Hiding in Plain Sight: Kate Warne and the Race to Save Abraham Lincoln

America’s first female detective Kate Warne’s mission? Protect president-elect Abraham Lincoln from Southern rebels bent on assassinating him before his inauguration.

Abraham Lincoln faced a dangerous and uncertain future when he left Springfield, Illinois, for his inauguration in Washington, DC. Luckily for him, detective Kate Warne had his back, even if he didn’t know it yet.

Hired by the Pinkerton Detective Agency, Kate Warne used her exceptional acting and conversational skills to pose as a Southern lady to help uncover the rebel plot to kill Lincoln in Baltimore, the only Southern city on his inaugural train route to DC. Kate warned Lincoln’s staff that he faced a deadly welcome in Baltimore, the detectives urged him to change his route, but the president-elect refused to cancel his commitments. In a race against time, Kate and Pinkerton had one last chance. Lincoln would travel disguised as her sick brother on a night train from Philadelphia, secretly making his way through Baltimore in the wee hours of the morning and then on to Washington. Would they make it? Would someone leak their movements to the assassins?

This exciting American history picture book from award-winning author Beth Anderson, well-known for action-packed books on daring women, and illustrated by Sally Wern Comport in her signature mix of collage, drawing, and paint, brings Kate to thrilling and vivid life.