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Name: The Lincoln Conspiracy
Rating: 4.6 (60 reviews)
Author: Brad Meltzer and Josh Mensch

Brad Meltzer and Josh Mensch

The Secret Plot to Kill America's 16th President – and Why It Failed

4.6 (60 Bewertungen)

28 Min.

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US-Präsidenten Krisen & Skandale Geschichte der USA

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The Lincoln Conspiracy
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What’s in it for me? A thrilling account of a plot that threatened the fate of a nation.

At the beginning of 1861, the United States was plagued by division, hatred, and doubt. Northern states, like Massachusetts and Pennsylvania, and Southern states, like Georgia and South Carolina, had never been more different – socially, economically, and politically. At the heart of the schism was the fate of over three million enslaved people who lived in the South at the time. Their labor upheld the Southern way of life that the aristocratic planter class was committed to protecting. The storm of civil war was gathering, and when it eventually broke it would kill more Americans than all wars from the American Revolution to World War II combined.

The election of Abraham Lincoln in November 1860 was a catalyst for the splintering of the United States. An avowed abolitionist, Lincoln was universally abhorred in the South. Southern politicians, scions of business, and members of shadowy, armed militias that would eventually give rise to the Ku Klux Klan – vowed to die trying to prevent Lincoln from taking office.

Lincoln would have to pass through the rabidly secessionist city of Baltimore on his way to his inauguration in Washington, D.C. For those who wished Lincoln ill, this would be their best chance.

In these blinks, you’ll learn

how an impulsive cash gift helped save Lincoln’s life;
why someone threatened to put a “spider in Lincoln’s dumpling;” and
Lincoln’s highly inappropriate code-name during the midnight run to Washington

In the debates with Douglas, Abraham Lincoln established himself as a persuasive speaker – and an abolitionist.

It was the dog days of summer, August 1858, and the town of Ottawa, Illinois was packed with visitors. Thousands of people had been streaming in for days, from all over the state. Now, on the day everyone had been waiting for, Ottawa was hosting more than twice its usual population.

The mood was festive, but this wasn’t a county fair: it was a policy debate between Illinois’s two candidates for United States Senate.

Stephen Douglas was heavily favored to win. A wealthy landholder, slave owner and Washington insider, Douglas had already served two terms in the Senate. His opponent was an upstart country lawyer from Kentucky whose name recognition was so poor that the papers kept calling him Abram Lincoln.

The key message here is: In the debates with Douglas, Abraham Lincoln established himself as a persuasive speaker – and an abolitionist.

The two opponents weren’t just different in terms of background. They looked like physical opposites, almost to the point of comedy. Douglas was short and stubby, with chubby cheeks. Lincoln was tall, a foot taller than Douglas, with a body the newspapers called gawky, and a startlingly angular face.

Their politics were also in fierce opposition, especially on the question of slavery, the hot button issue of the day. Douglas was a staunch pro-slavery advocate, and dedicated white supremacist. “I do not regard the negro as my equal,” he said. “He belongs to an inferior race, and must always occupy an inferior position.”

Lincoln, for his part, used folksy humor to win the crowd. He only became animated on the issue of slavery. The “zeal for the spread of slavery, I cannot but hate,” he said. “I hate it because of the monstrous injustice of slavery itself.”

Illinois was a swing state, and the Lincoln-Douglas debates were closely watched. Lincoln lost the election, but the fact that he had almost unseated an incumbent was widely noted. Lincoln’s star, as an abolitionist and persuasive speaker, was rising.

Two years later, in 1860, Lincoln was selected as the Republican presidential nominee for Illinois at the Illinois State Republican Convention. He had become so popular that he literally had to crowdsurf to the stage. He ultimately rode the wave to become the national Republican party’s nominee. Lincoln was running for president.

In New York, though, the newspapers were still getting his name wrong.

Political chaos in the South helped accomplish what for many was a nightmare outcome: President-elect Lincoln.

In the South, the reaction to Lincoln’s nomination was extreme. As news spread that the Republican presidential nominee was a Northern abolitionist, a group of men gathered in a Baltimore barber shop owned by Cypriano Ferrandini, an immigrant from Corsica who had found an ideological home in the radical politics of the South. Ferrandini’s barber shop had become a meeting point for Baltimore’s elite white supremacists. For them, as for many in the South, this was the last straw.

Support for the abolition of slavery was growing in the North. The Southern planter class increasingly felt their way of life, which depended on slave labor, was under attack by a government that no longer represented them. Violence was on the rise, even in Washington’s halls of power. In 1856, an abolitionist Massachusetts senator was beaten almost to death on the floor of the US Congress by a South Carolina congressman.

As Lincoln prepared to assume the presidency, the South responded to his election in ominous ways.

