The Lincolns - A Primer by Indiana State Museum & Historic Sites

Preface

Brief Historyof the

Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection By Sara Gabbard. Executive Director, Friends of the Lincoln Collection of Indiana

n Feb. 12, 1928—Abraham Lincoln’s 119th birthday— the Lincoln National Life Insurance Company created a new department called the Abraham Lincoln Historical Research Foundation. The Foundation reflected the personal interests of company president Arthur Hall and chairman of the board Samuel Foster. Both were Lincoln collectors; both wished to create a central, organized research facility for Lincoln enthusiasts—a facility that would provide accurate information about Lincoln and his times. The Foundation then hired Dr. Louis A. Warren as director. Between 1928 and 1931, Warren purchased several major collections of books and documents for the Foundation, and on April 15, 1929, he published the first issue of Lincoln Lore. In February 1931, the Foundation dedicated the Lincoln Museum and Library. When Lincoln Financial Group announced in March 2008 that The Lincoln Museum would close on June 30, there was widespread concern about what would happen to the museum collection. And there was widespread interest among Lincoln and Civil War sites, collecting institutions,

and private collectors as well. Lincoln Financial Foundation, which owned the museum collection, was adamant that the collection would be donated to an institution that could provide permanent care and broad public access. The proposal offered by a consortium of Indiana institutions emerged as the final selection. That consortium was led by the Indiana State Museum and the Allen County Public Library, with the support of the Indiana Historical Society, the Indiana State Library, the Indiana State Archives, and other organizations in Indianapolis, Fort Wayne, Bloomington, and Spencer County. The Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection was donated to the State of Indiana by Lincoln Financial Foundation. Artifacts are now housed at the Indiana State Museum in Indianapolis and at the Allen County Public Library in Fort Wayne. The Lincoln collection that had been built in Indiana stayed in Indiana.

Left: John Chester Butler after Francis B. Carpenter, Lincoln Family in 1861, c. 1873 mezzotint Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection

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The Of

Other than these and a few other snippets, Lincoln seldom mentioned his heritage, or his upbringing. Circumstantial evidence points to a strained relationship between Thomas Lincoln, a subsistence frontier farmer, and his son Abraham, who preferred reading Shakespeare to plowing rock-strewn fields. For reasons of his own, Lincoln’s law partner and first biographer, William Herndon, chose to focus on those difficulties, rather than to reference other examples of a typical father-son dynamic. Soon a narrative evolved that portrayed the martyred president as not only a great man and a great leader, but as a hallowed gift from God. Persevering over abject poverty, an abusive and incompetent father, a psychotic wife, feral sons, and all manner of other crosses to bear fit this narrative perfectly. The truth of the matter is considerably more complex.

Ancestors

Abraham Lincoln

By R. Dale Ogden, Chief Curator of Cultural History, Indiana State Museum & Historic Sites

here is, perhaps, no more mythologized figure in American history than Abraham Lincoln. From apocryphal stories of his prowess as a rail-splitter on the frontier, to the popular belief that he suddenly emerged from utter obscurity and total failure to save the nation and free the slaves, every aspect of the 16th President’s life has taken on epic proportions. Considering the national trauma that was engendered by the horrific civil war that defined his legacy, it’s not surprising that his countrymen would endeavor to elevate Lincoln the man to Lincoln the sacred icon. As the historian Drew Gilpin Faust has written “The parallels between Lincoln and Christ were powerful and unavoidable, reinforcing the belief in the war’s divine purpose, realized through the sacrifice of the one for the many.” 1

One of the most persistent legends associated with Abraham Lincoln is the notion that he arose from a family of poverty stricken ne’re-do-wells. Lincoln himself provided the foundation for this myth. In an autobiographical sketch he authored in 1859, the aspiring commander-in-chief remarked: “My parents were both born in Virginia of undistinguished families.”2 In a longer memoir

written for the 1860 presidential campaign, Lincoln expanded on this theme: “[T]he . . . father of the present subject, . . . even in childhood was a wandering laboring boy, and grew up litterally (sic) without education. He never did more in the way of writing than to bunglingly sign his own name.”3 Thomas Lincoln c. 1845. Photographic print Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection

The Lincolns

Mordecai Lincoln’s deed to a share in a forge. Plymouth, MA Colony. December 22, 1703 Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection

By the time the first son of Thomas and Nancy Lincoln was born in Kentucky in 1809, Lincolns had lived in America for six generations. Farmers, craftsmen, and even two governors populated the Lincoln lineage. And, while Abraham may have descended from a lesser branch of the family tree, his grandfather had been an American officer during the Revolution, his father was a landowner and skilled craftsman, and his mother, stepmother, and beloved sister anchored a loving home. The history of Abraham Lincoln’s family in America began when his great-great-great-great grandfather, Samuel Lincoln (circa 16221690), emigrated from Hingham, Norfolk, England to Hingham, Massachusetts Colony in 1637. One branch of the Lincoln family would remain in New England to produce generations of industrialists, businessmen, governors and U.S. Congressmen.

1. Drew Gilpin Faust. This Republic of Suffering: Death and the American Civil War. New York City: Knopf Publishing Group, 2008 2. Abraham Lincoln. Autobiographical sketch. 1859 3. Abraham Lincoln. Autobiographical sketch. 1860

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Mordecai Lincoln (1657-1727), one of Samuel and Martha Lincoln’s eleven children, was a blacksmith by trade. He became a successful owner of iron works, grist mills, and saw mills in Massachusetts, and established the first smelting furnace in New England.

of jobs in a desperate effort to acquire food and shelter. In 1802, Tom moved to Hardin County, Kentucky, purchased his first farm and, in 1806, married Nancy Hanks (1784-1818). Born in what is now West Virginia, the nature of Nancy’s parentage has been a question for nearly 200 years. In any case, her family ultimately settled in central Kentucky where she married Tom Lincoln and gave birth to three children: Sarah (1807), Abraham (1809), and Thomas (1812) who died in infancy.

Mordecai’s great-great grandson, Captain Abraham Lincoln was typical of the line of farmers and craftsmen who migrated from New England to Pennsylvania before moving on to Virginia. Captain Lincoln’s grandson and namesake would become the 16th President of the United States. While far removed from a life of wealth and privilege, Abraham Lincoln descended from a long line of upstanding citizens.

Although he was virtually illiterate and lacked any formal education, or the ambition to seek one, Tom Lincoln was a skilled carpenter, land-owning farmer, and responsible citizen. He served on juries, as a guard for county prisoners, and as a trustee for the Little Pigeon Creek Separate Baptist Church. He was a first-rate storyteller and popular with his neighbors.

