The Lincoln Conspiracy

March 15, 2020
The tale of how Abraham Lincoln came close to being assassinated even before taking the oath of office. In short, energetic chapters, Meltzer and Mensch, who collaborated on The First Conspiracy: The Secret Plot To Kill George Washington (2019), fashion a brisk political thriller centered on a nefarious plot to murder Lincoln before his inauguration. Lincoln, who won a slim majority of the popular vote, was deeply hated by the slaveholding South. Six weeks after the election, South Carolina became the first state to secede; five others soon followed, and Jefferson Davis was sworn in as president of the Confederacy. But secession did not satisfy a group of conspirators who gathered to devise a plan to seize the city of Washington and prevent the inauguration and even to kill Lincoln on his way to the capital, "and thus inaugurate a revolution." The authors speculate that the conspirators were likely members of the Knights of the Golden Circle and National Volunteers, groups composed of pro-slavery white supremacists that grew in virulence after Lincoln's election and likely were precursors of the Ku Klux Klan. They were thwarted largely through the efforts of pioneering private detective Allen Pinkerton, who was called in to investigate, and foil, the plot. The authors create an admiring portrait of Pinkerton and his staff, which included the first female detective, the sly, unflappable Kate Warne. In addition, a secret "Committee of Five," convened by Secretary of State William Seward, gathered in Washington to ensure the peaceful transfer of power. Pinkerton was charged with logistics, which meant studying the train route for Lincoln's convoluted inaugural journey, planning for every contingency, and eventually masterminding a plan that involved smuggling Lincoln, in disguise, onto a train days before he was expected. In addition to revealing the conspiracy, the authors vividly convey the virulent racism endemic in the South. A sharply drawn episode from a regrettable part of America's past. (b/w illustrations)

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March 30, 2020
Meltzer and Mensch (The First Conspiracy) deliver a solid recounting of the conspiracy to assassinate president-elect Abraham Lincoln during his February 1861 railroad trip from Springfield, Ill., to Washington, D.C., and the successful efforts to foil it. Opening in dramatic fashion (“There’s a secret on this train”), the authors describe how “America’s first private detective,” Allan Pinkerton, and two undercover agents—a man and a woman—snuck Lincoln, who was disguised as the woman’s invalid brother and concealed in a sleeper berth, into Baltimore, Md., in the middle of the night, where he changed trains and immediately departed, thwarting “an underground network of secessionists” who expected him to arrive a day-and-a-half later. Flashbacks to Lincoln’s presidential campaign illuminate the tensions between pro- and anti-slavery activists, and the authors briskly detail the backgrounds of conspirators Cypriano Ferrandini, Baltimore’s “most powerful barber,” and 28-year-old socialite Otis K. Hillard, as well as the efforts of Pinkerton Agency detectives to gather intelligence on the white supremacist societies allegedly behind the plot. Meltzer and Mensch maintain suspense despite the known outcome of the story, and convincingly counter claims that Pinkerton made the whole thing up for publicity purposes. Readers new to the “Baltimore Plot” will appreciate this comprehensive and well-written overview.

April 17, 2020

Coauthors Meltzer and Mensch (The First Conspiracy: The Secret Plot to Kill George Washington) turn their historical sleuthing skills to uncover the plot by Baltimore pro-secessionists to murder president-elect Abraham Lincoln while he passed through Baltimore on his way to his inauguration in 1861. Relying largely on the field notes and recollections of private detective Allen Pinkerton and his agents, the authors follow the trail of intrigue, disguises, deceptions, and countermoves whereby Pinkerton and company worked their way into the plotters' circle to foil the murder plot. The account moves back and forth between the investigation and Lincoln's journey, from his home in Illinois to his inauguration in Washington, DC, but the book's real appeal is in its descriptions of the methods and meaning of the Pinkertons' work. VERDICT While the authors offer no new information or interpretation of Lincoln's preinaugural journey, which is better related in Ted Widmer's Lincoln on the Verge: Thirteen Days to Washington, the instructive accounting of the mentality, movements, and means of Pinkerton and his agents makes for a revealing look inside the world of secessionist fanaticism.--Randall M. Miller, St. Joseph's Univ., Philadelphia

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April 15, 2020
Best-selling novelist and television host Meltzer and documentarian Mensch return to the winning formula of The First Conspiracy (2019) in this account of a conspiracy against President Abraham Lincoln, whose 1860 election became a flashpoint for southern opposition. As Lincoln traveled from Illinois to Washington, DC, for his 1861 inauguration, well-founded fears developed that Lincoln would be attacked in Baltimore, a choke point on the railroad routes between the northern U.S. and DC and a city with strong southern sympathies. The conspiracy failed, with Lincoln spirited through town to catch his DC train, but it allows a fascinating look at the conspirators and the investigators who thwarted them. Meltzer and Mensch introduce a constellation of pro-slavery militias and secret societies, with names like the Knights of the Golden Circle, which worked with the local police on plans to ensnare Lincoln, while their discussion of how the newly founded Pinkerton National Detective Agency infiltrated the conspiracy includes unexpected details of undercover work, 1860s-style?including by pathbreaking women detectives. A delightful addition to popular literature on the Civil War era.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2020, American Library Association.)