After the gruesome civil war was over Lincoln wanted to celebrate. So he went to Ford's Theater to see a play. The theater had a special balcony for the president which was decorated with flags and banners and such. While he was there he had his so called "secret service" with him where he was sitting. Sometime in the middle of the play someone asked "the secret service" guy guarding the entrance to the balcony, if he had wanted a drink. Incredibly he said sure and went to the bar, leaving the president wide open for danger. Then the inevitable happened and someone entered the balcony with a pistol which wasn't really all that powerful to begin with. That someone just happened to be John Wilkes Booth.
John let stupidity get the best of him for he was aiming at the hardest part of the body, generally the back of the head. All of a sudden a shot echoed through the theater and the president's head leaned forward. John, being the actor that he was, took out a knife a jumped from the balcony on to the stage and broke his leg in the process. Then he screamed at the top of his lungs "Sic Semper Tyrranis" and limped off the stage. Everyone in the theater clapped thinking it was all a part of the act. Then they noticed that president Lincoln wasn't putting his head back. All of a sudden it had clicked that the president has been shot. Someone had screamed asking if there was a doctor in the house and as it turns out there was one fresh out of med school.
They dragged Lincoln to the house, directly across from the road, bringing him through the kitchen to the room in the back. Then Lincoln, still being alive, started having trouble breathing because there was a blood clot putting pressure on the part of the brain that controls all the things we don't have to think about. The young doctor reacted quickly and put his finger in the gun shot hole in the back of his head and cleared away the blood clot! Lincoln started to breath easier. To top it all off this big shot army surgeon with years of experience came in and basically said to back off, let me do it because I'm more experienced. Keep in mind that an army surgeon's method is that if you get shot in the arm, the arm comes off, if you get shot in the leg, the leg comes off, if you get shot in the torso, they're going in with a pair of pliers and looking for it. So he takes a probe and does a "search and rescue" on a bullet that's only 2 inches in. He goes in so far that you could see it through the back of his eye and the guys says, generally put, "oh, well it's not on this side" and does another "search and rescue" and does the same thing again except now you can see it in the other eye. Hmmmmm I wonder how he died? NOT.
In short, Lincoln celebrated, got shot by a guy who is real into drama, and died in the hands of an "experienced" and "all knowing" army surgeon. During the ridiculous probing, the army guy couldn't tell if he was hitting the bullet or the brain, so the bullet was getting pushed and twisted into places where it shouldn't have been. Lincoln probably would have lived. So in my opinion Lincoln had the crappiest day I had ever heard of and that's probably why this was the most interesting lesson to me.
