the ground, had no feeling. He was forced to wait for several minutes as the blood began to circulate again.

He longed for a cup of hot coffee, warm biscuits, and a fire. He crouched under the belly of the train, rubbing his numb hands together until he had enough feeling in them to work a revolver.

No one at the station noticed him under the car, half-hidden by the tender’s wheels. The guards would not be expecting trouble. Gettysburg was deep inside the Union and there was little reason for the sleepy-eyed soldiers guarding the station to expect anything out of the ordinary. Robert E. Lee had invaded just last summer with his entire Army of Northern Virginia, but because of the sacrifices of the men buried in the cemetery, it wasn’t likely the Rebels would ever return this far north.

Finally, the president emerged from one of the cars. Percy looked out from behind a wheel and saw him up close, a tall, bearded man, thin to the point of emaciation, dressed in black and looking as tired as Percy felt. In the bright autumn sunshine, he looked even more gaunt than he had in the mountain twilight the night before.

The president clutched some papers in his long hands and looked puzzled about what to do next. He wore a stovepipe hat that made him tower over the men nearby.

A few others got off the train. There was a sturdy-looking officer Percy recognized as Major Rathbone, the bodyguard who had ridden with Lincoln in the car from Baltimore. Percy spied on him from his hiding place under the tender, and held his breath as the major glanced back at the train. Rathbone’s gaze didn’t linger on the train, however. Instead, the major carefully studied the station, but, seeing nothing out of the ordinary, appeared to relax. There was also a short, fat man Percy recognized as one of the passengers from the Chesapeake .

With stiff fingers, Percy drew the Colt revolver from his pocket and thumbed back the hammer.

On the platform, one of the soldiers nudged the corporal next to him. “I’ll be damned but that tall fellow looks just like President Lincoln,” he muttered.

“It can’t be him, though,” whispered the corporal, who had also noticed the resemblance. “We saw him ride past here this morning on his way to dedicate the cemetery.”

Still, there was an air of dignity and command about the tall, bearded man. If this was Lincoln, the corporal briefly wondered, then who was at the cemetery?

“Damn peculiar, if you ask me,” the first soldier said, staring at the man in the stovepipe hat.

“You there — where is everyone?” the major asked the soldiers.

“They’re all up at the new cemetery, sir, watching the dedication,” the corporal answered, offering a ragged salute. He was staring at the tall man in the black suit beside the major, still not quite sure what to make of him. “They’re listening to Edward Everett, the orator… and President Lincoln.”

“Mr. Everett is a good speaker,” the president said. “As for Mr. Lincoln—” He raised his bushy eyebrows quizzically and a glance passed between the president and Major Rathbone.

Percy decided it was now or never. He slipped out from under the tender and moved, stiffly and slowly, toward Lincoln. His right hand was wrapped firmly around the grip of the revolver. Percy walked toward Lincoln with as much dignity as he could muster after the long, cramped ride.

Strangely, he felt nothing. No fear. No excitement. Just a sense of calm. Only his heart, thumping in his chest, betrayed any emotion.

A lifetime of memories washed over Percy as he crossed the depot toward the president. He thought of home: green fields in springtime, sweethearts he had known, the first time he jumped a fence on horseback—

Duty .

One of the guards saw Percy and elbowed his companions.

“Look what the cat done dragged in,” the corporal said, just loudly enough for Percy to hear. The men laughed quietly at the figure in the dirty coat. “You reckon he’s left over from the celebration last night?”

A great crowd had come to town for the ceremony and some men had caroused too excess the night before. Although the man on the platform looked as if he had crawled out of some alley after a night of hard drinking, there was a determined quality about him. He strode deliberately toward the tall, bearded man in the stovepipe hat. His face was hard and set. The laughter stopped, the soldiers exchanged worried looks, and they nervously held their rifles at the ready. Something was going on, but they didn’t know what.

Percy crossed the platform. None of the men in the knot immediately surrounding Lincoln had spotted him. He was thirty feet away, but he didn’t trust his aim in the condition he was in. He walked closer. Twenty feet. Fifteen feet. Close enough . He raised the Colt.

Prescott, the fat lawyer, saw him first. His eyes went wide as he recognized Percy.