Mourning the President

Lincoln was shot on April 14, Good Friday, 1865. There were at least twelve funeral services for him, beginning in Washington on Wednesday, April 19, with a service in the White House. The casket was then transported to the Capitol, where thousands more visitors filed by to pay their final respects.

On Friday, April 21, the President’s funeral train left Washington on a journey that would cover more than 1,600 miles, retracing the path Lincoln took four years earlier from Springfield to the nation’s capital. Between April 21 and May 3, there were ceremonies in Baltimore, Harrisburg, Philadelphia, New York, Albany, Buffalo, Cleveland, Columbus, Indianapolis, Chicago, and Springfield. In each city, the coffin was laid out for public viewing and hundreds of thousands turned out to view the body. Hundreds of thousands more lined the tracks in each city to greet the arriving or departing train.

Writing about the funeral service he attended in Albany, Cornell’s first President, Andrew Dickson White, remembered:

The funeral was conducted with dignity and solemnity. When the coffin was opened and we were allowed to take one last look at Lincoln's face, it impressed me as having the same melancholy expression which I had seen upon it when he entered the East Room at the White House. In its quiet sadness there seemed to have been no change. There was no pomp in the surroundings; all, though dignified, was simple. Very different was it from the show and ceremonial at the funeral of the Emperor Nicholas which I had attended ten years before; —but it was even more impressive.

—Andrew Dickson White

Funeral Procession Program. Washington: Thursday, April 19, 1865. Washington, D.C.
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This program for Lincoln’s funeral in Washington details the order of the procession from the White House to the Capitol. Listed participants include a military escort, clergy, the hearse and pallbearers, representatives of the Senate, House, Army and Navy, the Lincoln family, the cabinet, diplomatic representatives, and others.

Gift of Gail and Stephen Rudin

Lincoln’s Funeral Train in Philadelphia. Photographed by James E. McClees, Philadelphia. Saturday, April 22, 1865.
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Describing the reception of Lincoln’s funeral train in Philadelphia, the Inquirer reported that “Half a million sorrow-stricken people were upon the streets to do honor to all that was left of the man whom they respected, revered and loved with an affection never before bestowed upon any other...”

Collection of Stephan Loewentheil

Lincoln’s Funeral Hearse. Photographed by Draper & Husted. [Philadelphia, April 1865].
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This image of Lincoln’s funeral hearse was taken in front of the Philadelphia shop of the undertaker who designed it, Edward Earley.

Collection of Stephan Loewentheil

The Funeral of President Lincoln in New York. Tuesday April 25, 1865. Currier & Ives, 1865.
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On April 25, Lincoln’s hearse was drawn by 16 horses in a New York City funeral procession that traveled up Broadway to Fourteenth Street, over to Fifth Avenue, up Fifth to Thirty-fourth Street, and across Thirty-fourth to Ninth Avenue to the Hudson River Railway Depot.

Susan H. Douglas Collection of Political Americana

Head-Quarters, Army of the Potomac. General Orders No. 16. April 17, 1865. A directive that military flags be flown at half mast on the day of Lincoln’s funeral.
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Gift of Gail and Stephen Rudin

John Gilmary Shea, editor. The Lincoln Memorial: A Record of the Life, Assassination, and Obsequies of the Martyred President. New York: Bunce and Huntington, 1865.
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James Leaming. Letter to Reuben Leaming. April 17, 1865.
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James Leaming writes to his brother, Reuben, about the death of the President: “Dear Brother, The whole north is draped in mourning. The nation laments the death of the President by the hands of an assassin...In the hour of victory in our nation’s proudest hour the most beloved man of all is taken from us...”

Gift of Gail and Stephen Rudin

Postal Envelope Cover, 1865.
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Gift of Gail and Stephen Rudin

Abraham Lincoln Mourning Ribbons, 1865.
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Gift of Gail and Stephen Rudin

President Lincoln’s Funeral March. Sheet music. Composed by E. Mack. Philadelphia: Lee & Walker, [1865].
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Gift of Gail and Stephen Rudin

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