After serving as an officer in the colonial militia during the Revolutionary War, Captain Lincoln (1744-1786), his wife Bathsheba, and their three sons relocated from Virginia to a large farm near Louisville, Kentucky in 1781. While working this land with his sons in 1786, Captain Lincoln was shot and killed by a band of NativeAmerican foragers. The eldest Lincoln boy, Mordecai (a common Lincoln name in the 18th century), shot one of the attackers, thereby saving the youngest child, Thomas, from being kidnapped. After his father’s death, in compliance with the laws of the time, Mordecai Lincoln inherited all of his family’s land and property. President Lincoln, who greatly admired his uncle, once commented, “Uncle Mord ran off with all the talents of the family.” Without an inheritance, Mordecai’s little brother Tom was forced to fend for himself. Thomas Lincoln (1778-1851) was eight years old when he witnessed his father’s murder. Destitute, and wanting of a formal education,

In 1808, Thomas purchased 300 acres in Hardin (now LaRue) County Kentucky, but soon lost the land in a title dispute. While waiting (in vain) for the ownership question to be settled, the Lincolns leased 30 acres in the Knob Creek Valley. The May 11, 1811 entry in the official Hardin County Record of Estrays lists a stray gray mare as being among the property in the possession of Thomas Lincoln. By 1815, Tom declared four horses, including a stallion, on the Hardin County Commissioner’s Tax Book. Of the 104 taxpayers listed, only six others owned as many horses as the Lincolns. Corner cabinet made by Thomas Lincoln, c. 1818 From the Collection of David Lutz

Tom struggled to survive on the harsh frontier. As a child, he moved frequently with his mother and siblings, working a variety

The Lincolns

Land owners on the frontier were subject to a jumble of federal grants, state laws, and local ordinances, and like many illiterate young men, Tom Lincoln fell victim to confusion and outright fraud. In 1816, economic misfortune finally forced the Lincolns to relocate from the comparative civilization of Kentucky to the backwoods of

southern Indiana. For the next fourteen years, the family struggled to eke out a living on a hardscrabble farm in what is now Spencer County. The notion that Tom Lincoln endured a trying relationship with his son has never been in question. Tilling the rocky soil of southern Indiana was exhausting work. That the strapping youth preferred his studies to physical labor surely created friction between father and son. But the two also shared a sense of humor and a renowned fondness for storytelling. By modern standards, Thomas was stern and distant parent. Yet there is little credible evidence that he was ever estranged from Abraham. Indeed, there are personal letters that reveal a cordial relationship to the end of Thomas’ life. Perhaps the strongest circumstantial evidence that Tom was at least willing to tolerate his son’s academic pursuits can be found in the women whom the elder Lincoln chose to run his household. Nancy has been long-revered for her well-known encouragement of Abraham’s intellectual curiosity. When Nancy died in 1818, Tom was presented with an opportunity to recruit a harsh taskmistress to whip his idle boy into shape. Instead, he married the widow Sarah Bush Johnston. Sally was every bit as supportive of Abraham’s desire to advance himself as Nancy had been. If Tom was inclined to crush his son’s aspirations, he followed an odd path toward that goal. That Abraham Lincoln triumphed over enormous obstacles is undeniable. That he sprang from ambitious, talented, successful, and supportive roots is an accurate assessment of his heritage.

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There I Grew up Abraham Lincoln’s Indiana Youth By William E. Bartelt Educator, National Park Service ranger, vice-chair Indiana Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission

ddressing the 140th Indiana Regiment from the balcony of the National Hotel in Washington D.C., on March 17, 1865, Abraham Lincoln said “I was born in Kentucky, raised in Indiana, reside in Illinois, and now here . . . ” Indeed, Lincoln grew up in Indiana: he crossed the Ohio River at age seven, in Spencer county about the time Indiana became a state on December 11, 1816. Then he crossed the Wabash River into Illinois in March 1830 at age 21. Those fourteen years proved significant in forming the Abraham Lincoln we know. In 1860 Lincoln said of his father’s move to Indiana, “This removal was partly on account of slavery; but chiefly on account of the difficulty in land titles in Ky. He settled in an unbroken forest; and the clearing away of surplus wood was the great task a head.” Already handy with an axe, young Abraham assisted in clearing the land to provide space for shelter and for spring planting. By February the family moved from the temporary, three-sided, camp structure into a more comfortable log cabin in Spencer county. Soon they carved a farm from the forest; and on the whole, the Lincolns—parents Thomas and Nancy, older sister Sarah, and Abraham—found a good life there. In 1817 Nancy Lincoln’s aunt and uncle Elizabeth and Thomas Sparrow, with their nephew Dennis Hanks joined the Lincolns. But in October 1818 catastrophe befell them. In late summer some members of the Lincoln’s Little Pigeon Creek community fell ill. Although they called it “milk sickness,” residents truly did not know

the cause. Now we realize those who drank the milk or ate the meat of a cow that ingested the white snakeroot weed soon became ill, and many died. By October at least one neighbor and both Thomas and Elizabeth Sparrow lay buried on a knoll in sight of the Lincoln cabin. Then 35-year-old Nancy Lincoln sickened and died on October 5. Abraham helped his father prepare the coffin for his mother and she was interred in the expanding cemetery. Of course, difficult times followed for the Lincoln family. Although Sarah attempted to keep house for Thomas, Abraham, and Dennis Hanks, the task overwhelmed the eleven-year-old. When griefstricken Thomas eventually realized his family needed the presence of a woman, he traveled to Kentucky and returned in December 1819 with his new wife, Sarah Bush Johnston, and her three children. Stepmother Sarah—called Sally —recognized young Abraham’s intellect and passion for learning; Lincoln loved and appreciated Sarah as “a good and kind mother.” As Sarah and Abraham grew close, Thomas bonded with Sarah’s son John D. Johnston. Thomas shared more common frontier interests with his stepson than with his own son. While Thomas was a typical 19th century strict father, Abraham’s friends and neighbors—when interviewed years later—did not mention an antagonistic relationship between the two.

left: Karl Bodmer, Cave-In-Rock. View on the Ohio. Ackerman and Company, London, 1839. Indiana Historical Society

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In Indiana, Lincoln attended three different schools although his total formal education amounted to less than one year. Yet this curious boy supplemented his schooling by reading and by talking with those around him. He learned from neighbors as he worked their fields, from customers as he served them at Gentry’s store, and from men he spent time with at Baldwin’s blacksmith shop. Perhaps young Lincoln’s greatest source of information was the Ohio River flowing about 15 miles from the Lincoln homestead. Though Lincoln visited the 6th Spencer County seat, Rockport, frequently, his most extensive contact with the river came when he worked in the river town of Troy. For most of a year, Abraham worked for Green Taylor on his farm and operated the ferry at the mouth of Anderson River. Here he learned about national and world events by reading newspapers from major river cities. Moreover, he conversed with crews and passengers on steamboats docking at Troy. And here he earned his first dollar in less than a day by ferrying two passengers to a steamboat in mid-river. Each man threw a half-dollar in the bottom of the scow. As president he remarked that this, “. . . was a most important incident in my life.”

driftwood, shoals, and steamboats, protected the cargo from river thieves (they were attacked along the sugar coast of Louisiana), negotiated the sale of produce at plantations along the way, sold the remaining produce and lumber in New Orleans, and then protected Gentry’s money on the steamboat trip back home. For a smart, curious young man familiar only with frontier Kentucky and Indiana, this trip opened new worlds.

