What was John Wilkes Booths motivation behind the assassination of Abraham Lincoln?
John Wilkes Booth was an actor and a Confederate sympathizer who plotted to overthrow the Union government by assassinating Lincoln, Vice President Andrew Johnson and Secretary of State William H. Seward. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Lincoln Abraham Lincoln died in 1865, at the age of 56. John Wilkes Booth killed President Abraham Lincoln on April 14, 1865 at Ford’s Theater. ” Our American Cousin ” was the name of the play President Lincoln Attended when John Wilkes Booth shot him.