Gunshot Wound

[wsanto]

(08-19-2013 04:38 AM)RJNorton Wrote:  James P. Ferguson said, "At the moment the President was shot, he was leaning his hand on the railing, looking down at a person in the orchestra..." Were there other eyewitnesses who backed up Ferguson's description of Lincoln's position?

It makes the most sense to me that he was looking down and to the left.

If Booth enters from the doorway to Box 8, steps directly behind the president and fires with the gun in his right hand; Lincoln's head has to be slightly looking left for the entry wound to be an inch to the left of the midline. Also the course of the bullet's path is traveling from the lower back of Lincoln's head (below his ear) cephalad (toward the top of his head) into the frontal lobe of Lincoln's brain. He had to be looking downward for this trajectory because it is unlikely Booth was aiming the gun barrel with an upward tilt while also aiming so low relative to Lincoln's ear. Remember, Booth is standing and Lincoln is sitting so, if Lincoln is upright, the bullet would have entered higher (above the ear) and traveled slightly downward (assuming Booth is firing the gun in a more natural position).

If Booth entered from Box 7 it makes more sense that the bullet crossed the midline and lodged behind Lincoln's right eye. But, in my opinion, he entered from Box 8 and shot from the right side of Lincoln with Lincoln in the position Ferguson described for the bullet path as described by Dr. Woodward.

Another interesting tidbit from Dr. Woodward's autopsy--

" Both the orbital plates of the frontal bone were fractured and the fragments pushed upwards toward the brain. The dura matter over these fractures was uninjured. The orbits were gorged with blood."

That implies that Lincoln's face hit the ledge of the box which fractured his frontal bones around both eyes with the bone fragments pushing inward toward Lincoln's brain. Again this makes sense if he was leaning forward toward the ledge of the box when the force of the bullet pushed it further into the ledge. This is consistent with his right eye taking more force than the left and the observations that his right eye suffered some trauma from the gunshot.