David Herold

David Edgar Herold ( born June 16, 1842 in Maryland, † July 7, 1865 in Washington, DC) was an American assassin who together perpetrated a successful attempt on President Abraham Lincoln John Wilkes Booth.

Early years

Herold was born in Maryland, the sixth of ten children of Adam and Mary Porter Herold. He grew up in Washington DC and attended Gonzaga College High School, the Georgetown College and the Rittenhouse Academy. He then worked as a pharmacist. Herold later attended the Charlotte Hall Academy, where he met John Surratt, who introduced him to Booth.

In 1864 he was for a time in Brooklyn, New York, with a doctor named Francis Tumblety (c. 1830-1903 ) employed. Tumblety was briefly arrested also in the hunt for the Lincoln assassins, but later released.

Assassination

On the evening of April 14, 1865 at the Booth Lincoln in the Ford Theatre in Washington shot, Lewis Powell broke into the house of the Secretary of State William H. Seward, injuring him seriously with multiple stab wounds. Herold guided Powell here. However, Seward survived the attack. Herold should assassinate Vice President Andrew Johnson, but fled before he could perform this. A few days later, the assassins were captured.

On July 7, 1865 Herold was together with Mary Surratt, Lewis Powell and George Atzerodt, three other accomplices of Lincoln assassin hanged. Booth himself had been killed a few days after the attack in an attempt to arrest him.