Beschreibung:

LINCOLN, Abraham, ASSASSINATION]. War Department, Washington, April 20, 1865. $100,000 Reward! The Murderer of our Late Beloved President, Abraham Lincoln, is still at large. $50,000 Reward will be paid...for his apprehension, in addition to any reward offered by Municipal Authorities, or State Executives. $25,000 Reward Will be paid for the apprehension of John H. Surratt, one of Booth's Accomplices. $25,000 Reward will be paid for the apprehension of David C. Herold, another of Booth's accomplices. ...Let the stain of innocent blood be removed from the land by the arrest and punishment of the murderers. All good citizens are exhorted to aid public justice on this occasion...[signed in type:] Edwin M. Stanton, Secretary of War. [Washington, D.C.], 20 April 1865. (Kunhardt & Kunhardt, Twenty Days , p.106; The Last Best Hope of Earth: Abraham Lincoln and the promise of America , ed. J. Rhodehamel and T. F. Schwartz, 1993, pp.68-69; S. Swanson and D. Weinberg, Lincoln's Assassins: Their Trial and Execution, an Illustrated History , Santa Fe: Arena Editions, 2001, p. 50, fig. 38). Folio (23¾ x 12 1/8 in.), three early albumen photos attached in small frames at the top (Surratt, Booth, Herold), paper evenly browned, slight wear along old folds, a few small holes neatly patched without loss, backed with linen, neatly laid down on acid-free matboard . "LET THE STAIN OF INNOCENT BLOOD BE REMOVED FROM THE LAND": THE WAR DEPARTMENT REWARD POSTER, AN EXAMPLE WITH PHOTOGRAPHS ATTACHED Probably the most famous reward poster in American history. At the time it was circulated by the War Department, only John Wilkes Booth, Herold and Surratt had been identified as part of the assassination conspiracy. Herold escaped with Booth into Maryland then into Virginia, where, six days after this poster was issued, they were surrounded by a detachment of Union soldiers in a Virginia tobacco barn. Herold surrendered, but Booth refused to give himself up and was fatally shot. (Herold was subsequently tried, convicted and executed with other conspirators on 6 June 1865. Surratt escaped to Europe but was brought back for trial in 1867.) The broadside is known in two separate printings (the present corresponds to the second printing, first issue): First printing . Makes no provision for the mounting of photographic images at the top; vertical dimension is approximately 580mm. (22 7/8 in.) In the description of Booth at the bottom, the text reads "and wears a heavy black mustache." The conspirator Herold is simply described as "a little, chunky man, quite a youth, and wears a very thin moustache." (A copy of this version, from the Byron Reed Collection, was sold here on 8 October 1996, lot 209, $17,000.) Second printing, first issue : From an entirely new setting of type, it carries three small three-sided woodcut frames at the top, so that photographs of the conspirators might be inserted as they became available (these, some have noted, bear an uncanny resemblance to gallows trees); maximum vertical dimension is roughly (24 3/16 in.). In the description of Booth, the text is the same as the first printing: "and wears a heavy, black moustache." The physical description of "David C. Harold" ( sic ) is considerably more detailed than in the earlier version, here extending to three lines. A "Notice" regarding other rewards is appended at the bottom. Second printing, second issue : Identical to the first printing, first issue, except the text of the Booth description reads: "and wore a heavy mustache, which there is some reason to believe has been shaved off." A small number of copies of the second printing of the broadside have carte-de-visite albumens attached, as does this example (the copy at the Huntington has cartes of Booth and Herold, but not Surratt). Most of the extant copies were evidently not furnished with photographs at the time of their issue. Of the copies sold at auction in the last 22 years, only three (this, the Crocker copy, so