The image is haunting, depicting a gaunt-faced man with a familiar beard, staring ahead lifelessly. The right eye appears disfigured from an unseen wound.
Some experts believe the man is Abraham Lincoln, captured hours after the nation's 16th president died from an assassin's bullet on April 15, 1865, a heretofore unknown photo of incalculable historic value. Others dismiss the mere possibility.
The original ambrotype image is locked away in an Illinois safe deposit box, the subject of court fights and accusations of robbery and, on Sunday, a Discovery network documentary that attempts to unravel the mystery.
"In the world of authenticating, this is like finding the Holy Grail," said Whitny Braun, a California investigator whose effort to determine if the photo is real is traced in Discovery's special, "The Lost Lincoln." The man who claims to own the image sued to halt the show. But a federal judge ruled Friday night, citing freedom of speech, that the documentary could air.
After looking into it for two years, Braun said she's 99% convinced the photo is genuine. She and the special's producer, Archie Gips, say it makes too much sense for it to be real than not.
As the story goes, the image was captured by Henry Ulke, a professional photographer who lived across the street from Ford's Theatre in the boardinghouse where Lincoln was brought after being shot. He died the next morning, and Ulke supposedly took the picture in secret before Lincoln's body was taken to the White House.
Associated Press
