Who ran the first Secret Service for what President?

William Wood for President Lincoln.


The Secret Service officially went to work on July 5, 1865. Its first chief was William Wood. Chief Wood, widely known for his heroism during the Civil War, was very successful in his first year, closing more than 200 counterfeiting plants. This success helped prove the value of the Secret Service, and in 1866 the National Headquarters was established in the Department of the Treasury building in Washington, D.C.

http://www.secretservice.gov/history.shtml

Interesting. It seems that a "wash" has been done on the history of the Secret Service. I saw no mention of Allan Pinkerton, who headed the US Secret Service in the Civil War, despite ample documentation of Pinkerton's efforts and the name "Secret Service" in conjunction with those efforts. I knew that Hoover did a similar wash on the history of the FBI, effectively eliminating the eforts of his predecessors in publicity of the FBI, but was unaware of this one. At least, in Hoover's case, there was a name change involved, so he could at least claim a technical distinction.

There are things that are official and unoffical like the old Army brevet rank, official in time of war, unofficial in peace time. The Secret Service was an espionage organization operated by Col. Lafayette Baker during the Civil War. At, the time, President Lincoln's bodyguard was made up of Army troops, and was known as the President's Bodyguard, oddly enough. Pinkerton operated with the Army of the Potomac. The Secret Service's main mission was to ferret out Confederate spies in Washington. So, basically what we have here falls under the heading of 'semantics'.

Thanks for the information, Caveman. I knew about Pinkerton's work in the Army of the Potamac, but not about the President's Bodyguard.