I have employed Fehrenbacher’s rules when using recollected words of Lincoln. “First,” he said, “it should be recognized that many a quotation has a provenance too weak and/or a substance too dubious to be incorporated in serious historical writing.” In order to judge whether a quote is marred by a “substance too dubious,” I have examined Lincoln’s own writings closely, as well as the vast literature about him, developing over more than two decades a nose for what “smells” authentically Lincolnian. This procedure is hardly scientific, and there is room for disagreement among historians of good will. I have also tried to learn as much as possible about those reporting Lincoln’s words in order to assess their veracity.
Fehrenbacher also advised that “insofar as the pace of narrative or argument will allow it, the reader should be given some measure of a quotation’s authenticity.” It would be tedious to clutter the text with such qualifiers as “if we can believe the recollective memory of X,” and the reader should supply such a disclaimer before all recollected quotes, which are identified in the notes. While trying to avoid such clumsiness, I have sought to distinguish canonical utterances of Lincoln from “recollective testimony.”12
I have not, however, heeded Fehrenbacher’s advice to treat such testimony as indirect rather than direct discourse. To be sure, such language may not be strictly accurate, but paraphrasing Lincoln’s alleged words robs them of much of their impact.
Historians have understandably relied more heavily on contemporary sources than on reminiscences, but as Donald A. Ritchie has persuasively argued, “[d]ocuments written at the time have an immediacy about them and are not influenced by subsequent events, and yet those documents can be incomplete, in error, or written to mislead. A statement is not necessarily truer if written down at the time than if recalled later in testimony. Whether written or oral, evidence must be convincing and verifiable.” I have tried to follow Ritchie’s sound advice: “Treat oral evidence as cautiously as any other form of evidence.”13
NOTES
List of Abbreviations
AL MSS DLC: Abraham Lincoln Papers, Library of Congress
CSmH: Huntington Library, San Marino, California
DLC: Library of Congress
HI: Herndon’s Informants
H-W MSS DLC: Herndon-Weik Papers, Library of Congress
ICHi: Chicago History Museum
IHi: Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, Springfield
InU: Indiana University
LMF: Lincoln Museum, Fort Wayne
MHi: Massachusetts Historical Society
RPB: Brown University
Chapter 19. “The Man Does Not Live Who Is More Devoted to Peace Than I Am”
1. Garrett allegedly expressed this view in a letter to Mayor James G. Berret of Washington. Washington Globe, 7 Feb. 1861.
2. Springfield correspondence, 28 Jan., Missouri Democrat (St. Louis), 29 Jan. 1861, Michael Burlingame, ed., Lincoln’s Journalist: John Hay’s Anonymous Writings for the Press, 1860–1864 (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1998), 21.
3. Chase to Lincoln, Columbus, 28 Jan. 1861, AL MSS DLC.
4. Thurlow Weed Barnes, Life of Thurlow Weed Including His Autobiography and a Memoir (2 vols.; Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1884), 1:605–606.
5. Indianapolis correspondence, 11 Feb., New York World, 15 Feb. 1861, Burlingame, ed., Lincoln’s Journalist, 24.
6. Reminiscences of Henry B. Carrington, Indianapolis News, 11 Feb. 1908.
7. Reminiscences of William P. Wood, Washington Sunday Gazette, 23 Jan. 1887.
8. Rochester Democrat, n.d., copied in the Baltimore Sun, 22 Feb. 1861.
9. Indianapolis correspondence by Hay, 11 Feb., New York World, 15 Feb. 1861, Burlingame, ed., Lincoln’s Journalist, 25.
10. Reminiscences of Thomas Ross in an unidentified newspaper article, [1903?], clipping collection, LMF.
11. John G. Nicolay, “Some Incidents in Lincoln’s Journey from Springfield to Washington,” Michael Burlingame, ed., An Oral History of Abraham Lincoln: John G. Nicolay’s Interviews and Essays (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1996), 117.
12. John Hay, “The Heroic Age in Washington,” lecture of 1871, Michael Burlingame, ed., At Lincoln’s Side: John Hay’s Civil War Correspondence and Selected Writings (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 2000), 117.
