Abe’s bones were once interfered with by the Irish. Rob Buchanan tells us the story.
We travel outside the Pale today, but the Dublin connection to this macabre story will be obvious. In the 36 years between Abraham Lincoln’s assassination and final burial, his mortal remains had many gruesome adventures. A scandalous heist to steal his remains happened on the 17th November 1876, 11 years after his assassination in Ford’s Theatre.
Even Irish people regard the tall gaunt 16th president of the United States as a cultural icon. The bearded and stovepipe-hatted leader’s assassination in 1865 was headline news around the world. In death his body made some unscrupulous Irish people see dollar signs!
Abraham Lincoln’s Corpse
But before the bodysnatchers got involved, Lincoln’s corpse was already causing hassle. His grieving and mentally ill widow, Mary Todd Lincoln, engaged in a custody battle with the U.S. government. The officials believed Lincoln was the property of the people, and therefore his tomb should be in the centre of Springfield Illinois. His wife understandably wanted somewhere more private. She eventually got her wish. His first resting place was an above-ground marble sarcophagus in the verdant Oak Ridge cemetery, Springfield Illinois. Yet when poor haunted Mary Lincoln passed away in 1882, against her wishes, she was cold-heartedly buried apart from him in a mere side chamber of her husband’s tomb.
Mary Todd Lincoln
Now back to the grave robbing caper. It’s difficult to imagine how extremely dangerous, and profitable, counterfeiting was in previous centuries. The crime’s severity usually carried a mandatory death sentence. It was synonymous with treason. But during the American Civil War, amid the chaos, the stakes of counterfeiting were lower. And the risks of getting caught were mitigated by this increased profitability.
When Chicago’s finest arrested master counterfeiter Ben Boyd for possession of currency plates, his gangland crime boss Irishman James “Big Jim” Kennally was furious. His biggest moneymaker was behind bars with a huge bail. So this crack team of criminals came up with a cunning, if needlessly complicated plan.
They would raid Lincoln’s tomb, snatch his mouldering remains and ransom them to raise funds. This money would be used to pay the Governor of Illinois to release their star counterfeiter Ben Boyd on bail. Yep, that’s a lot of unnecessary steps in my opinion! But I’m not body-snatching money-faking gangster. Boyd was considered the Einstein of money forgery; his work was undetectably perfect. So having him on your team was a licence to print money.
Abraham Lincoln and the Irish
This gang, by the way, was a decidedly Irish outfit. In Illinois, a disproportionately high percentage of the gangsters and associated tradesmen, property owners and “shovers” (counterfeit money launderers) happened to be immigrants from the Emerald Isle. Luckily our national image isn’t entirely tarnished by all these Paddy criminals. Because the blokes who brought these gangsters to justice included a courageous Dublin-born copper. More on him later.
Abraham Lincoln with his youngest son
So perhaps after way too much moonshine, Big Jim Kennally ordered two of his cronies, Jack Hughes and Torrence Mullen, to kidnap the body of Abraham Lincoln from his tomb and ransom it to bail Boyd out, plus another $200,000 because why the hell not?!
The receiving vault (foreground) and the tomb (background)
In maybe the only intelligent move in this catastrophic caper, the Irish lads realised that tomb raiding is an art requiring skill and experience. So enter Lewis Swegles, a man who claimed to have the talents required. What Swegles didn’t mention to the hapless crooks was that he was a Secret Service informant! Now the Chief of the Chicago Secret Service was another Irishman, Patrick D. Tyrrell. He was the ex-Dub copper.
The Mole
In a lamplit, cigar smoke-filled room, the Secret Serviceman, Swegles (the mole) and Lincoln’s son Robert hatched a plan. They would catch the bodysnatchers red-handed and destroy one of Chicago’s most dangerous gangs in the process.
Infantry and Cavalry statues at the corners of the obelisk.
A few nights later, beneath a cloud-shrouded crescent moon, the would-be graverobbers made their way across the crisp, frosted cemetery grass. Perfect weather for body snatching. Clinging to the shadows of the autumn night, the graverobbers had no idea that the authorities lay in wait amid the silent tombstones for them.
For the recently formed U.S. Secret Service, this wasn’t just another criminal case to bust. This mission was an almost a religious obligation.
The Graveyard
The criminals tried hard to appear nonchalant to their colleagues but the sight of the massive graveyard stretching endlessly in all directions made them shiver despite themselves. And apparently, the cops were equally nervous. Because just as the thieves began to use their tools upon the mausoleum a gunshot shattered the eerie silence of the cemetery. The percussion resonated off the hundreds of headstones.
1865 illustration of Lincoln burial
A hair-triggered local sheriff had prematurely fired. Terrified of being shot, or perhaps being torn to pieces by enraged Lincoln fanatics, the would-be bodysnatchers fled. To make matters worse, in the heat of the moment, the bumbling secret service agents thought the thieves were shooting at them so they shot back also. Within seconds the tranquillity of the tombs became the O.K.Coral.
The gangsters escape in the fog of war however 10 days later the unlucky lackeys were apprehended. Jack Hughes and Torrence Mullen and several other gang members were arrested. Hughes was indicted for counterfeiting in connection with Boyd who was out on bail at the time. Mullen was not only a thief and also a counterfeiter and got a hefty stretch. Dishonoured and hated for their shameful plan, the Chicago gang collapsed.
About a quarter of a century later, on the 26th September 1901, another good law-abiding Irishman called John Power became the Lincoln crypt’s custodian. He and Robert Lincoln, the late president’s son, took the opportunity to renovate and further secure his Da’s remains. Unhappy with the security arrangements still, Power formed an anonymous team who relocated Honest Abe to a secret grave.
His busy body was transferred to a new coffin, which in turn was placed inside a steel cage. This huge assembly was then buried 10 feet under the floor of the Monument. Oh, and they covered it all with concrete as the icing on the impregnable cadaver cake! The Irishman Power and his team swore a solemn oath to protect the remains. The descendants of these men still have a secret society today.
Mary Todd Lincoln’s crypt in the Burial Room is next to those of her sons
And remember Abraham’s poor late wife Mary, who had been stuck in a niche beside her more favourite husband? Well, their son Robert Lincoln ensured when the secret society moved his Da to the new place, they took Mary too and this time laid her right beside him where she’d always been in life.
For more history please follow Rob on Instagram here.
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Author bio:
Rob Buchanan was one of the winners of 2015 Poetry Ireland Introductions series. His debut poetry collection “The Cost of Living” sold out. He has won national and international awards for his writing, and has been published in a number of poetry journals and magazines including The Stinging Fly, Flare, Live Encounters and Pendemic. Rob was a winner of the Young Ireland Award in Glasgow for his lectures on the Dangers of Democracy. He has written popular current affairs columns for, and been published, in DublinLive, The Outmost, Eile, An Phoblacht , Rukkle, Headspace and The Journal. Rob lives in Dublin and is working on his first novel and a Dublin history anthology.
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