Riding Along With Lincoln's Funeral Train

Several months ago, at the behest of National Geographic, I retraced the route of Abraham Lincoln’s funeral train from Washington, D.C., halfway across the continent to his final resting place in Springfield, Illinois. (Read “Lincoln: Looking for his Legacy Today.”)

Early in my pilgrimage, I found a railroad spike in the weeds along a section of abandoned tracks. I knew it couldn’t date back to the 1860s—it was probably a few decades old—but nonetheless, I kept it in the cupholder of my car for the next 1,500 miles. I liked its look, somehow both industrial and homemade, roughened and angular—Lincolnesque. It seemed to evoke not just the fallen leader’s final journey, but also his legacy as America’s great “railroad president.”

On the drizzly morning of April 19, 1865, when the train carrying the murdered president’s coffin pulled out of Washington’s central depot, it embarked on a journey that resonated deeply with many chapters of his life.

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