13. Henry Villard, Memoirs of Henry Villard, Journalist and Financier, 1835–1900 (2 vols.; Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1904), 1:152.
14. Nicolay, “Some Incidents in Lincoln’s Journey,” Burlingame, ed., Oral History of Lincoln, 111.
15. George W. Hazzard to his wife, Buffalo, 17 Feb. 1861, AL MSS, Addendum 1, DLC.
16. Roy P. Basler et al., eds., Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln [hereafter CWL] (8 vols. plus index; New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1953–1955), 4:192.
17. The Israelite (Cincinnati), 15 Mar. 1861, in Bertram W. Korn, American Jewry and the Civil War (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1951), 41.
18. Charleston, South Carolina, Courier, 19 Feb. 1861.
19. CWL, 4:195–196.
20. Indianapolis correspondence, 11 Feb., New York World, 15 Feb. 1861, Burlingame, ed., Lincoln’s Journalist, 26, 27.
21. New York Herald, 12 Feb. 1861.
22. Cincinnati correspondence, 12 Feb., Baltimore Sun, 14 Feb. 1861; George W. Sanders to Stephen A. Douglas, Cincinnati, 12 Feb. 1861, Douglas Papers, University of Chicago.
23. William L. Hodge to John Austin Stevens, Washington, 18, 19 Feb. 1861, Stevens Papers, New-York Historical Society.
24. Washington correspondence by Kritick, 11 Mar., Charleston Courier, 14 Mar. 1861; Baltimore Exchange, 12 Mar. 1861; Louisville Journal, n.d., quoted in George S. Cottman, “Lincoln in Indianapolis,” Indiana Magazine of History 24 (1928):9.
25. New Orleans Crescent, 21 Feb. 1861.
26. Boston Daily Advertiser, 16 Feb. 1861.
27. New York Evening Post, 16 Feb. 1861.
28. New York Herald, 15 Feb. 1861.
29. Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, 23 Feb. 1861.
30. Clay to John A. Andrew, n.p., 18 Feb. 1861, Andrew Papers, MHi.
31. Indianapolis correspondence, 11 Feb., New York World, 15 Feb. 1861, Burlingame, ed., Lincoln’s Journalist, 26.
32. Nicolay, “Some Incidents in Lincoln’s Journey,” Burlingame, ed., Oral History of Lincoln, 109–110; Ward Hill Lamon, Recollections of Abraham Lincoln, 1847–1865, ed. Dorothy Lamon Teillard (2nd ed.; Washington, DC: privately published, 1911), 36.
33. Cincinnati Gazette, n.d., copied in the Albany Atlas and Argus, n.d., clipping collection, LMF.
34. Cincinnati correspondence, 12 Feb., New York World, 15 Feb. 1861, Burlingame, ed., Lincoln’s Journalist, 28.
35. CWL, 4:197.
36. Rutherford B. Hayes to Sardis Birchard, Cincinnati, 15 Feb. 1861, Charles Richard Williams, ed., Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes (5 vols.; Columbus: Ohio State Archeological and Historical Society, 1922–1926), 2:5.
37. William Henry Smith in Francis Fisher Brown, The Every-Day Life of Abraham Lincoln (New York: N. D. Thompson, 1886), 382–383.
38. Cincinnati correspondence, 12 Feb., New York World, 15 Feb. 1861, Burlingame, ed., Lincoln’s Journalist, 29–30.
39. Cincinnati Gazette, 13 Feb. 1861.
40. William T. Coggeshall, Lincoln Memorial: The Journeys of Abraham Lincoln from Springfield to Washington, 1861, as President Elect, and from Washington to Springfield, 1865, as President Martyred, Comprising an Account of Public Ceremonies on the Entire Route, and Full Details of Both Journeys (Columbus: Ohio State Journal, 1865), 35.
41. CWL, 4:199.
42. Annie U. P. Jay to J. G. Wright, Raysville, 17 Feb. 1861, Anna W. Wright Papers, Indiana State Library, Indianapolis.
