HISTORICAL WALKING TOURS | BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS
  • Freedom Trail Tours
    • In The Footsteps of Paul Revere
    • Freedom Trail Audio Tour
    • The Boston Massacre Tour
    • Boston Civil War Tour
    • The Boston Massacre Lesson Plan
    • Paul Revere's Neighborhood
    • Paul Revere's Row to Charlestown 4/18/1775
    • The Boston Massacre per the Pennsylvania Gazette
    • Paul Revere Lesson Plan
  • Revere Bells Index
    • The Stickney Revere Bell Listings of 1976
    • Ashby Mass. Revere Bell
    • Paul Revere Bell of Beverly
    • Revere Bells in Boston >
      • Paul Revere Bell Old South Meeting House
    • California's 2 Paul Revere Bells
    • Paul Revere & Son's Bell Westborough Massachusetts
    • Falmouth, Massachusetts
    • Revere Bell Fredericksburg VA
    • Revere Bell Hampton NH
    • First Parish Church of Kennebunk
    • Revere Bells in Maine
    • Revere Bell in Mansfield
    • Revere Bell of Michigan
    • Revere Salem Mass Bell
    • Roxbury First Unitariarn Universalist Church and their Revere Bell
    • Revere & Son Bell, Savannah Georgia
    • Singapore Revere Bell
    • Tuscaloosa Bell >
      • History of the St John and Leavens Patriarchs
      • Samuel St John Jr Estate Genealogy
      • Authenticating the Revere Tuscaloosa Bell
      • Joshua B Leavens Last Will and Testament
      • 20th Century Tuscaloosa bell
    • Revere Bells Lost in Time
    • Revere Bells Washington DC
    • Revere Bell in Wakefield, Mass
    • Revere Bells Woodstock VT
  • Bostonians
    • Edward F Alexander of The Harvard 20th Civil War Regiment
    • Polly Baker
    • John Wilkes Booth
    • The Mad Hatter, Thomas, Boston Corbett who Killed John Wilkes Booth
    • Richard-Henry-Dana-Jr
    • James Franklin
    • Benjamin Harris of Publick Occurrences
    • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
    • William Lloyd Garrison
    • USS Thomas Hudner DDG116
    • Edward Hutchinson Robbins Revere
    • Amos Lincoln
    • King Philip
    • Mayor's of Boston
    • Mum Bett & Theodore Sedgwick
    • James Otis
    • Paul Joseph Revere
    • Reverend Larkin's Horse
    • John Rowe >
      • John Rowe's Diary Entries
      • John Rowe's Dinner Party
      • John Rowe and the Jail Fire
      • Hang John Rowe?????
      • John Rowe the Fisherman
      • Joh Rowe's Tea Ship
    • Be Proud to be Called a Lucy Stoner
    • Rachel Wall , Pirate
    • Paul Revere the Coroner of Boston
    • Deborah Sampson
    • Who was Mrs. Silence Dogood?
    • Dr. Joseph Warren's Dedication
  • History Blog
  • Lilja's of Natick
    • Lilja Brothers Military History
    • Lilja's Family Album
    • Memorials and Tributes to the Five Lilja Brothers
    • Lilja Family Tree
    • Lilja Historical Family Tree Documents
    • Lilja References
  • Collage of Boston
    • 4th of July Parade, Bristol RI
    • Boston Harbor
    • The Customs House
    • Forest Hills Cemetery
    • Georges Island
    • Nonviolent Monument to Peace - Sherborn
    • The Battle Road
    • Skate bike and scooter park
    • Cassin Young & USS Cassin Young
    • MIT
    • Historic Charles River
    • The Roxbury Standpipe on Fort Hill
    • John & Abigail Adams National Park
  • Boston's Racial History - Ante-Bellum

What did john wilkes booth have to do with boston, massachusetts?

Picture
The Deringer by Henry Deringer of Philadelphia
                                                                        John Wilkes Booth prepared to be a Bostonian
 
John Wilkes Booth purchased property in the newly developed Back Bay area, at 115 Commonwealth Avenue in 1863.  This was not a speculative financial  purchase.  His brother resided in Boston for 15 years. Instructions to thes real estate agent were clear that this would be his home.
 
