James Hall, 94; was authority on Lincoln shooting

WASHINGTON -- James Hall, one of the most authoritative scholars on the Abraham Lincoln assassination, died Feb. 26 of aspiration pneumonia at his home in McLean, Va. He was 94.

Mr. Hall, with William A. Tidwell and David Winfred Gaddy, wrote "Come Retribution: The Confederate Secret Service and the Assassination of Lincoln," a 1988 book that detailed Confederate plans to kidnap and assassinate the president. The Washington Post's review of the book said its outline of Confederate intelligence activities and clandestine secret service operations was "by far the best such account in print."

Although he earned his living as director of the wage and hour division of government contracts in the Labor Department, Mr. Hall devoted his spare time and the years after retiring in 1972 to research the Lincoln assassination.

Mr. Hall helped train guides at the Surratt House Museum in Clinton, Md., and 30 years ago helped the museum set up its popular tours of the route that John Wilkes Booth took after shooting Lincoln. The museum named its research center for Mr. Hall.

In 2001, Mr. Hall was the keynote speaker at the National Park Service's Lincoln symposium at Ford's Theatre. He was still researching the subject at almost age 90.

Called the specialist's specialist on the Lincoln assassination, he knew more about it "than anyone who ever lived, except those personally involved in it," Ford's Theatre historian William Hanchett once said.