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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. Where in John Wilkes Booth's room at the National Hotel did investigators find a letter outlining the plot against the government?
(a) In the flue of the fireplace.
(b) In his trunk.
(c) Under his mattress.
(d) In his dresser drawer.

2. What color uniforms did Northern soldiers wear during the Civil War?
(a) Black.
(b) Blue.
(c) White.
(d) Red.

3. Though Dr. Samuel Mudd did not know about John Wilkes Booth's recent plan to assassinate the President, of what previous abandoned plot was Mudd aware?
(a) The plot to kidnap William Seward.
(b) The plot to assassinate Mary Todd Lincoln.
(c) The plot to overthrow the Union government and install Confederate leaders instead.
(d) The plot to kidnap the president.

4. Who ordered that Mary Todd Lincoln be removed from Abraham Lincoln's bedside and proclaimed that she would not be allowed in again?
(a) Edwin Stanton.
(b) Tad Lincoln.
(c) Frederick Seward.
(d) Fanny Seward.

5. Though it would have been easy for John Wilkes Booth to gain an audience with President Lincoln within the Executive Mansion due to Booth's acting fame, why did he not take that action?
(a) He knew it would be too difficult to escape from the Executive Mansion alive.
(b) He was too scared to use so brazen a method.
(c) He wanted the dramatic setting of a theater.
(d) He did not see any honor in shooting a man within his own home.

Short Answer Questions

1. What had John Wilkes Booth hidden along the carpet earlier in the day that he then used to barricade the door to the Presidential box behind him?

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

3. What two items did John Wilkes Booth retrieve from Mary Sarratt's boardinghouse on the night of the assassination attempts?

4. What was the cause of William Seward's injuries that caused him to be healing in bed when the assassination attempt on his life was made?

5. Who asked Dr. Charles Leale to treat him first, before the doctor tended to Abraham Lincoln?

Short Essay Questions

1. Since John Wilkes Booth could have easily gained an audience with President Abraham Lincoln in the Executive Mansion using his famous face, why did he not just assassinate him in such a meeting?

2. How did the North celebrate when Richmond, Virginia fell to Union forces on April 3, 1865?

3. How does James L. Swanson use the words of Mary Todd Lincoln's dressmaker, Elizabeth Keckley, to foreshadow the coming death of Abraham Lincoln?

4. 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?

5. 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)

6. What is the significance of the photo that was taken at Abraham Lincoln's inauguration and that includes John Wilkes Booth?

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 danger to Lewis Powell's assassination plot lurked in William Seward's room of which Lewis Powell was unaware?

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

10. How does James L. Swanson characterize the personality of the actress Laura Keene, who was present at the scene of John Wilkes Booth's shooting of Abraham Lincoln.

(see the answer keys)

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