While campaigning for Henry Clay in 1844, Abraham returned to the place where he grew up. He visited his mother’s and sister’s graves, renewed old friendships, and after returning to Springfield wrote poetry about his “childhood home” and his life in Indiana. In part he said, Near twenty years have passed away

Neighbors later spoke of the maturing Lincoln’s ability to craft words and entertain them with stories. Indiana friend Nathaniel Grigsby related in 1865, “His mind & the Ambition of the man soared above us. He naturally assumed the leadership of the boys — He read & thoroughly read his books whilst we played —. Hence he was above us and became our guide and leader & in this position he never failed to be the leader.”

Since here I bid farewell To woods and fields, and scenes of play, And playmates loved so well.

Where many were, but few remain

In 1830, Thomas and Sarah Lincoln, along with Sarah’s children, moved to Illinois. Now 21 and no longer legally obligated to his father, Abraham decided to join his extended family. Once Thomas sold his Indiana land and crops, on March 1, 1830, the entourage of 13 said their goodbyes and moved west.

In addition, the river provided the most eye-opening adventure of his young life. In 1828 he was hired to join Allen Gentry, one of storekeeper James Gentry’s sons, to deliver a large amount of produce by flatboat to New Orleans. Coming just a few months after his beloved sister, Sarah, died in childbirth, the journey allowed young Lincoln time to grieve. Although some writers stress Lincoln’s seeing plantation slavery and slave markets on this journey, perhaps the most significant aspect is Lincoln’s responsibility and leadership on the trip. Two young men—Lincoln, age 19, and Gentry, age 21--maneuvered the flatboat around the

Of old familiar things; But seeing them, to mind again The lost and absent brings.

The friends I left that parting day, How changed, as time has sped! Young childhood grown, strong manhood gray, And half of all are dead.

Gravestone of Nancy Hanks Lincoln Lincoln Boyhood National Memorial, National Park Service

White Snakeroot William Bartelt

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Abraham Lincoln’s Sum Book By James M. Cornelius, Ph.D. Curator, Lincoln Collection, Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library & Museum, Springfield, IL.

hen William Herndon visited Sarah Bush Johnston Lincoln in September 1865, he learned something astonishing: that for 35 years she had saved the boy Abraham’s pages of math practice. She gave Herndon those pages for his trip back to the Lincoln-Herndon law office in Springfield, and 10 of those presumed 12 pages are extant today. Some evidence suggests that other family members had already passed along some of the pages. For Herndon’s, and our own, study of Lincoln, these writings are page one. Each page measures about 9 x 12 inches, evidently hand-stitched together at one time into what the Lincoln industry now calls his ‘sumbook.’ (In earlier days it sometimes went by the term ‘copybook’ in part because Abraham supposedly created a parallel booklet of copied poems and phrases, now lost.) The 10 pages known today are owned by 11 different locations -- one of them was digitally reunited, top and bottom halves, by the Papers of Abraham Lincoln project in 2009 upon finding an unrecorded half-page at the University of Chicago. The display at the Indiana State Museum in 2013 was the first effort to reunite any of these historic calculations since the days of Herndon. A half-dozen pages may once have been in the hands of his Greencastle, Indiana, friend and co-author Jesse Weik, but otherwise the greatest horde consisted of three leaves, held directly from Herndon in 1886 by one Samuel B. Munson, d/b/a The Lincoln

Memorial Collection (Chicago). Isaac Newton Arnold, a leading anti-slavery Congressman from Chicago, owned at least one leaf, by Herndon’s gift, and perhaps another lost in the Great Fire of 1871. Eight of the 10 located pages are now in public institutions, and two in private hands. The first page of the sumbook, from the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library & Museum, in Springfield, Illinois, was valued at $750,000 when Louise Taper donated it to ALPLM in 2007. Another page was sold at auction in 2011 for about $700,000; and a half-page for $352,000 in 2006. Those are some pumpkins, Abraham. In the early days these pages were also called his ‘schoolboy exercise book.’ People assumed that he had completed them as assigned schoolwork, but we now know that his schooling ended well before 1824, and that he borrowed or found books from which he could drill himself. Those ‘arithmetick’ books were by Nicolas Pike (1808 ed.) and Nathaniel Daboll (c. 1820). They raised a reader in the skills a clerk would need: long division, long multiplication, acreage, weights and measures, interest and discount, British and American currency -- those maddening and non-decimal pounds, shillings, and pence circulated on the western frontier into the 1840s. Lest anyone think Lincoln an immortal, these dozens of exercises do include one error in calculation. (Thanks to William Bartelt of Evansville, Ind., for pointing this out to me.) Otherwise the young plowboy expertly forged ahead each night before the fire, with

left: Abraham Lincoln sum book pages front and verso of same sheet, 1824-1826 Indiana Historical Society

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goose-quill pen and rudely bound paper, training his mind and perfecting his hopes for a life in which mental faculties counted for more than brawn. And did Lincoln use these lessons in adult life? Yes, a good politician has to do the math. As economic spokesman for the Whigs in the state legislature, Lincoln in 1839 spoke on a proposed SubTreasury banking system. Nearly every paragraph of his long speech contains figures, and those that do not, analyze the constitutional transgressions that arise from bad federal economic decisions. In both 1855 and 1858 while running for U.S. Senate, Lincoln counted his lead or deficit by county or region, and pondered the percentages of various immigrant groups. In 1860 he wrote to campaigners in various states to ask how many votes ahead the Republican party seemed to be, based on earlier statistics. As President did he continue to use his facility with numbers? Often. Here are 5 simple instances: 1. In March 1862 he wrote to the editor of the New York Times, addressing a northern sentiment that all the slaves in Delaware could be purchased from their owners for an average of $400 per person, at total cost of less than a half-day’s cost of fighting the war; and that slaves in the 4 Border States, plus the District of Columbia, could be purchased for 87 days’ worth of war costs. But as Gerald Prokopowicz, a one-time historian in Fort Wayne, remarked, buying all those people is a “Yankee notion.” The Confederates would not dream of it; Congress would not pay for it; Lincoln knew it to be preposterous, perhaps the height of evil banality. 2. In 1863 he and Secretary of War Stanton calculated how many train cars were required to move a desired number of soldiers

over how many miles, and how quickly, from the Potomac to East Tennessee, in support of General Rosecrans. 3. In 1864 he walked into Secretary of the Treasury Chase’s office one day and asked him to invest all of his money in government bonds. He poured out a heap of coins and greenbacks as well as lists of securities owned and debts he was owed; and knew the rough total. This scene recapitulated Lincoln’s last day as postmaster of New Salem, Illinois, in 1836, when he turned over all receipts to an official: not just the exact amount, but the very coins taken in, still stored in the same old sock. Scrupulous care with numbers generally connotes moral scruple, too. 4. In Lincoln’s mind, important numbers clung to important words. When told that only about 400 Frémont supporters had turned out at a Cleveland convention to puff his candidacy against Lincoln in 1864, Lincoln snapped up his Bible and turned right to 1 Samuel 22:2, and gleefully read, “... everyone that was discontented, gathered themselves unto him ... and there were with him about four hundred men.”