“Dear Joe, Did you or Orlando send me that catalog of Back Bay lands to be sold April 9th. However, find out about them. For lots No. 5,6,7 or 9 (any one of them) on the north side of Commonwealth Avenue. I will bid as high as $2.70 per foot (their minimum value is $2.25). If you fail to get any one of the above, I will bid on corner lot (Commonwealth Avenue) No. 20. as high as $3.25 per foot. If you are not out bid and fail to get any of them, I will bid on any one (single lot) on south side of Marlborough Street as high as 20 percent above its minimum valuation (a corner lot preferred.) Attend to this, dear Joe. See Keach who said something about the auctioneer being sorry he did not know I wanted to buy last time. Let Orlando see this. Advise with him about it. He promised to buy from me, or to let me know about it. I don’t care about the lots on Marlborough St. If I buy one of them, it will be on spec. So if you miss Commonwealth Ave, strike light on the first….Yours truly, J. Wilkes Booth”[i]
 
Here are some financial comparisons of the property value then and now at 115 Commonwealth Avenue
  • The purchase price was $8,192
  • The land was recorded in his mother's name
  • Booth did not develop the property.  It appears he subsequently suffered financial losses in the oil business
  • In 1876 Walter Hastings Jr. purchased the property and built a house on it that cost twenty-six thousand dollars
  • 115 Commonwealth Avenue, sold for $10,600,000, on September 5, 2010[ii]
  • The sale price in 2010 was $1,012, a square foot, compared to the original lot sale price of $8,192
  • Yearly taxes today are three times the value of the house and land in 1876
                                                                                    Footprint of the Booths and Boston;
  • John Wilkes Booth stayed at the Parker House in April 1865​
  • He practiced shooting with a pistol on School Street over the five-day stay in April 1865
  • He was killed by pursuing Union soldiers April 23rd, 1865 
  • The Union soldier that shot and killed Booth  at the Garrett barn in Port Royal, Virginia,  was also a Bostonian; Sergeant Thomas P. “Boston” Corbett
  • His brother Edwin Booth was a long-term Boston resident 
  • After the assassination, Boston was sympathetic to the burden Edwin endured
  • Edwin Booth's wife Mary was buried at Mt. Auburn Cemetery, in 1863[iii]
  • Edwin remarried in 1869
  • Edwin declared bankruptcy during the depression of 1873. His theatre folded
  • His second wife died in 1881
  • After two strokes Edwin Booth died June 6, 1893, and was interred next to his first wife, Mary
  • Asia Booth Clarke, younger sister to the two Shakespearean actors, died at age 52 on May 16, 1888, in England  ending a lightly threaded marriage to John Sleeper Clarke of Boston comedial acting fame
  • Her body was returned to the Booth Family site in Barltimore, Maryland
  • ​John Wilkes Booth’s body was eventually returned to the Booth family sight, at Green Mount Cemetery, Baltimore Maryland, joining his family in eternity[iv]
  • After the assassination, John Wilkes younger brother, Junius, managed for many years the "Boston Theatre", ran a retreat for actors at Manchester By The Sea and married in Boston and raised four children. He died in 1886. 
  • Learn of the Bostonian that killed John Wilkes Booth
                                                                                              Sources
​http://historyofmassachusetts.org/john-wilkes-booth-owned-property-in-boston/Rebecca Beatrice Brooks
American Brutus: John Wilkes Booth and the Lincoln Conspiracies; Michael W. Kauffman; 2005
Classic Realty; 115 Commonwealth Avenue Boston: www.classic-realty.com/115-commonwealth-avenue-boston/
http://www.bu.edu/bhr/2015/05/11/boston-the-booth-brothers-and-the-parker-house/By: Susan Wilson