43. Philadelphia Morning Pennsylvanian, 14 Feb. 1861.
44. The Israelite (Cincinnati), 15 Feb. 1861, in Korn, American Jewry and the Civil War, 41.
45. Cincinnati, Ohio, German Workmen to Lincoln, Feb. 1861, AL MSS DLC.
46. CWL, 4:202.
47. Rutherford B. Hayes to Sardis Birchard, Cincinnati, 15 Feb. 1861, Williams, ed., Diary and Letters of Hayes, 2:6.
48. Columbus correspondence, 13 Feb., Cincinnati Gazette, 14 Feb. 1861.
49. Columbus correspondence, 13 Feb., New York World, 18 Feb. 1861.
50. Ohio State Journal (Columbus), 13 Feb. 1861.
51. Cincinnati correspondence, 13 Feb., New York Herald, 14 Feb. 1861.
52. CWL, 4:204.
53. Edwin R. Reynolds Congressional Globe, 36th Congress, 2nd Session, Appendix, 1008 (18 Feb. 1861).
54. C. Carter to William Overton Winston, Philadelphia, 16 Feb. 1861, Winston Family Papers, Virginia Historical Society.
55. New York Herald, New York Daily News, 15 Feb. 1861.
56. Washington correspondence, 23 Feb., Chicago Tribune, 27 Feb. 1861.
57. A leading Columbus banker in Victor Searcher, Lincoln’s Journey to Greatness: A Factual Account of the Twelve-Day Inaugural Trip (Philadelphia: Winston, 1960), 134.
58. Undated memo, William T. Coggeshall Papers, Ohio Historical Society.
59. Columbus correspondence, 13 Feb., New York World, 18 Feb. 1861; Columbus correspondence, 13 Feb., Chicago Tribune, 14 Feb. 1861.
60. James A. Garfield to his wife, Columbus, 17 Feb. 1861, in John Shaw, ed., Crete and James: Personal Letters of Lucretia and James Garfield (East Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 1994), 107; Garfield to B. A. Hinsdale, Columbus, 17 Feb. 1861, Garfield Papers, DLC.
61. William Dennison to Francis P. Blair, Columbus, 19 Feb. 1861, Blair Family Papers, DLC.
62. Columbus correspondence, 13 Feb., New York Tribune, 18 Feb. 1861.
63. Lamon, Recollections of Lincoln, 33–34.
64. This is a composite of two versions of the story, told in Indiana and later in New York. CWL, 4:193; Stephen Fiske, “When Lincoln Was First Inaugurated,” Ladies’ Home Journal, Mar. 1897, 7.
65. CWL, 4:207.
66. John M. Cook to Stephen A. Douglas, Steubenville, 15 Feb. 1861, Douglas Papers, University of Chicago.
67. CWL, 4:208.
68. Nicolay to Therena Bates, Pittsburgh, 15 Feb. 1861, Michael Burlingame, ed., With Lincoln in the White House: Letters, Memoranda, and Other Writings of John G. Nicolay, 1860–1865 (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 2000), 27.
69. CWL, 4:208–209.
70. Ibid., 4:210–215.
71. Ibid., 4:245.
72. New York World, 16 Feb. 1861.
73. New York Tribune, 16 Feb. 1861.
74. Villard, Memoirs, 1:152.
75. Baltimore Exchange, 20 Feb. 1861; Washington States and Union, 16 Feb. 1861; Pittsburgh Post, 16 Feb. 1861.
76. Springfield (Massachusetts) Republican, 18 Feb. 1861.
77. Washington correspondence, 16 Feb. 1861, an unidentified clipping enclosed in John Perkins to S. S. Cox, [New York], Sunday [n.d.], Cox Papers, RPB.
78. Cleveland Plain Dealer, 18 Feb. 1861.
79. Cleveland correspondence, 15 Feb., Cincinnati Gazette, 16 Feb. 1861.
80. David Davis to his wife, Buffalo, 17 Feb. 1861, Davis Papers, IHi.
81. Nicolay to Therena Bates, Buffalo, 17 Feb. 1861, Burlingame, ed., With Lincoln in the White House, 28.
82. Cleveland correspondence, 15 Feb., Chicago Tribune, 16 Feb. 1861; CWL, 4:215–216.
83. Riddle in Browne, Every-Day Life of Lincoln, 387.
84. Nicolay, “Some Incidents in Lincoln’s Journey,” Burlingame, ed., Oral History of Lincoln, 112.
85. Rutherford B. Hayes to Laura Platt Mitchell, Cincinnati, 13 Feb. 1861, Ari Hoogenboom, Rutherford B. Hayes: Warrior and President (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1995), 113.
