•April 18, 2018•

By  Tara McClellan McAndrew
for The State Journal-Register

It was July 3, 1876 — the eve of our country’s first centennial. Everyone in Springfield would be celebrating downtown. No one would be near Oak Ridge Cemetery.

It was the perfect time to steal Abraham Lincoln’s body.

The incredulous plot was hatched by Midwestern counterfeiters who had been shut down when their expert bill engraver was jailed. Benjamin Boyd’s bills were the best in the Midwest, possibly the country. In 1875, he was captured in Fulton, found guilty, and sent to the Joliet penitentiary for 10 years. Without his plates, the criminals who made and passed the counterfeit bills were out of business. They had to spring their money man.

“Big Jim” Kennally, a St. Louis Irishman who led Midwestern counterfeiters, according to Thomas J. Craughwell’s book, “Stealing Lincoln’s Body,” brainstormed a solution. They would snatch Lincoln’s body, bury it in the Indiana Dunes, then ransom it for $200,000 and Boyd’s pardon and freedom.     Login or Subscribe to read the rest of this story.