Who Is Responsible For Lincoln's Assassination

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“Our country owed all her troubles to him, and God simply made me the instrument of his punishment.” That’s John Wilkes Booth’s mind and heart speaking in his last journal entry he did before being killed by Union soldiers. This is a couple of days after he shot President Abraham Lincoln. I think Booth was motivated to assassinate Abraham Lincoln because of mainly because of these three reasons listed here. Booth’s failed kidnapping plot for Lincoln, The fall of the Confederacy, and finally Lincoln’s offer of Black Citizenship.

The first reason why John Wilkes Booth assassinated President Abraham Lincoln is when Booth’s kidnapping plot failed. Earlier Booth had put together a team with a plot to kidnap President Abraham Lincoln and hold him for ransom. The team he put together consisted of Lewis Powell, John Surratt Jr. , George Atzerodt, Mary Surratt, and David Herold. On biography.com it states “ Booth had gathered around himself a group that was a lot more than ragtag.” When the train carrying Lincoln failed to arrive at it’s station Booth’s carefully thought out plan failed. According to the video on biography.com It states “Know one knows when he[Booth] Was pushed over the edge to murder but these events were thought to do that.”

The
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When Abraham Lincoln became the 16th President of the United Staes he cared for blacks, but to free them was not his one of his main intentions. It was only when the Civil War raged across the United States that Lincoln turn his attention to slaves. When he wrote the Emancipation Proclamation It angered many Southerners along with John Wilkes Booth. It states in the video on biography.com “The John Brown hanging would have a large impact on John Wilkes Booth life.” John Brown was a black who took part in a raid and killed many whites. When Brown was caught he was sentenced to die by