Stealing Lincoln’s Body by Thomas J. Craughwell

Category: 50 Books

11. Stealing Lincoln’s Body by Thomas J. Craughwell

How do you pronounce that last name? crafwell? crah-well? I dunno.

In continuing with my Lincoln fetish. Heh. fetish. This was a great book. It was short, which is so rare in Lincoln books. It’s not really so much about Lincoln though, it’s about a heist to steal the dead president’s body back in the 1870s. The fellows who were going to steal the body were doing so to hold it for ransom. What did they want? One of their buddies released from jail and $200,000. I know, the plan itself is even more, “really? they thought that would work?”

This book gives a short history on counterfeiting, which apparently was a HUGE DEAL back then. The author tells how half the currency at that time was fake. So the book is mostly about that and there’s a lot about the criminal history of Chicago and Irish immigrants. It was very interesting. I had no idea that counterfeiting had been that big of a deal.

Like I say, the book was short (maybe 250 pages or so, the last 30 or so pages were bibliography and index) but it was riveting and as with any Lincoln book, there were a ton of names. But I love the specificity (is that a word?) of this book, and the author sticks with it. It’s JUST about the heist (what led up to it, the heist itself, the aftermath), it doesn’t wander all over the place. A great read.

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