Just days after the Confederate surrender at Appomattox ended the American Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated while attending a play at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C. The assassin was John Wilkes Booth, a famous actor and Confederate sympathizer who believed Lincoln's death would revive the Southern cause. Lincoln died the following morning. He was the first American president to be assassinated. His death had a profound impact on the Reconstruction era; Lincoln had favored a policy of 'malice toward none' to bring the South back into the Union, but his successor, Andrew Johnson, and 'Radical Republicans' in Congress pursued more contentious paths. Lincoln's legacy as the 'Great Emancipator' who preserved the Union and ended slavery was cemented by his martyrdom, making him one of the most revered figures in American history.