5. Election Night 1864 found him penciling in columns of figures for each state of the Union: votes he had won in 1860, and votes as the telegraph brought news of them now, to gauge where he was losing and where winning support. A far cry indeed from the sumbook pages of 1824 to renewed political mastery of the nation in 1864, and the vote-counting needed to pass the 13th Amendment resolution through the House in 1865. Yet skills planted are skills that bear fruit in due season. They may take the shape of soldiers moved, money invested, peoples freed. And we all know exactly how important -- how poetic -- mere numbers can be. Mr. ‘Four score and seven years ago’ Lincoln surely taught us that truth.

Abraham Lincoln sum book pages front and verso, 10 pages on 5 sheets (including the sheet from the Indiana Historical Society in beginning of article), 1824-1826 a and b - Courtesy of the Lilly Library, Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana; c and d - Chicago History Museum; e and f - Herndon-Weik Collection of Lincolniana, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress; f and g - Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum

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ary Ann Todd was born in a city that was sure of its role in the new nation. Antebellum Lexington thrived at the center of a hub of roads from the lush Bluegrass to the Ohio River, with access to New Orleans and Europe’s rich colonial markets. Lexington was Kentucky’s first city: success came early, even before 1800 much of Lexington’s prosperity relied on both immigrant and African-American labor. The Democratic Society of Lexington, founded in the summer of 1793 with Senator John Breckinridge as President, showed a local cultural hostility to federalism and a passionate sympathy for the young republic of France. Men wore tri-color cockades and planted liberty poles on every corner – one remaining for several years on the corner of Main and Cheapside. Schools, banks, factories and stores sprang up to meet the needs of a mobile population and of those who gambled on an international economy. These commercial networks tied Lexington’s elite to a national ruling class. Lexington boasted the first newspaper and the first performance of a Beethoven symphony west of the Alleghenies, the nation’s second asylum, and a graded racetrack that attracted the best thoroughbred owners and breeders in the world. The brisk trade in the streets and stores of Lexington reminded visitors of the markets of Philadelphia. By 1810 the sales of some merchants surpassed one million dollars in a single year. The first steam locomotive made in the U.S., invented by Thomas Barlow and constructed by Joseph Bruen, both of Lexington, ran on the Lexington & Ohio Railroad. On December 21, 1834, a grand ball and supper at Brennan’s Tavern celebrated the opening of the railroad.

The Todd/Parker Family in Kentucky

Home to a multitude of schools for both boys and girls, Lexington had one of the finest medical libraries in the U.S. and one of

the very few law departments (the first in the West) housed at Transylvania University, the envy of Thomas Jefferson. Against the background of plans for macadamizing the city’s roads, a tenacre botanical garden on one end of Main Street was established in 1824. Managed by Professor C.S. Rafinesque, the botanical garden maintained a pastoral aspect to the city that was valued scientifically and artistically by the cultural elite of the nineteenth century. Presidents and war heroes often visited, and the city’s finest would be on display for parades, festivals and lavish parties. Many Lexingtonians attended the open lectures held by such famous intellectuals as Charles Caldwell, a phrenologist. The city offered a cultural mecca unheard of in other cities on the new nation’s frontier. World-renowned musicians and portrait-painters came to live in Lexington. Silversmiths flourished. Lexington was the first city in Kentucky to have street lights, paved sewers and sidewalks. The Lexington Female Benevolent Society organized in 1815, but Lexington’s women – both white and black – had always played a large role in forging an infrastructure for social services and education. The city hosted an education convention in 1830 that led to the beginning of the state’s public school system, and within a few years, its tax-paying women (femmes sole) in rural districts gained the right to vote in elections pertaining to schoolrelated issues. Notwithstanding the patriarchal nature of the nineteenth century society around them, elite women in the U.S. functioned from a power base not accessible to the majority of women. Mary, as a member of an interstate and sometimes international elite, experienced two versions of a public sphere: one for the common folk on the streets or in the newspapers and another for her own

left: Todd Family Home Image Courtesy of the Kentucky Historical Society

By Randolph Hollingsworth, Ph.D., Assistant Provost, University of Kentucky

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Meissen porcelain figurine belonging to Mary Todd, c. 1835 Image courtesy of the Kentucky Historical Society

elite enclave in the exclusive settings of dinner parties and parlor teas. After attending public gatherings or city-wide torchlight parades, presidents, governors, military heroes, and foreign diplomats retired to the homes of Lexington’s elite for private conversations such as a request for a personal favor, perhaps the suggestion of political appointment or a pardon.

The definition of “public” for the elite then was two-fold: besides the general public, there was a more limited one; and, the world for whom the elite played a candid and discerning role was not in the least a democratic or inclusive public realm. Like many other Kentucky elite women she knew, Mary stood boldly in “public” arenas and used her society’s prescribed role for elite women. Elite Kentucky women were accustomed to taking part in political debate, in the public realm of the large dinner party or the parlor of an exclusive resort. Practicing and perfecting southern political rhetoric was an important art for the educated and intellectual women of nineteenth century Kentucky.

career as a businessman. Their most famous forbearer was Colonel John Todd, territorial governor of Illinois, who constructed the Lexington Fort and became immortalized by his death at the Battle of Blue Licks in 1792. His widow and child entrusted some of their land holdings with Col. Todd’s good friends, the Parker brothers John, James, Robert and Alexander. All military men, often political leaders, surveyors and general merchants, the Parkers owned vast amounts of land in central Kentucky and intermarried with some of the most conservative Virginia families. Alexander Parker, having accumulated considerable wealth, was appointed to serve as a trustee for the University and the Lexington Free Library.

