Today it is the most famous reward poster in American history. In 1865, it was the symbol of a failing, increasingly desperate manhunt. James L. Swanson acquired a copy of it when he was 19 while a sophomore at the University of Chicago. He bought it instead of a car.
Booth shot Lincoln in front of 1500 witnesses, escaped from the theater, galloped away on a horse and essentially vanished. The failure of several thousand pursuers to capture him became an embarrassment to the government.
On April 20, six days after the assassination, Secretary of War Stanton proclaimed a $100,000 reward for Booth's capture and that of two of his alleged accomplices. It was a staggering sum at the time when an average worker earned about $1 a day and the War Department printed broadsides to publicize it.
Every penny of the blood money was paid, divided among a dozen of the pursuers most credited with the capture and death of Booth.
Catch the Guy. --Old Secesh
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