86. Cleveland Plain Dealer, 18 Feb. 1861.
87. Buffalo correspondence by “Wilkins” (Uriah Painter), 17 Feb., Philadelphia Inquirer, 20 Feb. 1861.
88. “Semi-occasional” to Thurlow Weed, Erie, 20 Feb. 1861, Weed Papers, University of Rochester.
89. Erie Weekly Gazette, 21 Feb. 1861, in J. H. Cramer, “A President-Elect in Western Pennsylvania,” Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography 71 (1947):216–217.
90. Grace Bedell to Lincoln, Westfield, New York, 18 Oct. 1860; Lincoln to Grace Bedell, Springfield, 19 Oct. 1860, CWL, 4:129–130.
91. Springfield correspondence, 28 Jan., New York Evening Post, 1 Feb. 1861.
92. Anna Ridgely diary, 6 Feb. 1861, IHi; Truman H. Bartlett to Charles W. McLellan, Chocorua, New Hampshire, 3 Nov. 1907, Lincoln Collection, RPB.
93. Grace Bedell Billings to E. B. Briggs, Delphos, Kansas, 1 Mar. 1939, Westfield, New York, Republican, 14 May 1939; “Lincoln’s Beard,” Washington Post, 14 Oct. 1910.
94. CWL, 4:220.
95. Buffalo correspondence, 16 Feb., New York World, 19 Feb. 1861, Burlingame, ed., Lincoln’s Journalist, 33.
96. Buffalo correspondence, 18 Feb., New York World, 19 Feb. 1861, Burlingame, ed., Lincoln’s Journalist, 34.
97. Nicolay to Therena Bates, Buffalo, 17 Feb. 1861, Burlingame, ed., With Lincoln in the White House, 28.
98. CWL, 4:220–221.
99. Benjamin Brown French to Henry Flagg French, Washington, 6 Mar. 1861, French Family Papers, DLC.
100. Washington correspondence, 19, 20 Feb., Cincinnati Enquirer, n.d., copied in the Illinois State Register (Springfield), 22, 23 Feb. 1861.
101. Washington correspondence, n.d., New York Express, 20 Feb. 1861.
102. Washington correspondence, 16 Feb. 1861, in an unidentified clipping enclosed in John Perkins to S. S. Cox, [New York], Sunday [n.d.], Cox Papers, RPB.
103. Washington correspondence, 14 Feb., Baltimore American, 15 Feb. 1861.
104. Charles Francis Adams to Richard Henry Dana, Washington, 18 Feb. 1861, Dana Family Papers, MHi.
105. Charles Francis Adams to John A. Andrew, Washington, 22 Feb. 1861, Andrew Papers, MHi; Charles Francis Adams diary, 16, 20, 21 Feb. 1861, Adams Family Papers, MHi; Charles Francis Adams, paraphrased in Charles Francis Adams, Jr., diary entry for 19 Feb. 1861, in Charles Francis Adams, 1835–1915: An Autobiography (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1916), 77; Charles Francis Adams, Jr. to Richard Henry Dana, Washington, 21 Feb. [misdated Jan.] 1861, Dana Papers, MHi.
106. Samuel R. Curtis to his wife, Washington, 24 Feb. 1861, Kenneth E. Colton, ed., “ ‘The Irrepressible Conflict of 1861’: The Letters of Samuel Ryan Curtis,” Annals of Iowa, 3rd series, 24 (1942):32–33.
107. Samuel R. Curtis, manuscript journal, 13 Feb. 1861, IHi.
108. William S. Holman to Allen Hamilton, Washington, 18 Feb. 1861, Hamilton Papers, Indiana State Library, Indianapolis.
