White House Historical Association

Charles Forbes

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"Charles Forbes," White House Workers History Project, White House Historical Association, 2026, https://whha.whirlihost.com/Detail/workers/365.
Positions
Footman
Messenger
Usher
Coachman
Years in President's House
circa 1861 – 1865
Legal Status
Free Person
Gender
Male
Race/Ethnicity
White
Presidencies
Abraham Lincoln
Andrew Johnson
Biography
Charles Forbes was born in 1835 in Ireland.1 Little is known about his early life, but according to White House Doorman Thomas Pendel’s memoir, Forbes arrived in the United States shortly before his employment at the Executive Mansion.2 At the White House, Forbes served as President Abraham Lincoln’s footman and messenger. In this capacity, he accompanied the president during his travels, escorted him to and from the Executive Mansion, and acted as a courier, retrieving people or delivering items on the president’s behalf.3 On the night of President Lincoln’s assassination, Forbes was reportedly one of two men suspected of granting John Wilkes Booth access to the presidential box at Ford’s Theatre. Policeman John F. Parker was accused of abandoning his post, leaving the president without protection. Ford’s Theatre identifies Forbes as the man who admitted Booth, though some accounts place both Forbes and Parker outside the door before the shooting.4 According to Pendel, Forbes collected the Lincolns’ guests that evening and drove them to the theater, placing him on duty there that night. Days later, newspapers published the eyewitness account of Captain Theodore McGowan, who recalled seeing the president’s messenger seated outside the box when Booth approached. Booth presented a calling card, exchanged a few words with the messenger, and was admitted. Moments later, the fatal shot was fired, and Booth fled across the stage.5 Throughout his life, Forbes was often associated with this alleged mistake; however, the Lincoln family’s continued relationship with him in subsequent years suggests they did not hold him responsible. Forbes remained at the White House for a short time after the assassination. In July 1865, both Mrs. Lincoln and Tad wrote to Lincoln’s former bodyguard, William H. Crook, inquiring about “Charlie,” as they affectionately called Forbes, suggesting that he was still working in the Executive Mansion.6 However, by 1866, Forbes had left the White House and was employed as a messenger in the Treasury Department.7 When Robert Todd Lincoln became secretary of war in 1881, he reportedly requested that Forbes be transferred to his department, where Forbes was assigned as a messenger in the Adjutant General’s Office.8 By 1890, he had been promoted to a clerkship within the same department.9 Charles Forbes died on October 11, 1893, still employed at the War Department.10 He was initially buried in an unmarked grave at Congressional Cemetery in Washington, D.C., until 1984, when the Lincoln Group, a historical society, placed a marker at his burial site.11
  1. Ancestry.com, “Charles Forbes,” in U.S., Find a Grave® Index, 1600s–Current, accessed August 7, 2025, https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/60525/records/91195365?tid=&pid=&queryId=478a55b1-8f70-405c-9669-13e9c137aa6a&_phsrc=fQN162&_phstart=successSource.
  2. Thomas F. Pendel, Thirty-Six Years in the White House (Washington, DC: The Neale Publishing Company, 1902) 32, https://archive.org/details/thirtysixyearsin00pend/page/n39/mode/2up?q="Charles+Forbes".
  3. William H. Crook, Through Five Administrations: Reminiscences of Colonel William H. Crook, Body-Guard to President Lincoln (New York and London: Harper & Brothers, 1910) 21, https://archive.org/details/throughfiveadmin06croo/page/20/mode/2up?q="Forbes"; “Return of President Lincoln and Secretary Seward,” Evening Star (Washington, DC), February 4, 1865, 2, https://www.newspapers.com/image/146128394/?match=1&terms="Charles Forbes" .
  4. William H. Crook, a former bodyguard of President Abraham Lincoln, wrote in his memoir that John Parker admitted to leaving his post to secure a better view of the play. Crook added that if Parker had remained at his station, the president might never have been wounded. See William H. Crook, Through Five Administrations: Reminiscences of Colonel William H. Crook, Body-Guard to President Lincoln (New York and London: Harper & Brothers, 1910) 72-73, https://archive.org/details/throughfiveadmin06croo/page/20/mode/2up?q="Forbes"; “Lincoln’s Assassination,” Ford’s Theatre, accessed August 7, 2025, https://fords.org/lincolns-assassination/?0#assassination-booth-enters-the-presidential-box.
  5. Thomas F. Pendel, Thirty-Six Years in the White House (Washington, DC: The Neale Publishing Company, 1902) 40, https://archive.org/details/thirtysixyearsin00pend/page/n39/mode/2up?q="Charles+Forbes"; “Capt. McGowen’s Account of the Assassination,” New-York Tribune, April 17, 1865, https://www.newspapers.com/image/466667112/?match=1&terms=McGowan.
  6. William H. Crook, Through Five Administrations: Reminiscences of Colonel William H. Crook, Body-Guard to President Lincoln (New York and London: Harper & Brothers, 1910) 20, https://archive.org/details/throughfiveadmin06croo/page/20/mode/2up?q="Forbes". 
  7. Register of Officers and Agents, Civil, Military, and Naval, in the Service of the United States by the United States Department of the Interior (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1866), 39, https://www.google.com/books/edition/Register_of_Officers_and_Agents_Civil_Mi/RxUZAAAAYAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&bsq="Charles Forbes".
  8. 1870 United States Federal Census, Washington, District of Columbia, entry for Charles Forbes; Ancestry.com, accessed August 7, 2025, https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/7163/records/13737211?tid=&pid=&queryId=478a55b1-8f70-405c-9669-13e9c137aa6a&_phsrc=fQN162&_phstart=successSource; 1880 United States Federal Census, Washington, District of Columbia, entry for Charles Forbes; Ancestry.com, accessed August 7, 2025, https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/6742/records/35147944?tid=&pid=&queryId=478a55b1-8f70-405c-9669-13e9c137aa6a&_phsrc=fQN162&_phstart=successSource; Official Register of the United States vol. 1 (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1881), 252, https://www.google.com/books/edition/Official_Register_of_the_United_States/PLBDAQAAMAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&bsq="charles forbes"; “Army and Navy Notes,” The Washington Post (Washington, DC), May 16, 1881, https://www.newspapers.com/image/1037728133/?match=1&terms="charles forbes".
  9. Official Register of the United States: Containing a List of Officers and Employees in the Civil, Military and Naval Service vol. 1 (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1892), 280, https://www.google.com/books/edition/Official_Register_of_the_United_States/FrJDAQAAMAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&bsq="charles forbes".
  10. “Could Not Save Lincoln,” The Washington Post (Washington, DC), October 12, 1895, 8, https://www.newspapers.com/image/1038324392/?match=1&terms="Charles Forbes" .
  11. “Charles Forbes,” Find A Grave, accessed August 7, 2025, https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/18002817/charles-forbes; David J. Kent, “Raising the Stone: Charles Forbes and the Lincoln Group of DC (From the Archives),” Lincoln Group of the District of Columbia – Lincolnian, September 12, 2024, accessed August 7, 2025, https://www.lincolnian.org/post/raising-the-stone-charles-forbes-and-the-lincoln-group-of-dc-from-the-archives.
Birthplace
Ireland
Congressional Cemetery
Related Workers
Thomas F. Pendel
Ushers, Stewards, and Doorkeepers, 1864 – 1909
Thomas Stackpole
Ushers, Stewards, and Doorkeepers, circa 1853 – 1865
William H. Crook
Ushers, Stewards, and Doorkeepers, 1865 – 1915
Related Association Content
https://www.whitehousehistory.org/fords-theater-and-the-white-house