Charles Leale Dr . Charles Augustus Leale M . D . ( March 26 , 1842 – June 13 , 1932 ) was a surgeon in the Union Army during the American Civil War . He was the first doctor to arrive at the presidential box at Ford ' s Theatre on April 14 , 1865 after John Wilkes Booth fatally shot President Abraham Lincoln in the back of the head with a Philadelphia Deringer pistol . At the time , Leale was a 23 - year - old surgeon in charge of the Wounded Commissioned Officers ' Ward at the United States Army General Hospital in Armory Square , Washington , DC . Just six weeks earlier , he ' d graduated in medicine from Bellevue Hospital Medical College in New York . He married a daughter of Yonkers , New York industrialist John Copcutt ( 1805 – 1895 ) at the historic John Copcutt Mansion . A few days before Lincoln ' s assassination , Leale took a brief break from his exhausting job and took a walk down Pennsylvania Avenue for some fresh air . He noticed a crowd of people heading towards the White House . He discovered Lincoln giving his last public address to the public and was intrigued by the president ' s facial features . Soon after , Leale learned that Lincoln was going to Ford ' s Theatre to see the play " Our American Cousin " . " After completing his duties . . . Leale changed to civilian clothes and rushed to the Theater , not to see the play , but to study President Lincoln ' s face and facial expressions . " He asked for a seat in the orchestra so he would have an unhindered view , but arrived late and was given a seat in the dress circle ( near the front , same side and 40 ft away from the president ' s box ) . There was an interruption in the play when Lincoln arrived . The orchestra played " Hail to the Chief " and the audience gave a standing ovation . Leale could see the full face of the president as he stood only a few aisles behind him . The play was interrupted once more when John Wilkes Booth jumped down from the presidential box to the stage . Leale , seeing this , immediately rushed to the president ' s box . When he arrived , he found Lincoln slumped in his armchair supported by Mrs . Lincoln , who was weeping frantically . Leale received permission to take charge . Leale discovered Lincoln paralyzed and struggling to breathe . He laid the president down on the floor and initially thinking that Lincoln had been stabbed in the shoulder , searched for wounds . Finding none , he further detected that Lincoln ' s eyes were dilated and finally found " a large clot of blood about one inch below the superior curved line and an inch and a half to the left of the median line of the occipital bone in the back of the skull , " that showed that he had been shot . After examining the wound , Leale realized that Lincoln ' s condition improved if the blood clot was removed , and so continued to release the clot periodically . His assessment of the dire condition of the president ( " his wound is mortal ; it is impossible for him to recover " ) was announced to the entire country . Army surgeon Dr . Charles S . Taft and Dr . Albert F . A . King of Washington then joined Leale and conceded that Lincoln would not survive a carriage ride back to the White House . Leale ordered that Lincoln be moved to the Petersen House across the street so that he could rest in comfort . Leale gave control over the president to the Lincoln family physician , Robert K . Stone , and the commander of the Armory Square Hospital , D . W . Bliss . Lincoln was placed on a bed diagonally , for his 6 ' 4 " body was too long to fit lengthwise . He lasped into a coma for approximately nine hours before passing away at 7 : 22 the next morning . For most of the night , Leale held the president ' s hand , he was holding it when President Lincoln died , and afterwards said that " sometimes , recognition and reason return just before departure . I held his hand firmly to let him know , in his blindness , that he had a friend . " What was to be a short observation of the president ' s face turned into nine hours of close doctoring for Charles Leale . Although Leale submitted a report in 1867 to Representative Benjamin F . Butler ' s House commission investigating the assassination , Leale ' s account of Lincoln ' s death was not publicly revealed until the 100th anniversary of Lincoln ' s birth in 1909 . In that year Leale spoke on " Lincoln ' s Last Hour " to the New York commandery of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States . His 1865 written report of 22 pages was thought lost until 2008 , when a photocopy of a version available in the Records of the Adjutant General at the National Archives and Records Administration was found in the Georgetown University Library and published . On June 5 , 2012 the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum announced that a researcher for The Papers of Abraham Lincoln , Helena Iles Papaioannou , had discovered an 1865 report by Leale in the records of the Surgeon General of the United States , seemingly written just hours after the assassination . The report was in a collection of correspondence received by the Surgeon General at the National Archives . The announcement ( which is available online ) also includes the full text of Leale ' s report . Papaioannou discusses the discovery in an " All Things Considered " interview . Leale was one of the last surviving attendees of Lincoln ' s assassination upon his death in 1932 .