DC By the Book

Excerpt: As the grim news spread through Washington City, angry crowds spilled into the cold, muddy night. Abraham Lincoln had been shot at Ford’s Theatre, on Tenth Street. The wounds were mortal, people were saying. There was no way he could survive.

Excerpt: The same night found Jonathan and Meg at the National Theatre, where a strange drama called "Brand", by an unknown but clearly mad Norwegian named Ibsen, was being performed to great acclaim.

Excerpt: Here was Third Street, just above C Street, where even in the darkness it was possible to make out the charred remains of what had once been the bawdy house kept by Sophia Harbour, known to the trade as Madame Sophie.

Excerpt: The streetcar pulled up at the carriage block on the corner of Fourteenth Street, near the Willard Hotel, where negroes were not welcome except in service. Abigail stepped carefully down onto the broken stone. Neither the driver nor any of the gentlemen passing on the street made any effort to assist her, but she had not expected them to.

Excerpt: The Executive Mansion was falling apart. Many of the great rooms downstairs had been refurbished beautifully by Mrs. Lincoln, at an expense so fabulous that the Congress had opened an investigation. But the second floor, the puny family apartments, and this rabbit warren of offices for the President and his tiny staff – remained as they had been for most of the century: cramped, dingy, ill-lighted.

Excerpt: On the Island, as it was known, the irregular southwest corner of the city, bounded by the Potomac and Anacostia Rivers and the fetid remains of the barge canal to the north, the new day was announced by the bells of the dairy wagon on its rounds, and the clattering of hooves as cabs and horsecars arrived at the Seventh Street Wharf, disgorging passengers and cargo to catch the first ferry of the day over to the Virginia side.

Excerpt: On the Island, as it was known, the irregular southwest corner of the city, bounded by the Potomac and Anacostia Rivers and the fetid remains of the barge canal to the north, the new day was announced by the bells of the dairy wagon on its rounds, and the clattering of hooves as cabs and horsecars arrived at the Seventh Street Wharf, disgorging passengers and cargo to catch the first ferry of the day over to the Virginia side.

Excerpt: She reached the front just in time to see Abraham Lincoln himself, victor in the war and savior of her people, crossing Pennsylvania Avenue toward Lafayette Park, trailed by a lone bucktail, as members of the Pennsylvania regimentwho guarded the President were known.

Excerpt: Two years after the attack, Seward remained hidden from public view, in his house across Lafayette Park from the Mansion, tended by his son Frederick and a servant or two, seeing nobody except a few intimates - including Mr. Lincoln.

Excerpt: Rather than alighting from the car where the tracks crossed Fourteenth Street, as she would if heading for the office, Abigail remained aboard until Lafayette Park was directly across the street from the White House.

Excerpt: She nodded, nervous excitement making the color rise girlishly in her cheeks, "On the original plan of the city, that bluff up ahead is supposed to hold the national cathedral. But nobody expects it to be built. Look how long it took them to put the new dome on the Capitol, and of course poor General Washington's monument looks as if it will never be finished."

Excerpt: They were turning right. The road flattened, and the land opened out. Tennally Town was farm country, with the occasional factory or warehouse sprinkled in.

Excerpt: And so they went up to the Capitol, to watch the Senators give their speeches, explaining which way they would vote. If all who wished to speak could be heard today, the Senate would vote. Otherwise the trial would adjourn for Easter weekend, resuming on Tuesday.

Excerpt: Abigail shut her eyes and drew the blanket up to her neck. They had reached Georgetown, the unincorporated village inhabited by freed slaves and poor whites, few people of either color possessing many prospects. No sensible person went into Georgetown at night.

Excerpt: It was midday Wednesday, three days after Abigail’s resignation. They were visiting a jeweler on the second floor of a building on Seventeenth Street, across from the Old Clubhouse, where William Seward was living, or perhaps dying, seeing nobody other than a few close friends, running the State Department through his son Frederick, the assistant secretary.

Excerpt: A thin red glisten on Washington’s monument hinted that morning was very near. Abigail could not remember the last time she had stayed up all night.

Excerpt: THE HORSECARS HAD vanished. Everywhere, people were running, crying, shouting at no one and everyone, rushing about madly without any thought to destination. Struggling away from Capitol Hill, Abigail heard a military trumpet in the distance, and, closer in, voices raised in vicious argument as three or four men came to blows.

Excerpt: "Walk where?" "I don't know, but we should go." They did, finally reaching the corner of Second and B. The throng was thinning here, and a streetcar came clattering up, part of the Anacostia & Potomac Line, the driver shouting and cursing and sounding his horn to clear a lane.

Excerpt: Moments later, she was outside the Capitol in the midst of the jostling, struggling throng, not sure where she should be going.

Excerpt: They were at the White House.

Excerpt: Lincoln was heading for the grim fortress known as the Old Clubhouse, home of Secretary of State Steward, his closest friend and adviser, who had not left the house in the two years since he was himself attacked, Lincoln gravely wounded, and Vice-President Andrew Johnson murdered.

Excerpt: They passed the Old Clubhouse, the grim granite mansion of Secretary of State William Seward, who had not left it in two years.

Excerpt: But Abigail was staring at the Old Clubhouse, residence of Mr. Lincoln's closest friend and most trusted adviser, wondering why Edwin Stanton's personal bodyguard was skulking outside.