November 25, 1864—In their first and only performance together, three members of America’s first great family of tragedians—Edwin, John Wilkes, and Junius Booth Jr.—appeared in a benefit at New York’s Winter Garden Theater. Outside city streets on that night, eight agents of the Confederate Secret Service (CSS) spread mayhem by setting fires in several Broadway hotels—just a small portent of the chaos that John Wilkes Booth would unleash six months later.
Most visitors who pass by the statue of William Shakespeare on Literary Walk in Lower Central Park are unaware that at least one source of the funds for this work by John Quincy Adams Ward derived from the Booth brothers’ benefit--an estimated $3,500 to $4,000, by later accounts. And still fewer realize that the play in which they appeared was about assassination: Julius Caesar.
Given his subsequent act of madness, you’d think that John would have taken on the role of assassin—but instead, he played Marc Antony. To his way of thinking, though, this might have made sense—Antony not only was a major character with that “Friends, Romans, Countrymen” speech, but he’d managed to alter the course of events seemingly tilted against him through charm, eloquence and guile—something that Booth hoped to do now, a growing number of historians believe, as an agent employed by the CSS.
Instead, the role of assassins fell to the brothers at odds with John for his Confederate sympathies. It fell to Edwin Booth to play the conscience-stricken conspirator Brutus. You might argue that his character’s inner torment had echoed in his own life the last few years. He was still sorrowing over the death of his wife, actress Mary Devlin, the prior year; in a way, he would never really get over it.
The role of Cassius, assumed by Junius Jr., would have really suited John. You remember why Caesar disliked Cassius, right? He "has a lean and hungry look; he thinks too much; such men are dangerous."
Most visitors who pass by the statue of William Shakespeare on Literary Walk in Lower Central Park are unaware that at least one source of the funds for this work by John Quincy Adams Ward derived from the Booth brothers’ benefit--an estimated $3,500 to $4,000, by later accounts. And still fewer realize that the play in which they appeared was about assassination: Julius Caesar.
Given his subsequent act of madness, you’d think that John would have taken on the role of assassin—but instead, he played Marc Antony. To his way of thinking, though, this might have made sense—Antony not only was a major character with that “Friends, Romans, Countrymen” speech, but he’d managed to alter the course of events seemingly tilted against him through charm, eloquence and guile—something that Booth hoped to do now, a growing number of historians believe, as an agent employed by the CSS.
Instead, the role of assassins fell to the brothers at odds with John for his Confederate sympathies. It fell to Edwin Booth to play the conscience-stricken conspirator Brutus. You might argue that his character’s inner torment had echoed in his own life the last few years. He was still sorrowing over the death of his wife, actress Mary Devlin, the prior year; in a way, he would never really get over it.
The role of Cassius, assumed by Junius Jr., would have really suited John. You remember why Caesar disliked Cassius, right? He "has a lean and hungry look; he thinks too much; such men are dangerous."
Junius, though the least talented, might also have been the least conflicted of the three Booth brothers. He would eventually not only leave acting by becoming a theater manager, but even get into another business entirely—hotels.
The political differences separating Antony from the two conspirators mirrored the divided loyalties of the trio of brothers. John was an increasingly loud Confederate sympathizer; Junius exhibited merely Democratic leanings; while Edwin would have nothing to do with John’s views. As it happened, Edwin had become a particular favorite of Abraham Lincoln’s, as the theater-loving President saw him in four plays in eight weeks in 1864.
Subsequent correspondence shows that Edwin had tried unsuccessfully to secure John during the summer. Besides the usual itinerant schedule that many actors maintained then, another factor unknown to Edwin might have limited John’s availability: his increasingly strenuous efforts to aid the CSS.
John by this time had already formulated plans to kidnap the President. It would only be in the new year that he would change his mind and decide to kill Lincoln instead.
The political differences separating Antony from the two conspirators mirrored the divided loyalties of the trio of brothers. John was an increasingly loud Confederate sympathizer; Junius exhibited merely Democratic leanings; while Edwin would have nothing to do with John’s views. As it happened, Edwin had become a particular favorite of Abraham Lincoln’s, as the theater-loving President saw him in four plays in eight weeks in 1864.
Subsequent correspondence shows that Edwin had tried unsuccessfully to secure John during the summer. Besides the usual itinerant schedule that many actors maintained then, another factor unknown to Edwin might have limited John’s availability: his increasingly strenuous efforts to aid the CSS.
John by this time had already formulated plans to kidnap the President. It would only be in the new year that he would change his mind and decide to kill Lincoln instead.
The Booth brothers were reviving, in their own fashion, the tumultuous life of their father. Junius Brutus Booth, considered the first great tragedian to appear over a prolonged period in the U.S., fled England as a 25-year-old in 1821, deserting his wife and two-year-old child to run away with a Bow Street flower-seller, Mary Ann Holmes, already pregnant with Junius Jr. The couple claimed to have wed shortly after coming to the U.S., because it was not recognized. Because the wife he left behind did not learn of his second family until 1846, then would not grant him a divorce for another five, all nine children he had with Mary Ann were conceived out of wedlock.
Junius Sr. possessed a reverence for life, teaching his children not even to hurt a fly. But he was also mad for much of his adult life, a weakness exacerbated by drinking bouts. While performing Othello, he aroused the fires of others in his company that he would really smother Desdemona with a pillow. He could disappear for days on end and even be found on city streets naked.
Decades later, as his sons rose to prominence, it was natural for some to compare their styles of performance. Edwin was striving for a more naturalistic style, while John imitated the grandiloquence of his father. One Cleveland theater manager wrote that John “has more of the old man’s power in one performance than Edwin can show in a year. He has the fire, the dash, the touch of strangeness.”
Ah, strangeness—the quality that can win multiple awards from fellow thespians—and turn you into someone with a dangerous political monomania. That fall, Booth was meeting up in Montreal with representatives from the CSS. In October, a ciphered letter was sent from Richmond to Booth: His "friends would be set to work as directed."
Junius Sr. possessed a reverence for life, teaching his children not even to hurt a fly. But he was also mad for much of his adult life, a weakness exacerbated by drinking bouts. While performing Othello, he aroused the fires of others in his company that he would really smother Desdemona with a pillow. He could disappear for days on end and even be found on city streets naked.
Decades later, as his sons rose to prominence, it was natural for some to compare their styles of performance. Edwin was striving for a more naturalistic style, while John imitated the grandiloquence of his father. One Cleveland theater manager wrote that John “has more of the old man’s power in one performance than Edwin can show in a year. He has the fire, the dash, the touch of strangeness.”
Ah, strangeness—the quality that can win multiple awards from fellow thespians—and turn you into someone with a dangerous political monomania. That fall, Booth was meeting up in Montreal with representatives from the CSS. In October, a ciphered letter was sent from Richmond to Booth: His "friends would be set to work as directed."
CSS agents were already at large in New York that night. In the aftermath of the multiple fires, more than 200 people were rounded up and the newspapers were filled with talk about how the government had to be more careful about restricting Southerners in the North.
Of course, the eight real saboteurs escaped.
Oh, one other thing: one fire was set at the LaFarge House, adjacent to the Winter Garden, around 9:20 pm. Though quickly extinguished, it set off tremendous consternation next door at the Winter Garden. It took Edwin Booth, a police inspector, and a local judge to soothe everyone’s nerves at the packed audience.
When John murdered the President months later, Edwin withdrew in shock and sorrow from the stage for months. It was not until January 1866, when he returned to the Winter Garden, in the role he had begun immediately after his benefit performance with his brothers—Hamlet—that he was able to resume his career.
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