Joseph "Peanuts" Burroughs was a biracial American boy who worked odd jobs at Ford's Theatre in Washington DC during the 1860s. On 14 April 1865, Edman Spangler hired him to hold onto the getaway horse used by John Wilkes Booth, only for Booth to rush out of the theatre after shooting Abraham Lincoln, strike Burroughs with the handle of his knife, and flee on the horse.