The neoclassical education most popular with central Kentuckian elite families equated oratory and conversation with an exercise of power and intimately related to a culture of honor. Mary had come into womanhood under the tutelage of the popular Lexington educator, Madame Charlotte Mentelle, who was a refugee of the French Revolution. Mentelle wore her hair short, went shooting for pleasure, fenced, and rode her horse astride: perhaps not characteristic for Anglo-American middle class white women, but certainly significant for Mary.

Robert and Elizabeth Porter Parker migrated to Lexington from Pennsylvania and built the first brick house outside the Lexington Fort, amassing a fortune from surveying, a mill in the countryside, and a store on the corner of Main and Cross streets by the time of his death in 1800. His widow often found herself at odds with her Todd relations, but made room on her spacious city lot for her daughter Eliza Ann’s new house and husband (a cousin) Robert Smith Todd. Six children later – the fourth was Mary born December 13, 1818 – Eliza died. When Robert S. Todd married his second wife, Elizabeth Humphreys, they moved to a house on Main Street (now the historic Mary Todd Lincoln Historic Home). Eight more siblings created the large blended family from which Mary was eager to escape. Like many of her peers in Lexington she boarded away from home to attend school. Widow Parker, while disapproving of her son-in-law and his new wife, was always a champion for her granddaughter Mary. Nevertheless there was not enough money in the 1830s to send her to New Orleans or Washington D.C. for her social debut as did many others with

Mary came from Kentucky pioneer stock. The Todds, who usually married parallel cousins, resulting in a convoluted genealogy, often married up in their social circles. They gained access to finances necessary to invest in the nation’s future – and their personal political fortunes. They always remarried after the death of a spouse, creating extended families which could close ranks quickly. Robert Smith Todd, Mary’s father, was one of six sons of the county clerk, Levi Todd. Like his father, he did well in politics serving as a Kentucky legislator with more success than in his

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Blanchard silver spoon, belonging to Elizabeth Parker, c. 1840 Image Courtesy of the Kentucky Historical Society

whom she had attended dancing schools in Lexington. Instead Mary was sent to visit her older sisters in Springfield, Illinois. There she expanded her social circle to include the new state’s political stars, including her future husband. Mary Lincoln was our first “First Lady,” so dubbed by the London Times for her “statesmanlike tastes.” Kentucky belles tended to strike melodramatic poses in public. Her biographer, Jean Baker, theorized that Mary Lincoln’s famed mercurial temperament was a result of her frustration at Washington’s inability to allow her the female independence and autonomy she had been raised to admire. For Mary, the highly politicized ceremonies surrounding an official visit of state or a formal ball functioned as a stage on which to perform, and her position on the stage was everything. Lincoln’s enemies in Washington had no problem associating her ambitious performances with a fatal personality flaw, but her active interest in politics, rich clothing and elaborate refurbishings of the White House, were all part of her political identity interpreted best within a Southern – a Kentucky – culture of honor.

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The Springfield Tea Set

By Thomas D. Mackie, Director Abraham Lincoln Library and Museum, Lincoln Memorial University, Harrogate, TN.

ormal teas were part of the Victorian culture of calling; a controlled, social interaction between the private home and the public world of community politics. They reflected the status of the family, but were under the masterful control of the woman of the home. Though a patriarchal society, the parlor rooms, and social calls, including teas, were part of the women’s sphere in the mid-nineteenth century. Mary Todd Lincoln was well educated and trained in the world of women politicos and the social expectations of Victorian high society. Like her husband, she was ambitious and politically astute, and understood that the arena of politics would extend to the parlor of their home even before her husband became an official candidate for president. For this reason, she hosted various social functions and served coffee and hot chocolate from this set of china in the front parlor of their Springfield home. The political candidate’s skills were partially measured through the quality of their private entertainments. Accruements of entertainment must meet high standards for national offices.

a purchase for $25.72 in February of 1859 to Van Ness & Ferguson, which handled “Queensware”. A month later the Lincolns made a substantial increase in purchases of coffee, tea and sugar. 1 The Lincolns were entertaining guests in improved style.

In 1859, the Lincolns very likely custom ordered this floral pattern china named “Bentick” from Ridgway due to its status as “by appointment to Queen Victoria”. This purchase may be one of Lincoln’s first strikes to prepare to run for president in 1860. In reviewing Lincoln’s expenses one historian noted that they made

This china set was manufactured by Ridgeway about 1850 near Staffordshire, England. The pattern is a transfer image with hand coloring to imitate the colors used in porcelain from the Imari district of Japan. The shapes of the jug and coffee pot were popular from 1825 on, as was the custom of producing coffee and

Lincoln Home coffee/tea/hot chocolate porcelain set, c. 1860 Abraham Lincoln Library and Museum of Lincoln Memorial University

hot chocolate sets combined, with hot chocolate and coffee cups sharing a common saucer. This set was given to Lincoln Memorial University by Robert Todd Lincoln Beckwith just after the University dedicated its Museum facility in 1977. Beckwith was the great-grandson of President Lincoln, and his last direct descendent. Beckwith passed away in 1985. The Lincoln family and their close friends developed the habit of distributing scattered portions of their illustrious relation’s possessions to his many admirers.

1. Dickinson, Ron B. and Phillip D. Supina, “Mr. Lincoln needs a tea set: a Journey in Retail Archeology (unpublished article manuscript) Harrogate, TN: Abraham Lincoln Library and Museum Collection, 2011.

The Lincolns

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Dear Rascals The Lincoln Boys in Springfield

By Susan Haake, Curator, Lincoln Home National Historic Site, Springfield IL.

n August 1, 1843, Abraham and Mary Lincoln became the parents of a chubby blondish boy, Robert Todd Lincoln, named for his maternal grandfather. Abraham Lincoln, a lawyer and politician, was 34. The young mother was 25.

to Lincoln in May of 1848 from Lexington that Robert found a kitten, calling the keeping of cats “your hobby…so soon as Eddy [sic], spied it—his tenderness, broke forth, he made them bring it water, fed it with bread himself, with his own dear hands, he was a delighted little creature over it…”2 Lincoln was an affectionate father, encouraging Mary to “Kiss and love the dear rascals.”3

The Lincolns were living in a rented room at the Globe Tavern, a short walk away from Mr. Lincoln’s law office on the town square in Springfield, Illinois. Quickly realizing that a busy inn was no place to raise a baby, the Lincolns briefly rented a small house nearby before buying a cottage a few blocks southeast of downtown. Abraham, Mary and baby Robert moved into the house in May 1844. On March 10, 1846, Mary gave birth to a second son, Edward Baker Lincoln, named for a family friend. In October 1846, Lincoln wrote to his best friend, Joshua Speed, “We have another boy, born the 10th of March last. He is very much such a child as Bob was at his age—rather of a longer order. Bob is “short and low,” and, I expect, always will be.”1 The next big event in their lives was Mr. Lincoln’s election as a U.S. Congressman for the 30th session of Congress in November of 1846. The Lincolns tried living in Washington, DC, but Mr. Lincoln found his family to be a distraction, and sent them to stay with Mary’s father and stepmother in Lexington, KY. Presumably Eddie, being of a “longer order,” physically resembled Lincoln more. Apparently they also shared a delight in cats. Mary wrote Willie and Tad Lincoln, c. 1860. Cased quarter-plate ambrotypes Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection

The Lincolns

Myriopticon and hand carved wooden toy soldiers belonging to Tad Lincoln, c. 1864. Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection

1 Abraham Lincoln, letter to Joshua Speed, 22 October 1846. Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln (CW), Vol. 1. As excerpted in “The Lincoln Log” website, http://www.thelincolnlog.org. 2 Mary Lincoln, letter to Abraham Lincoln, May 1848. Turner & Turner, Mary Todd Lincoln: Her Life and Letters. 3 Abraham Lincoln, letter to Mary Lincoln, 2 July 1848. CW, Vol. 1 from “The Lincoln Log.”

