If you only knew the power of the dark side

John Wilkes Booth is an fascinating character to me in history. Specifically his intense interest and devotion to the southern cause. He was a successfull actor before and during the war and could have lived out an easy life but he felt a strong hatred for Lincoln and loyalty to the south. I looked up his history online and I found out he had been born in Maryland to British parents an acting family and I still coulden't really ascertain what it was that motivated his sympathy towards the south. In fact one of his brothers Edwin intensely disagreed with his feelings about the whole thing and refused to perform with him during his later years. He spent his last days brooding alone drinking heavily, and pondering ways to at first kidnap and then assassinate the president. Also I find it interesting that Lincoln would have attended the showing of 'Our American cousin' without any kind of guard or protection against possible threats. I guess it had not happened before but Booth just walked in while the president was engrossed in the play and shot him in the back of the head. And a student of history wonders how reconstruction and that whole process would have been different had Abe been at the helm instead of old Andrew Johnson. Probably alot better.