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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What does the word secede mean?
(a) To be superior to.
(b) To annihilate.
(c) To attack.
(d) To separate.

2. How far away from Washington D.C. were Mary Surratt's tavern and boardinghouse?
(a) 23 miles away.
(b) 13 miles away.
(c) 30 miles away.
(d) 10 miles away.

3. What rule was in place about the bridge that John Wilkes Booth intended to cross on his escape into Maryland?
(a) Any crossing the bridge had to dismount his horse and walk his horse over the bridge.
(b) Anyone crossing the bridge had to pay a toll.
(c) No one was allowed to take a horse over the bridge.
(d) No one was allowed to cross the bridge after dark.

4. What was the ultimate goal of John Wilkes Booth and his conspirators' plan to assassinate the Union government's top leaders?
(a) To incite the Confederacy to continue the war against the Union.
(b) To persuade General Lee to revoke his surrender.
(c) To be awarded a ransom.
(d) To install Confederate leaders in the place of the dead Union leaders the moment they were gone.

5. What previous act had John Wilkes Booth and his conspirators plotted in 1864 that had never come to fruition?
(a) The explosion of the Union Railroad.
(b) The assassination of Mary Todd Lincoln.
(c) The robbery of Fort Knox.
(d) The kidnapping of Lincoln and the holding of his person as a hostage for the Confederacy.

Short Answer Questions

1. What query did Laura Keene make of Dr. Charles Leale after she gained entry to the President's box where Lincoln lay dying?

2. What was the role of Charles Forbes, the only man sitting outside of the Lincolns' theater box seat?

3. On the night of April 11th at the Torchlight Parade, what did Lincoln say in his speech regarding African-Americans?

4. What noise finally led David Herold to flee the scene in the getaway carriage before Lewis Powell had emerged from the house?

5. What fraction of the casualties during the Civil War died due to disease?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is James L. Swanson's purpose when he describes John Wilkes Booth's passions as including "the romance of lost causes"? (2)

2. What action did David Herold take at the scene of William Seward's home that James L. Swanson imagines to have inspired the ire of John Wilkes Booth?

3. How did John Wilkes Booth's knowledge of Ford's Theater facilitate his assassination of Abraham Lincoln?

4. What is the author's purpose in relating the events of Mary Lincoln Todd's and Abraham Lincoln's afternoon together on the date of the assassination?

5. How was Frederick Seward injured during Lewis Powell's attempt to assassinate Secretary of State William Seward?

6. What methods does James L. Swanson use to convey the chaotic nature of the scene within Ford's Theater after John Wilkes Booth had escaped?

7. How does James L. Swanson demonstrate Fanny Seward's courage and ferocity within the scene of Lewis Powell's attempt to take her father's life?

8. What tone does James L. Swanson use in second paragraph of Chapter I when he writes, "The very next day, the tyrant Abraham Lincoln had visited his captive prize and had the nerve to sit behind the desk occupied by the first and last president of the Confederate States of America, Jefferson Davis"? (2)

9. How did Mary Todd Lincoln's letter to the Ford Theater's proprietors unwittingly help Abraham Lincoln's would-be assassins complete their goal?

10. What were the reasons that Dr. Charles Leale wanted to move Abraham Lincoln from the theater, even though he had just proclaimed his wounds sure to be fatal?

(see the answer keys)

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