On April 14, 1865, John Wilkes Booth shot President Abraham Lincoln in the back of the head at Ford’s Theatre in Washington, D.C. The president was carried across the street to a boarding house, where he died the next morning. After a week of viewings in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda, a train carried Lincoln’s body back home to Springfield, Illinois, for burial. The train traveled through 180 cities in seven states along the way, and it has been estimated that more than seven million Americans saw the funeral train on its journey to Oak Ridge Cemetery.
The solemn trip home:
- The train, dubbed “The Lincoln Special,” also carried the casket of Lincoln’s son, Willie, who had passed away three years earlier. Abraham Lincoln's widow, First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln, wanted them both to be buried in the family plot.
- In 10 cities along the route, Lincoln’s coffin was taken off the train and transported to a public building, so that citizens could see Lincoln lying in repose. Some waited more than five hours to pay their last respects.
- Lincoln was the first American president whose body was transported by a funeral train. In later years, seven other presidents traveled to their final resting places by train -- including George H.W. Bush in 2018.