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Mr. Lincoln completed his one term in Congress, and the family returned to Springfield in October 1848. But soon, tragedy struck. In January, 1850, Eddie fell ill with consumption (probably tuberculosis), fighting for his life for fifty-two long days. He died February 1, just a month shy of his fourth birthday. The pain of losing Eddie was eased somewhat when Mary discovered she was pregnant again. William Wallace, called “Willie,” arrived on December 21, 1850, just a week after his mother’s 32nd birthday. He was named for his maternal uncle William Wallace. Two and a half years later, the fourth and final Lincoln son arrived after a difficult birth. Thomas Lincoln, named for his paternal grandfather, arrived on April 4, 1853, squirming and yelling lustily. He had a large head, which, combined with his wriggling body, immediately caused his highly amused father to decide that he looked just like a tadpole. Little Thomas was called “Tad” ever after. The Lincoln boys were a lively bunch. Despite prevailing childrearing methods of the antebellum era requiring obedience and discipline, Mr. and Mrs. Lincoln were different in their parenting methods by not being strict. Mr. Lincoln even remarked that Robert turned out better than he expected considering “we never controlled him much.”4 Robert attended local schools, including what was then called Illinois State University in Springfield. He tried, but failed, to enter Harvard University in 1859, at the age of 16. To make up for his educational deficiencies, he enrolled at Phillips Academy in Exeter, New Hampshire for a year. In July 1860, Robert was admitted to Harvard’s Class of 1864. By this time, Robert’s photos show a

Robert Lincoln, 1858. Ambrotype in gutta-percha case Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection

handsome young man of average height, with his mother’s round face. Despite taking after the Todds in appearance and demeanor, he displayed his father’s genial sense of humor with close friends. Willie was studious and often wrote poetry and charming letters. His photos show a happy and mature boy, possibly even a little taller than boys his age. By all predictions, he was going to be the most like his father in appearance and personality. Photos of Tad show a dark-haired and dark-eyed boy, and sweet, but a little unfocused. He, like his brother Eddie, loved animals, including the family dog, Fido. Imagine his distress when Lincoln decided that Fido needed to stay behind with friends in Springfield. Tad must have been reassured by a letter in 1863 from Springfield barber and friend, William Florville, who wrote to

Stereoscope belonging to Willie and Tad Lincoln, 1857 Lincoln Home National Historic Site

Lincoln in the White House “Tell Taddy that his (and Willys) Dog is alive and Kicking doing well…”5 On February 11, 1861 the Lincolns left for Washington, little knowing that those days at the house at Eighth and Jackson streets were over. Willie and Mr. Lincoln died in Washington. Robert married and raised a family in Chicago. Mary and Tad traveled overseas until Tad’s death in Chicago at age 18. Mary eventually returned to Springfield, living with her sister Elizabeth until her death in 1882.

Star and planet finder, belonging to Robert Lincoln, c. 1900 Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection

Robert rented out the family home until 1887 when he deeded it to the State of Illinois. Robert’s last known visit to the house was in 1909 for his father’s one-hundredth birthday.

4 Abraham Lincoln, letter to Anson G. Henry, 4 July 1860. CW, Vol. 4 from “The Lincoln Log.” 5 Randall, Ruth Painter, Lincoln’s Sons, pg. 126.

The Lincolns

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THE

MYSTERIOUS JEWELS

MRS. LINCOLN

By Clark Evans, Head of Reference Services, Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress (ret.)

mong the most prized materials within the Library of Congress are those pertaining to the life and legacy of Abraham Lincoln. It is not just for its de facto status as the National Library of the United States that qualifies the Library as an appropriate repository of Lincolniana. The grounds of the Library’s Thomas Jefferson Building once housed the block containing the boarding house residence of Congressman Abraham Lincoln during the 1840s. Both as Congressman and President, Lincoln would regularly partake of the Library’s collections for his edification and research. As the home of the Abraham Lincoln Papers, not to mention the papers of numerous Lincoln associates such as William Herndon and John Hay, the Manuscript Division is the Mecca point for studies of the 16th President within the larger institution. However, scholars would be amiss if they failed to recognize Lincoln treasures located elsewhere in the Library. For the purposes of this essay, allow me to highlight just a few of the items in the Rare Book and Special Collections Division, specifically those which were gifted to the Library in 1936-37 by Mrs. Robert Todd Lincoln and her children. Perhaps foremost in this gathering is the Bible upon which Abraham Lincoln was first inaugurated as President. The volume has the power to conjure up the tense scene which unfolded

on the east front of the United States Capitol on March 4, 1861. Roger B. Taney, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, administered the oath to Lincoln at a point when the United States was literally splitting in two. A further examination of the Bible brings a note of unexpected poignancy. With the Lincoln family Bible in transit from Springfield, the Bible used for the ceremony was actually provided by William Thomas Carroll, Clerk of the Supreme Court, and his wife Sally. This simple gesture initiated a friendship between the Lincolns and the Carrolls. With the tragic death of Willie Lincoln in February of 1862, the Carrolls stepped forward and offered to the Lincolns their family crypt at Oak Ridge Cemetery in Washington, DC, as a temporary resting place for a beloved son. At the times when the Library places them on exhibit, the contents of President Lincoln’s pockets on the night of his assassination at Ford’s Theatre draws special attention from the public. Included among these artifacts are a watch fob, a linen handkerchief, a wallet, a pocketknife, two pairs of eyeglasses, and a Confederate five dollar bill (this last piece was likely presented to the President just days earlier when he visited the conquered Confederate capital of Richmond). A careful look at one of the eyeglasses finds that Lincoln’s repair of one of the stems with a piece of string is still in place. By showing the common humanity of the Great Emancipator, these objects tend to resonate with

left: Seed pearl necklace and bracelets, belonging to Mary Lincoln Alfred Whital Stern Collection, Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress

