In time for the release of Steven Spielberg’s movie about Abraham Lincoln, we wanted to share with you this diary entry from Monday, April 24th, 1865. In the entry the writer, a minister who also happened to be famed Civil War nurse Annie Bell’s father, recounts the events of the day he attended Lincoln’s funeral.
In the minister’s April 21st entry he writes: “Left home this evening for Harrisburg (Pennsylvania) to attend the Funeral Obsequies of Prest Lincoln.” Three days later, in the entry depicted in the image below, the minister describes his day in Harrisburg:
Arrived in Harrisburg about 7 o’clock A.M. got breakfast at somebody’s hotel, a poor one. Went up to the Capitol and got into the crowd that was trying to get in to see the late great & good President Abraham Lincoln. Got through after getting a most dreadful squeezing. Saw him. He looks Natural. Went through a 2nd time. Home this evening. Great reason to be thankful.
