'Deathbed Photo' of Abraham Lincoln Sparks Frenzy With Historians Unable to Verify Image

A photo claiming to be the last picture of the former United States President Abraham Lincoln has created ripples. Jerald Spolar, a dentist from Illinois, contacted an expert Whitny Braun to authenticate a photo of Abraham Lincoln that was in his possession, ATI reported.

Braun is an Assistant Professor of Bioethics at Loma Linda University and has been featured in the National Geographic Channel television program "Taboo" on NPR and other news outlets for her research on a variety of topics.

The alleged photo features Lincoln on his deathbed, and if genuine, it captures Lincoln right after his assassination. Braun's attempts at verifying the authenticity of the photo have been covered in Discovery’s new documentary Undiscovered: The Lost Lincoln. The individual in the image had many of Lincoln's features including the gaunt face and famous beard, the New York Post reported. The person's right eye was also bulging indicating a wound, which makes sense since Lincoln had been shot. 

Braun does believe that the photo features Lincoln, the Associated Press reported. “In the world of authenticating, this is like finding the Holy Grail,” said Braun.

To this date, the only known photo of Lincoln's body was captured from a distance and is a bit fuzzy, the New York Post reported. The latest picture, if authentic, would be a major find for historians.

But some experts are not on board when it comes to the photo's authenticity, the New York Post reported. “I’ve seen enough of these things to know that this is a whole lot of hysteria about something that is not Lincoln,” said Harold Holzer. “Not every man with a beard photographed after 1861 was Abraham Lincoln.”

Holzer published a book in 1984, “The Lincoln Image: Abraham Lincoln and the Popular Print,” in which he traced the 130 known photographs of the former president, the New York Post reported. Holzer presents several points against the photograph. He states that the man in the photo is wearing a shirt, but according to him, Lincoln's clothes were torn after he was brought to the boarding house to search for more wounds. He also pointed out the use of an ambrotype, something which had gone out of style by that time, and the good lighting. 

Braun was a skeptic initially when she received the details from Spolar, the New York Post reported. “My first reaction was ‘How could this be,’” Braun said. “How could a plate like this go unnoticed for 150 years? My initial thought was that it was too good to be true.” Discovery's documentary explains that the photo was taken by Henry Ulke, who was living across from Ford’s Theatre in the boarding house where Lincoln was brought after the assassination on April 15, 1865.

Braun took the help of ballistic experts including her father to verify the photo, and most of them concluded that the photo was legitimate, the New York Post reported. She also contacted Ulke's descendants who claimed that he specialized in taking images of corpses where their eyes were open.

The documentary’s producer Archie Gips believes this is a remarkable discovery and he does understand that many will question the photo's credibility, ATI reported. “There will be plenty of naysayers, of course, as there is with anything, especially the historians,” Gips added, ATI reported. “It’s a really important piece of history that’s incredible. It’s not what you’d expect. You’d expect to see blood pouring out of his eye. But you get a sense of eeriness. You don’t get a shock value or disgust.”

Ulke took the photo before Lincoln's body was carried to the White House according to the documentary. The reason the photo never saw the light of day was because Lincoln’s influential secretary of war, Edwin Stanton, demanded that all pictures of the president in existence remained private, ATI reported.

The photo somehow reached Lincoln’s mother Nancy Hanks in Illinois and was later handed down to Lincoln's second cousin Margaret Hanks, the New York Post reported. In 1986, Margaret Hank sold the photo along with her collection to Illinois auctioneer and Civil War buff Larry Davis. The photo apparently came with a Post-it note saying “Cousin Abe.”

Davis has allegedly accused his ex-wife in court papers of stealing the photo and selling it to Spolar, the New York Post reported. Spolar has in turn sued Braun, alleging that a non-disclosure agreement between them regarding the photo has been violated.

According to experts, if the photo turns out to be genuine it might be worth up to $2.3 million, the New York Post reported.