Prologue

Fall 1937

With his Springfield Model 1861 rifle cocked and loaded, the assassin waited nervously behind a patch of oak trees beyond the old horse trail. Soon, he spotted his target—a tall, thin, black-haired man in his mid-fifties riding quickly uphill on a chestnut brown horse. The target’s speed made for a much tougher shot, affording the assassin with only a single opportunity. He set, aimed, andfired.

But the rider maintained too fast of a pace for the assassin, and the bullet disappeared into the trees. The sound of applause competed with the sound of the assassin’s rifle as he dropped it to the ground.

The spectators offered a standing ovation to the actors that had reenacted this famous scene outside Abraham Lincoln’s summer cottage, as the target and the assassin took their respective bows.

The crowds gathered daily for the Lincoln Assassination Attempt on the grounds of the Old Soldiers’ Home in Washington, DC. A retirement home for veterans from the Great War, the Spanish-American War, and Indian conflicts, this extensive facility with its rolling hills and mature trees had served as President Lincoln’s summer home decades before in the 1860s. This free reenactment had become a very popular attraction among cost-conscious Depression-erafamilies.

Seventy-six-year-old Benton Steuben frequently watched the early afternoon showing of the reenactment. Still a stocky and strong man with curly white hair, age had softened the intensity of Benton’s facial features to present a more grandfatherly and approachable look. Only a small child at the time of the real assassination attempt during President Lincoln’s first term, Benton would often entertain crowds after the show with stories about Washington, DC during that time period. Financially sound in his retirement, Benton always refused tips. But, he never refused requests for stories, and he always answered the questions fielded by anychildren.

The Lincoln cottage area used to stage the reenactment only constituted two of the 250 acres in Old Soldiers’ Home. While originally designed for the veterans, the neighborhood children would use much of the remaining 248 acres for its trails, hills, and grassy fields to sled in the winter, ride bikes in the summer, and play baseball and football year-round. Eight-year-old Stanley and five-year-old Wally Peckertski spent more time playing at Old Soldiers’ Home than any of the neighborhood kids after finishing their school days at the red brick school building on Decatur Street known as Barnard Elementary School.

On