#i appreciate that manhunt at least has seward

[livesinyesterday]

The New York Tribune reported on April 17 that "the terrible news of Mr. Lincoln's death was broken to [Seward] last night." [...] Brooks reported on April 20 that a few days before, Seward had asked to have his bed moved near the window. "His eye caught the stars and stripes at half-mast on the War Department," and Seward told his attendant: "the President is dead." The attendant, according to Brooks, "stammered and changed color as he tried to say nay," but Seward continued: "If he had been alive he would have been the first to call on me; but he has not been here, nor has he sent to know how I am, and there's the flag at half mast." Then Seward, "lay in silence, the great tears coursing down his gashed cheeks, and the dreadful truth sinking into his mind."

-- Walter Stahr, Seward: Lincoln's Indispensable Man