American History Tellers

In the 1870s, a gang from Chicago hatched one of the most audacious criminal plots in American history. They planned to steal the body of Abraham Lincoln from his tomb in Springfield, Illinois, then hold the president’s corpse for ransom.   The brazen plot began in an unlikely place – the murky world of fake money. In the mid-1800s, counterfeiting was so rampant in the United States that it threatened the financial stability of the entire nation...

By 1876, criminal boss Big Jim Kennally was ready to put his Lincoln body-snatching plan into motion. But his gang of thieves needed one more member before they could attempt the heist. Soon, they found their new recruit: a former horse thief from Wisconsin named Lewis Swegles. But what the gang didn’t know was that Swegles was a “roper” – an undercover informant, employed by Secret Service agent Patrick Tyrrell to bring down Kennally’s counterfeiting ring...

By 1876, criminal boss Big Jim Kennally was ready to put his Lincoln body-snatching plan into motion. But his gang of thieves needed one more member before they could attempt the heist. Soon, they found their new recruit: a former horse thief from Wisconsin named Lewis Swegles. But what the gang didn’t know was that Swegles was a “roper” – an undercover informant, employed by Secret Service agent Patrick Tyrrell to bring down Kennally’s counterfeiting ring...