109. Edward Everett diary, 15 Feb. 1861, Everett Papers, MHi.
110. James R. Roche to Edward Harrick, New York, 20 Feb. 1861, Harrick Papers, New-York Historical Society.
111. Samuel Bowles to Henry L. Dawes, Springfield, 26 Feb. 1861, Dawes Papers, DLC.
112. Bigelow to William Hargreaves, [New York], 21 Feb. 1861, Bigelow Papers, New York Public Library.
113. Lewis P. W. Balch to Seward, Newport, 23 Feb. 1861, Seward Papers, University of Rochester.
114. Philadelphia Public Ledger, 16 Feb. 1861; Philadelphia Argus, n.d., and the New York Express, n.d., copied in the Baltimore Sun, 18 Feb. 1861.
115. Allan Nevins and Milton Halsey Thomas, eds., Diary of George Templeton Strong, 1835–1875 (4 vols.; New York: Macmillan, 1952), 3:100 (entry for 18 Feb. 1861).
116. New York World, 15 Feb. 1861.
117. Baltimore Exchange, 20 Feb. 1861; Baltimore American, 16 Feb. 1861.
118. Baltimore Sun, 15 Feb. 1861.
119. Kennedy to Abraham Comingo, Baltimore, 9 Mar. 1861, Civil War Papers, Maryland Historical Society.
120. Sherrard Clemens to John C. Underwood, Richmond, 18 Feb. 1861, enclosed in Underwood to Seward, Washington, 23 Feb. 1861, Seward Papers, University of Rochester.
121. Thomas S. Kennedy to J
ohn J. Crittenden, Louisville, 16 Feb. 1861, Crittenden Papers, DLC.
122. Louisville Democrat, 24 Feb. 1861.
123. Judd to Lyman Trumbull, Buffalo, 17 Feb. 1861, Trumbull Papers, DLC; Judd to his wife Ada, Buffalo, 18 Feb. 1861, Judd Papers, IHi.
124. Garfield to B. A. Hinsdale, Columbus, 17 Feb. 1861, Garfield Papers, DLC.
125. Ohio State Journal (Columbus), 16 Feb. 1861.
126. Buffalo correspondence, 17 Feb., New York Tribune, 19 Feb. 1861.
127. Springfield (Massachusetts) Republican, 18, 25 Feb. 1861.
128. Albany Evening Journal, 21 Feb. 1861.
129. Providence Journal, 15 Feb. 1861.
130. Washington correspondence, 18 Feb., Chicago Tribune, 21 Feb. 1861.
131. Albany correspondence, 18 Feb., New York Tribune, 19 Feb. 1861.
132. Buffalo correspondence, 17 Feb., New York Tribune, 19 Feb. 1861.
133. Nicolay, “Some Incidents in Lincoln’s Journey,” Burlingame, ed., Oral History of Lincoln, 117.
134. Albany correspondence, 18 Feb., New York World, 21 Feb. 1861, Burlingame, ed., Lincoln’s Journalist, 37–38.
135. New York Daily News, 20 Feb. 1861.
136. Albany correspondence, 18 Feb., New York Herald, 19 Feb. 1861; reminiscences of Andrew J. Provost, “Lincoln as He Knew Him,” New York Times, 12 Feb. 1922, p. 73.
137. Albany correspondence, 18 Feb., New York Times, 19 Feb. 1861.
138. Ibid.
139. Albany Atlas and Argus, 20 Feb. 1861.
140. CWL, 4:225–226.
141. Provost, “Lincoln as He Knew Him.”
142. New York Herald, 20 Feb. 1861.
143. Albany correspondence, 20 Feb., New York World, 21 Feb. 1861.
144. The Rev. Dr. Thomas Reed Rawson to his brother, Albany, 23 Feb. 1861.
145. E. R. Tinker to Henry L. Dawes, North Adams, 24 Feb. 1861, Dawes Papers, DLC.
146. Diary of Samuel J. May, entry for 19 Feb. 1861, May Papers, Cornell University.
147. Lincoln to Washburne, Cleveland, 15 Feb. 1861, CWL, 4:217.
148. Washington correspondence by James E. Harvey, 18 Feb., Philadelphia North American and United States Gazette, 19 Feb. 1861.
Abraham Lincoln: A Life, Volume 2 Page 151
