Abraham Lincoln was shot at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C., on the evening of April 14, 1865. Lincoln, the 16th President of the United States, was attending a performance of the play Our American Cousin with his wife, Mary Todd Lincoln, and others in the box seats. The assassin, John Wilkes Booth, a well-known actor and Confederate sympathizer, entered the presidential box and shot Lincoln in the back of the head. Lincoln was immediately rendered unconscious, and he was carried across the street to the Petersen House, where he died the following day, April 15, 1865. Booth fled the scene but was later tracked down and killed by Union soldiers. Lincoln's assassination occurred just days after General Robert E. Lee's surrender at Appomattox Court House, marking the end of the Civil War. The president's death shocked the nation and led to a period of mourning.