On Monday, April 3, the city burns. The following day Lincoln walks the still smoking ruins and the capital faces occupation by the Federal Army. April 9, about 90 miles west, Lee surrenders his force. And on the 14th of the month, the President is assassinated.
But on March 30, the beguiling calm of routine jurisprudence prevails in city court. The Examiner reports:
Only four days later, as the planned warehouse fires move beyond anything resembling a plan, the “presiding” Mayor Mayo sits within a carriage heading east to the Union lines, a note of capitulation on his person.
Anarchy, a massive munitions explosion its overture, plays out in the daylight, a wretched, sour bacchanalia no court can address.
The Examiner office yields to the inferno and has a share of black space on the map above. The Daily Dispatch and the Enquirer were consumed too. The winds favored the Whig. It’s their map.
