2025-01 Raynors Historical Collectible Auctions
Absentee bidding for this session ends on Sunday, January 26, 2025 at 10:00 AM EST.
The live portion of this session begins on Sunday, January 26, 2025 at 10:00 AM EST
Uncolored Print, 17” x 13”, titled “Assassination of President Lincoln, at Ford's Theatre, Washington, D.C., April 14th, 1865.” John Wilkes Booth wields a blood stained knife and jumps from the Presidential box where Lincoln sits slumped in his chair. Mary Todd Lincoln attends to her husband while the surrounding spectators exhibit hysteria and alarm. The Lincolns’ box, depicted as extremely small and overcrowded, contains their guests, Major Henry R. Rathbone and his fiancée, Clara Harris, although another unidentified female onlooker also occupies the box. Lincoln's guard had earlier left his post, so he is not depicted. On the top of the box railing rest a pair of opera glasses and a program, inscribed, “Ford's Theat../ American Cousin,” which is the name of the play being performed that night. The artist of this work, James E Baker (1837-1914), began as an apprentice at J. H. Bufford & Co. in 1857. He eventually became John Bufford’s principal draftsman and illustrator of sheet music. He worked in NYC in 1860-1867 and specialized in portrait prints. During the Civil War he produced, for Bufford, political cartoons and lithographs relating the national drama. He later worked for Armstrong & Company, remaining active until 1888.
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