During the election campaign, Lincoln had said he had no intention to abolish slavery where it already existed. He would only prevent slavery from being adopted by new US territories. Nevertheless, Southerners viewed his election as a kind of apocalypse. To them, it calcified the growing schism between themselves and the North. Lincoln had been elected president by the North, not the South.

Southerners didn’t hesitate to act, both individually and en masse.

Threats were seemingly everywhere. Luckily, Felton called the one man who could connect the dots.

In Washington, rumors began swirling. There were whispers of secret organizations bent on preventing Lincoln from taking office and even an invasion of Southern militias, aided by sleeper agents already in the capital. The city was in a precarious position, sandwiched between Virginia and Maryland, both slave states. If a Southern militia were to invade, it would be cut off from government support.

Rumors were also traveling north, to the Philadelphia office of railroad magnate Samuel Felton. Word reached him that a secretive cabal was planning to blow up his railroad lines between Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington so as to prevent Lincoln from reaching the capital.

Pinkerton’s detectives went undercover in Baltimore, to sniff out – and stop – any plot against the president-elect.

A few days later, Pinkerton was on his way to Baltimore, along with his best agents. They’d only had a few days to prepare, practicing their Southern accents, developing false identities, and gathering accessories for their disguises. Their plan was shockingly audacious: to infiltrate the groups of white supremacist secessionists in Baltimore, learn their plans, and foil them, ensuring that Lincoln made it to his inauguration.

When they reached Baltimore, they found a city seething with anger, self-righteousness, and hostility directed toward one target: Lincoln. It was only a matter of time, Pinkerton thought, before there was open revolt.

As Lincoln began his publicity tour, his popularity – and the safety risks – proved greater than anticipated.

Lincoln’s procession departed Springfield on February 11, 1861. Against the advice of friends concerned about the disturbing, persistent rumors, Lincoln embarked without a military escort. He did have a few bodyguards though, beefy barroom brawlers and former soldiers who knew how to handle themselves.

At every stop, crowds were gathered to cheer on the president-elect’s train. At every stop, Lincoln was ready with an easy smile and a folksy joke. As word of Lincoln’s charming manner spread, the crowds grew even larger. The trip’s planners had clearly underestimated the public’s curiosity in the gangly man who was about to become their leader.

With only days to go before Lincoln would pass through Baltimore, Pinkerton convinced his security detail of the danger.

The insistent stranger in Lincoln’s Cincinnati hotel wasn’t Pinkerton’s only agent in the field. Warne was speeding through the night, on a train from Baltimore to New York. Pinkerton had entrusted her with another critical message for Norman Judd.

They would use code names until the mission was complete. Lincoln’s was slightly unbefitting for a man destined for the highest office in the land. From then on, the president-elect would be known as Nuts.

As Lincoln’s enemies finalized their plans, Pinkerton, Warne, and Lincoln set out on a desperate overnight flight.

Meanwhile, back in Baltimore, Harry Davies had been invited to a meeting of the secret group conspiring against Lincoln. In a complicated ceremony, he was sworn in by Ferrandini, dressed all in black, who laid out the plan: to shoot Lincoln, on Saturday, February 23, shortly after 1:00 p.m., as the president-elect was transferring between Baltimore’s train stations. That left less than three days to act.

George Kane, Baltimore’s Police Marshal, was in on the plan. He would make sure Lincoln didn’t have a proper police escort.

The plot was foiled, but Lincoln only had hardship ahead of him – and everlasting posthumous glory.

When Lincoln and Pinkerton arrived in Washington, neither had slept for close to 48 hours. But the mission wasn’t over yet. Pinkerton still needed to conceal Lincoln’s identity as they made their way through the Washington station. He failed: a middle-aged man jumped out, grabbing at Lincoln and shouting his name. Pinkerton lunged.

“Don’t strike him! That is my friend,” Lincoln yelled. Pinkerton sheepishly released the man’s lapels. Lincoln chuckled, introducing him to his old friend, a congressman from Illinois.

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Worum geht es in The Lincoln Conspiracy?

The Lincoln Conspiracy (2020) tells the story of the first assassination attempt on America’s 16th president – before he was even president. Organized by a secret cabal of pro-slavery Southern secessionists, the plot was foiled by famous private detective Allan Pinkerton, as well as Kate Warne, one of his agents, and the first female detective in America.

Wer The Lincoln Conspiracy lesen sollte

Civil War fanatics
Lincoln geeks
Anyone interested in the story of abolitionism

Über den Autor

Brad Meltzer is the author of eleven best-selling thrillers. Josh Mensch is a television documentarian. Together, they also wrote The First Conspiracy, about the plot to kill America’s first president George Washington.

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