It was February 1861, and Abraham Lincoln had just launched a 12-day celebratory train journey from his home in rural Illinois to Washington, where he would soon be inaugurated as 16th president of the United States. The country was in turmoil — seven Southern states had seceded from the union — and on the cusp of civil war. Many wondered whether the country lawyer and one-term congressman had the skills necessary to rescue the nation; others didn’t want to give him the chance. Talk of assassination was in the air.
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