The Lincolns

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visitors in ways that other displayed treasures do not. There’s another Lincoln family treasure which invariably piques the curiosity of onlookers. These are the spectacular jewels gifted to Mary Todd Lincoln by her husband. Made by the celebrated firm of Tiffany and Company, they’re comprised of a seed pearl necklace and two bracelets. Part of the fascination with the jewelry rests in a belief they might provide insight into the domestic life of the President and First Lady. From the time of the Civil War until today, there has been continuous speculation as to the actual state of the Lincoln marriage. Many have rated it an unhappy union, marred by Mary’s instability and Abraham’s emotional detachment from his wife. Without doubt, residing in the White House added enormous pressures on the couple. Finding her ostentatious and unrefined, Mrs. Lincoln was given a particularly hostile reception from Washington society. Newspapers raised questions on her loyalty to the Union as one of her brothers and several of her half-brothers were enrolled in the Confederate Army. Nor was the press shy about recording her shopping sprees during the austerity of wartime. The President was painfully aware of his wife’s propensity to meddle in questions of patronage, as well as her overspending of public accounts. On the other hand, Mary’s defenders argue that despite its difficulties, the Lincoln marriage was undergirded by the couple’s deep love and devotion for each other. They describe her critics as misogynists whose attacks were based on rumors and fabrications. To the extent the jewelry may edify such a heated debate, one must begin by investigating the background of its acquisition. It

there are multiple photographs of her wearing the necklace and bracelets in late 1861 and the beginning of 1862. How can one explain these mysteries? We do know Mary Lincoln made a separate shopping trip to New York without her husband in January of 1861. It’s plausible she stopped by Tiffany’s at that time and became desirous of the jewelry. Respecting her status as the future First Lady, Tiffany’s could have transferred the set to Mrs. Lincoln with the understanding the purchase price would become due at a later date. While the precise details concerning their acquisition may never be known, it’s no longer clear President Lincoln’s purchase of the jewelry was purely a heartfelt gesture of love and affection for Mary. Rather, it may have been viewed by him more as an obligation which was necessary to satisfy his wife’s social requirements as First Lady.

Ostrich-plume fan belonging to Mary Lincoln, c. 1860 Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection

Mary Lincoln, 1861. Carte de Visite Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection

has been generally assumed Abraham Lincoln purchased the set directly from Tiffany’s Manhattan shop when he stopped briefly in New York on his journey to Washington as Presidentelect in February of 1861. However, on closer examination, his schedule in the city was fully booked with a number of

The Lincolns

social functions. There was simply no time for him to indulge in the luxury of shopping. Moreover, no mention is made of Lincoln stopping by Tiffany’s in any of the press accounts of his visit. Did Lincoln make the 530 dollar purchase of the jewelry sight unseen? To complicate the matter further, the ledgers at Tiffany’s record the sale of the jewelry to President Lincoln on April 28, 1862. Yet it is widely believed Mary Lincoln was wearing the Tiffany jewelry at the Inaugural Ball over a year earlier and

Regrettably, one then should be careful in ascribing this extraordinary gift as having a larger meaning to the relationship between Abraham and Mary Lincoln. As to the true state of their marriage, perhaps Elizabeth Keckley, the First Lady’s modiste, came upon a partial answer by detailing the peculiar nature of Mary Lincoln’s actions and personality in Behind the Scenes in the White House (1868). Her observations of Mary are consistent with many of the symptoms of what today is known as bipolar disorder. If true, and such a disorder was not medically recognized in the 19th century, it would explain a great deal as to the forbearance and sensitivity which Abraham Lincoln, versed as he was in the foibles and extremes of human nature, displayed to his wife.

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Mary Lincoln in a Divisive Society By Erin Mast. Director, President Lincoln’s Cottage National Historic Site, Washington D.C.

ary Lincoln, a deeply controversial figure of her day, continues to draw an intense amount of public interest, sympathy, and even scorn. As much as we continue to debate Abraham Lincoln and his presidency, so too do we dissect his wife’s actions and role in the Lincoln story. But whereas Lincoln is generally lauded for his political successes, Mary is typically derided for her social failures. Mary Lincoln was an ambitious woman, and one of the first to see promise in Abraham Lincoln. Not unlike other First Ladies, Mary played an active role in her husband’s political career, for better or for worse (perhaps getting worse the higher the stakes became), and during a time when overt involvement in politics by females was often regarded as inappropriate or unwelcome. Mary Lincoln came from the upper crust. She was intelligent and highly educated with a well-connected family (Dolley Madison was a distant relative by marriage and Henry Clay a neighbor and family friend). Fluent in French, Mary received 10 years of formal schooling to Lincoln’s aggregate one year. To her family’s initial dismay, Mary wed the frontier lawyer who was little known, unrefined, and lacking formal education as well as familial connections. She may have succeeded in helping her husband attain the highest office in the land in her own way, but if her personal ambition was to mirror the social achievements of, for example, Dolley Madison, they were

Mary Lincoln, 1865. Carte de Visite Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection

painfully dashed. When the Lincolns arrived in Washington, DC, they entered a social and political minefield. Seven states had already seceded from the Union and tensions were high. While her first major appearance, the Inaugural Ball was deemed a success by many as Mary was praised for her grace and poise, there was a sizable contingent that boycotted the affair. In the weeks that followed, it was plain to observers that Mary Lincoln was being snubbed. Few women attended White House events and one who did was Mary’s chief social rival, Kate Chase, daughter of Lincoln’s

The Lincolns

political adversary Salmon P. Chase. Though Salmon Chase’s political ambitions were constantly checked, Kate Chase managed to succeed in Washington society where Mary failed. For example, Kate’s wedding to Rhode Island Governor William Sprague was judged by many to be the event of the season. Mary Lincoln chose not to attend.

appropriate expressions of sympathy and then tactfully passing on to other subjects. However, it was--I think it a great shame to so misrepresent a president’s wife or any other woman.” It should be noted that Warner Underwood was no Lincoln supporter, and made a point of telling him so when Lincoln offered him a consular position on that same visit described in Josie’s diary.

Mary seemed unable to side-step condemnation from all sides, which took an obvious negative toll on society’s perception of her. The public gobbled up outrageous stories about Mary Lincoln, eager for more. While much was, and still is, made of Mary’s spending habits, little has been made of her visits to the nearby army hospitals to provide supplies, help care for wounded soldiers, or write messages home for them on their behalf. Fewer still know of Mary Lincoln’s letter to her husband in autumn of 1862 requesting $200 from the “A. Lincoln Hospital Fund” to be donated to Elizabeth Keckley’s Contraband Relief Association (CRA). The Lincolns’ $200 donation was the single largest individual donation received that year for the CRA, which provided much needed relief to formerly enslaved African Americans who had fled to the District after the DC Emancipation Act was passed in April 1862.

