John Wilkes Booth is a name with that most Americans know due to his evil deed of assassinating Abraham Lincoln. However, his deed and ability to hide for as long as he did required overcoming a great number of obstacles. In the book “Chasing Lincoln's Killer” by James L. Swanson, there were many conflicts that presented themselves. Some of which were overcome and some which were not. The major conflicts in the book were how and why John Wilkes Booth was going to kill Lincoln, and how Booth was going to escape. Both of Booths goals required careful planning and preparation, but in the end only one was achieved.
John Wilkes Booth was a known southern sympathizer, and despised Lincoln and his presidency.Booth formed a group to kidnap president…show more content… Booth hoped that killing Lincoln would help the confederacy. This makes killing Lincoln a person versus person obstacle, as well as a person versus society obstacle. It is a person versus person obstacle because killing someone obviously involves a conflict between two or more people. It is a person versus society issue because Lincoln represents an entire half of a nation, the union, and Booth the other half, the confederates. Now the actual task of assassinating Lincoln was difficult. However, Booth knew that Lincoln was going to be at Ford’s Theatre on April 14, and since “Booth knew the layout of Ford’s intimately”, (Swanson 11) he would have no trouble getting to where Lincoln was. Killing Lincoln was hard enough, but perhaps escaping and never getting caught was even more…show more content… Booth’s first obstacle in escaping was finding when and where to cross the Potomac river. This is a person versus nature conflict. Once across the river, Booth travels, with the help of Confederate Loyalists, deeper south all while being hunted by the US army. Eventually, Booth comes to the Garrett tobacco farm and stayed in their barn. The US army, then finds out he his hiding there, and rides to capture him. Once reaching the barn, they set it on fire to try and smoke Booth out. However, Sergeant Boston Corbett “watched Booth draw his pistol”, and “level the carbine to his hip, as though preparing to bring it into firing position” (Swanson. 173) Corbett then shot Booth in the spinal cord, which killed him very quickly. The conflict of killing Booth was both a person versus person conflict, as well as a person versus society conflict because Corbett represents the Union, while Booth represents the Confederacy. Although Booth and his hunters both faced great obstacles and conflicts to achieve their separate goals, in the end it was the hunters that prevailed.
The conflicts and obstacles that presented themselves to John Wilkes Booth and his hunters were unique and challenging in their own ways. For Booth, it was a matter of achieving in what his mind was justice. But for his hunters,the challenges were remarkably similar.Their obstacles and conflicts
