John Boertlein - Presidential Confidential: Sex, Scandal, Murder and Mayhem in the Oval Office

IT WAS A COLD DAY IN WASHINGTON ON January 30, 1835, as President Andrew Jackson made his way from his White House office to the U.S. Capitol building to pay his respects at the funeral of a congressman who had passed away. The Capitol rotunda held a crowd, gathered in hopes of getting a glimpse of the President. One of the onlookers, however, held malice in his heart.

Richard Lawrence, a young drifter, had two pockets full of pistol. As people made way for President Jackson to pass, Lawrence lunged out of the crowd while pulling one of the pistols. Lawrence pulled the trigger and a loud explosion echoed through the rotunda. For a tense moment, everything fell silentnothing happened. The bullet never left the gun. A misfire.

Jackson, a crusty old soldier with quick instincts, went after Lawrence with his walking cane. Lawrence managed to back away and produced the second pistol. At close range, aiming for the Presidents heart, Lawrence squeezed the trigger. Nothing. Another misfire!

Some men from the crowd, including Davy Crockett, the Tennessee congressman, tackled Lawrence and held him on the ground. Jackson continued flailing his cane, trying to crack the would-be assassins skull. His aides had to pull him away and whisk him back to the safety of the White House. The President was safe. The attempt had failed. Andrew Jackson dodged the bullettwice. Firearms experts figure the chances against two misfires in a row are about a lottery-sized 125,000 to 1.

Old Hickory Jackson proved to be a crusty old cuss. When whack-job-would-be-assassin Richard Lawrences pistols both misfired, the President opened a can of whoop-ass on the guy with a little assistance from onlookers in the Capitol Rotunda.

AS ANGER BETWEEN NORTHERN AND SOUTHERN states boiled in 1860, Texas senator Louis Wigfall hatched a scheme to kidnap President James Buchanan. A volatile, violent man, Wigfall wanted Buchanan out of the way so Vice President John Breckinridge would take over. Breckinridge, from Kentucky, would be much more sympathetic to the Southern causeand he did join the Confederacy when war finally broke out a year later. After he was kidnapped, Buchanans life would be used as leverage in negotiating a deal favorable for the South. Wigfall, however, had burned many political bridges during his career and could not muster enough support for the plan to make it happen. Buchanan remained safe. Plans to kidnap the president became regular news during Lincolns administration.

At his trial, Richard Lawrence, an unemployed house painter, was deemed insane. His motive for attacking President Jackson, he said, was that he, as rightful heir to the British throne, wanted to punish the President for killing his father three years before. The story made absolutely no sense. A jury found Lawrence not guilty of attempted murder for being under the influence of insanity. Richard Lawrence spent the rest of his life in an insane asylum.

President Abraham Lincoln