John W. Nichols of Omaha Helped 

Guard Martyred President for 

“I don’t want any guard tonight.  If you want to go to the theatre you may.”

Those were the words Abraham Lincoln spoke to his guard shortly before he left the White house on April 14, 1865, to attend the Ford theater, where he was shot by J. Wilkes Booth.

J. W. Nichols of 2814 North Twenty-eighth avenue was one of those who heard the words uttered by the martyred president an hour or so before the fatal gun shot was fired. 

Mr. Nichols met the president on numerous occasions at the White house and at the Soldiers’ home, which latter place was the president’s summer residence.   Mr. Nichols was not on any particular intimate terms with Lincoln, but his recollections are such as to make a chat with this venerable citizen interesting. 

Personally Lincoln looked with disfavor on the idea of having a personal guard, but such were the times and so earnest were the entreaties of his advisors that he consented to have the guard. 

This presidential guard of 100 men was known as the One-Hundred Fiftieth Pennsylvania volunteers, Company K.  They were mustered at Crawford county under Captain V. D. Derickson, September 1862, and immediately ordered to Washington.  Lincoln frequently visited the guards and it was the want of Mrs. Lincoln to minister to any of them that happened to be in hospital quarters, so Mr. Nichols states.

And after bidding his guards adieu, for the last time it proved, by giving permission to attend the theater, word came soon that the president had been assassinated. 

“Turn out quick, boys; the president is shot!” was the manner in which a member of the guard rushed into quarters.  That member happened to have been at the theater and saw the terrible tragedy which struck terror in the heart of the nation. 

Mr. Nichols heard the somber message which his comrade bore and with the others quickly got into formation under Captain Getchell.  The guards went to the theater and later to the Peterson house across the way whence the wounded man had been borne. 

The guards were in attendance at the White house and at the funeral.  Mr. Nichols says he looked upon the face of the president before the end came the next morning at 7:22. 

Mr. Nichols, on one occasion, stopped Lincoln’s runaway horse, hearing its distressed rider, without hat or coat. 

“I was standing near the gate of the White house when the horse came along,” Mr. Nichols recalled.  “The president found peace of mind in a horseback ride during the days which tried his and other men’s souls.  On this occasion the animal came along at a mad pace.  Lincoln was holding on for dear life. 

“I grabbed the rein of the animal and checked its speed.  Lincoln remarked to me that the horse nearly got away with him.  Of course, it just happened that I was the one standing near the gate at the time, but I was pleased in having had the opportunity.” 

Lincoln spent the summer months at the soldiers’ home where he lived in a marble cottage.  An ambulance and mules were used at the place.  Philip Yoakum drove the ambulance.  Mr. Yoakum died at Lexington, Neb., a year ago.  Illustrative of the democratic ways of Lincoln, Mr. Nichols tells of an incident in which Yoakum was frightened and Lincoln rather amused. 

The story is that Lincoln had occasion to order the ambulance to convey him to the city, his regular conveyance having been disabled.  Lincoln got inside the ambulance and Yoakum diverted the mules toward the city.  Not long after the start was made a burr fell off and a wheel dropped to the ground.  Yoakum was in a dilemma.   

“Never mind, my boy, I’ll hold the mules while you go back and find the burr.  I’ve ridden in an oxcart,” Lincoln remarked to Yoakum.  In the barracks that night the laugh was on Yoakum. 

Mr. Nichols had nothing but sweet things to say of Mrs. Lincoln, who sympathized with her husband during his trying war days.  Mr. Nichols saw Mrs. Lincoln at many of the Friday evening functions in the White house.  He can look back and in his mind’s eye can see her in white gown, with flowers on her head.  To Mr. Nichols she was “pretty as a picture.” 

Mr. Nichols recalls the family coachman remarking on several occasions, when asked where he might be going, that he was going to take “the Queen of America out for a ride.”  Mrs. Lincoln ingratiated herself into the hearts of the guards.  She had a kind word for tem and there is at least one Omaha man who cherishes the memory of having been beneath the spell of her influence.  Mr. Nichols declares that many stories of her are not based on fact. 

“As homely as a rail fence,” is a way that Mr. Nichols describes Lincoln’s face, but he says he is second to no one in attesting to his great character.  He says there was something in the man’s personality which compelled admiration and respect.  He had occasion to notice the lines of care grow on Lincoln’s face as news of one battle chased upon the heels of another report.  He saw Lincoln walk between the White house and the war department on many occasions.  In connection with these official walks of the president Mr. Nichols relates an incident which may have escaped the historians. 

Through some mere chance the guard had been stationed near the walk along which the president walked on a particular day.  Mr. Nichols never knew just why the change was made, but he does state that it was the general report that plans to kidnap the president the next day had been intercepted.  It was the general impression, however, that the change of the guard tent thwarted the plans of the kidnappers.  The reported plan was to spirit the president of to Green’s place, near the river.  Mr. Nichols refers to Green as a “rank old rebel.” 

Mr. Nichols states that Lincoln was not inclined in telling jokes or stories during the war days.  He says the man was wrapped up in the affairs of those stirring days.  He was wont to take quiet walks with Mrs. Lincoln. 

“Tad” Lincoln, the president’s favorite son, frequently pictured even to this day sitting on Lincoln’s lap, visited the guards’ quarters.  “Tad” talked with Mr. Nichols on numerous occasions. 

Mr. Nichols received the first full account of Booth’s capture from Boston Corbett, the man who shot Booth in the building in which the murderer had taken refuge.  The Omaha man knew Corbett as a attendant at the McKingue Methodist chapel.  He also knew Illcotti as a visitor at the White house.  Booth was looked upon as a sort of privileged character around the White house, Mr. Nichols states.  Mr. Nichols saw Booth two days before the tragedy. 

From a Nebraska newspaper, abt 1903-1904.