Samuel Arnold

In August 1864, after more than a decade apart, friends Booth and Arnold reunited for drinks at Barnum’s Hotel in Baltimore. They were joined by Michael O’Laughlen — Booth’s old neighbor, who coincidentally served in the same Confederate regiment as Arnold earlier in the ongoing Civil War. Before they parted ways, the three men agreed to kidnap President Lincoln. If all went according to plan, the abduction would serve as a catalyst to restart prisoner exchanges between the Confederacy and the Union. The dwindling CSA forces could then be replenished. The plot took months to develop, however, and underwent several drastic revisions, such as seizing Lincoln in front of a theater audience instead of during an isolated horse ride. Arnold divorced himself from the faltering kidnapping plot in mid-March 1865, weeks before Booth — under circumstances far different from the previous summer — murdered the president. Soon after the assassination, authorities obtained evidence that tied Arnold to Booth and the conspiracy. They arrested him in Virginia at Fortress Monroe on the morning of April 17th. Following his conviction by a military tribunal, Arnold began his life sentence at Fort Jefferson in the Dry Tortugas of Florida. In March 1869, three and a half years into his imprisonment, Arnold was pardoned by the outgoing president, Andrew Johnson. He lived his remaining 37 years as a free man.