The encounter between Josie Underwood and Mary Lincoln took place at the Soldiers’ Home, where the Lincolns had just moved a month prior. Unlike most of elite Washington society, the Lincolns had no place of their own to retreat to for the hot summer months. When they were offered quarters in a cottage at the Soldiers’ Home in the spring of 1861, they eagerly accepted and anticipated moving there within a few months. Mary Lincoln wrote with great excitement to friends about their plans to move to the beautiful grounds on a hilltop overlooking the city, but the outbreak of war and ensuing uncertainty forced them to postpone their move. The following year, Willie’s death and other factors resulted in them finally taking up residence at Soldiers’ Home in June of 1862. The Lincolns continued to entertain while living at the cottage, which in some ways allowed them to side-step White House protocol and have more choice in whom they admitted. The setting was less formal and more private, to be sure, but was far from a luxurious country retreat. Life at the Soldiers’ Home brought the Lincolns closer to the war and its human cost. On the three-mile ride from the Soldiers’ Home to the White House, they could see the first soldiers’ national cemetery—predecessor of Arlington National Cemetery, as well as contraband camps and caravans of wounded soldiers. Amidst all the suffering and chaos of the Civil War, Mary was still expected to fulfill her social obligations as the hostess of the White House, which she continued to do throughout the remainder of the tumultuous Lincoln presidency.

Occasionally a personal, first-hand account of the First Lady contradicts the pervasive criticism. In her diary entry from July 20, 1862, Johanna “Josie” Underwood, daughter of the former Kentucky Congressman Warner L. Underwood, wrote: “The derision was so frequent and widespread, that I was most agreeably surprised when I met her. Instead of seeing the coarse loud common woman the papers had made her out to be--she was really a handsome woman dressed in deep mourning (for her little boy--not long dead) her conversation was agreeable. Her manner gentle--Mrs. Etheridge thought--this owing to the sadness which was very apparent though she did not intrude it upon us--only responding to Pa’s very

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Stuffed toy cat and horse pull toy belonging to Peggy Beckwith, c. 1905 Courtesy of Hildene, The Lincoln Family Home, Manchester, Vermont

Descendents of Abraham Lincoln

industry. Manchester also had one of the country’s grand hotels, the Equinox, complete with spas flowing with healing mineral water from Equinox Mountain. Summer homes lined the village street and came to life from June until September.

They chose both their land and the location for their home carefully. They named their home Hildene because half the property on which they located their house looks down 300 feet to the other half on which their dairy operation was located. Because so much of Vermont was cleared at the time the views from the “hill” portion of the property were spectacular, with vistas stretching to the town of Bennington twenty-five miles to the south. The “dene” (a synonym for valley) portion of the property was cradled in the intimate surroundings of the Battenkill Valley.

Robert had come to Manchester as young man with his mother and his younger brother Tad for respite at the Equinox Hotel during the Civil War. Years later, he and his wife, Mary, returned to

Following three years of planning and construction, Robert and Mary, along with their staff, moved into their new home in the spring of 1905. While grand by the standards of rural Vermont

By Seth Bongartz, Executive Director, Hildene, The Lincoln Family Home, Manchester, VT.

n the early years of the twentieth century the Lincolns built what Robert referred to as their “ancestral home” in Manchester, Vermont. Nestled between the Green Mountains to the east and the Taconic range to the west, Manchester was a rural community with farms constituting the vast majority of the landscape. What had been forests had been cleared in the previous century for timber and to provide pasture for the sheep

Manchester with Robert’s law partner at his summer home. After a successful career as lawyer, Secretary of War under Presidents Garfield and Arthur, as Minister to England under Benjamin Harrison and finally as President of the Pullman Company, Robert and Mary were ready to build a summer home away from the stresses of work and city. Although Robert and Mary were involved in Chicago society, they wanted their summer home to be quiet and peaceful. They knew rural Manchester was their destination.

The Lincolns

in 1905, the house was not built for entertaining; it was built as a family home. They immediately found life at Hildene to be quiet and pleasant. They also soon developed the routines they would maintain for the next twenty-one years. Following the delivery of breakfast to his room, Robert would rise between 9:00 and 10:00. It seems likely Mary followed a similar routine. Robert would frequently hit some golf balls on the front lawn or perhaps work on correspondence with his secretary, Mr. Towers. Some mornings the chauffeur would take he and Mary for a drive in their new Pierce Arrow automobile, or perhaps he would deliver them downtown to meet with their banker. Robert had been made President of the Ekwanok Country Club as soon as he and Mary purchased their property in 1902. Most days, following lunch, he would play a round of golf, almost always with the same foursome, other than Robert, local Manchester men. Robert liked routine. In keeping with the norms of the Victorian era, while Robert golfed Mary would spend her afternoons at home managing the staff, selecting the menus for the following day and perhaps taking a stroll through the formal gardens behind the house.

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their intimate conversation interrupted only by servants collecting dishes and delivering the next course. As dark approached, Robert may have walked up to his observatory and spent time gazing through his Warner & Swazey telescope at whichever planet was in best view. But the house was not always quiet. Robert and Mary’s daughters, Mary and Jessie, along with their children, were frequent visitors. The grandchildren, Peggy, Bud and Link, undoubtedly brought a degree of chaos to the otherwise placid domestic routine. The grandchildren were doted on by both Robert and Mary. The house had dolls, dollhouses, lead soldiers, erector sets and stuffed animals. Robert himself made the story board to aid in story telling at nap or bedtime. Each of the three grandchildren spent a significant portion of their childhoods in Manchester running up and down the central staircase, in the privet maze of the formal garden, or perhaps walking the steep path connection “hill” to “dene”. Two of them, Peggy and Link would spend their lives here, Link in next door Dorset, Vermont and Peggy at Hildene itself following the death of her grandparents.

Abraham Lincoln’s grandchildren; Mamie, Jack and Jessie (L-R) c. 1883. Cabinet card Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection

As evening approached, Robert would wait for Mary at the bottom of the staircase to the second floor and then escort her to the dining room for their evening meal. While comfortable and nicely appointed, the dining room, like the rest of the house, was not built for entertaining. Most evenings Robert and Mary dined alone,

While most summer people came to Manchester for no more than the three months of high summer, Robert and Mary came for upwards of half the year and sometimes longer. They loved Manchester and they loved Hildene. It was here that Robert died in his sleep in 1926 and it was here that their children and grandchildren developed their own deep emotional connection to Robert and Mary’s “ancestral home.” Link died in 1971, Peggy in 1975 and Bud in 1985. Bud lived to see the formation of the non-profit Friends of Hildene, Inc, the organization that today runs Hildene for the benefit of the public.

The Lincolns

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