Friday April 14, 1865
Anderson, now sixty years old and white-haired, had retired from active duty because of poor health. He spoke a few words as he raised the tattered flag he had taken with him four years before. The fort barely resembled the structure he had abandoned; intense Union bombardment had reduced much of it to rubble and debris. There were speeches, music, and a prolonged salute of guns, this time without incident, and the ceremony concluded.
That evening in Washington, not long after Anderson raised the Union flag over Fort Sumter, President Lincoln attended a play at Ford's Theatre. Shortly after 10 p.m., he was shot by John Wilkes Booth.
Bibliography: Swanberg, First Blood, pp. 333-39; Meredith, Storm over Sumter, pp. 1-13; Randall and Donald, Civil War, p. 452; Long, Civil War, pp. 639-40, 675-76.