                                                                                              End Notes
[i] “Brooks, Rebecca Beatrice. “John Wilkes Booth's Boston Property.” History of Massachusetts, 26 Oct. 2017, historyofmassachusetts.org/john-wilkes-booth-owned-property-in-boston/.
[ii] Per REDFIN
[iii] http://www.bu.edu/bhr/2015/05/11/boston-the-booth-brothers-and-the-parker-house/By: Susan Wilson
[iv] https://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=13523390
 

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  • Freedom Trail Tours
    • In The Footsteps of Paul Revere
    • Freedom Trail Audio Tour
    • The Boston Massacre Tour
    • Boston Civil War Tour
    • The Boston Massacre Lesson Plan
    • Paul Revere's Neighborhood
    • Paul Revere's Row to Charlestown 4/18/1775
    • The Boston Massacre per the Pennsylvania Gazette
    • Paul Revere Lesson Plan
  • Revere Bells Index
    • The Stickney Revere Bell Listings of 1976
    • Ashby Mass. Revere Bell
    • Paul Revere Bell of Beverly
    • Revere Bells in Boston >
      • Paul Revere Bell Old South Meeting House
    • California's 2 Paul Revere Bells
    • Paul Revere & Son's Bell Westborough Massachusetts
    • Falmouth, Massachusetts
    • Revere Bell Fredericksburg VA
    • Revere Bell Hampton NH
    • First Parish Church of Kennebunk
    • Revere Bells in Maine
    • Revere Bell in Mansfield
    • Revere Bell of Michigan
    • Revere Salem Mass Bell
    • Roxbury First Unitariarn Universalist Church and their Revere Bell
    • Revere & Son Bell, Savannah Georgia
    • Singapore Revere Bell
    • Tuscaloosa Bell >
      • History of the St John and Leavens Patriarchs
      • Samuel St John Jr Estate Genealogy
      • Authenticating the Revere Tuscaloosa Bell
      • Joshua B Leavens Last Will and Testament
      • 20th Century Tuscaloosa bell
    • Revere Bells Lost in Time
    • Revere Bells Washington DC
    • Revere Bell in Wakefield, Mass
    • Revere Bells Woodstock VT
  • Bostonians
    • Edward F Alexander of The Harvard 20th Civil War Regiment
    • Polly Baker
    • John Wilkes Booth
    • The Mad Hatter, Thomas, Boston Corbett who Killed John Wilkes Booth
    • Richard-Henry-Dana-Jr
    • James Franklin
    • Benjamin Harris of Publick Occurrences
    • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
    • William Lloyd Garrison
    • USS Thomas Hudner DDG116
    • Edward Hutchinson Robbins Revere
    • Amos Lincoln
    • King Philip
    • Mayor's of Boston
    • Mum Bett & Theodore Sedgwick
    • James Otis
    • Paul Joseph Revere
    • Reverend Larkin's Horse
    • John Rowe >
      • John Rowe's Diary Entries
      • John Rowe's Dinner Party
      • John Rowe and the Jail Fire
      • Hang John Rowe?????
      • John Rowe the Fisherman
      • Joh Rowe's Tea Ship
    • Be Proud to be Called a Lucy Stoner
    • Rachel Wall , Pirate
    • Paul Revere the Coroner of Boston
    • Deborah Sampson
    • Who was Mrs. Silence Dogood?
    • Dr. Joseph Warren's Dedication
  • History Blog
  • Lilja's of Natick
    • Lilja Brothers Military History
    • Lilja's Family Album
    • Memorials and Tributes to the Five Lilja Brothers
    • Lilja Family Tree
    • Lilja Historical Family Tree Documents
    • Lilja References
  • Collage of Boston
    • 4th of July Parade, Bristol RI
    • Boston Harbor
    • The Customs House
    • Forest Hills Cemetery
    • Georges Island
    • Nonviolent Monument to Peace - Sherborn
    • The Battle Road
    • Skate bike and scooter park
    • Cassin Young & USS Cassin Young
    • MIT
    • Historic Charles River
    • The Roxbury Standpipe on Fort Hill
    • John & Abigail Adams National Park
  • Boston's Racial History - Ante-Bellum