Abraham Lincoln: A Life, Volume 1

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Abraham Lincoln: A Life, Volume 1 Page 147

by Michael Burlingame


  21. Lawrence Beaumont Stringer, “From the Sangamon to the Potomac: More Light on Abraham Lincoln,” typescript of an unpublished manuscript, p. 131, Edgar Dewitt Jones Papers, Detroit Public Library. Stringer’s informant was Colonel Charles H. Miller, who witnessed the trial, which took place in Logan County.

  22. Lincoln to Joshua Speed, Springfield, 24 Mar. 1843, CWL, 1:319; Sangamo Journal, 13 Apr. 1843.

  23. Lincoln to Morris, Springfield, 26 Mar. 1843, CWL, 1:320–321.

  24. Donald W. Riddle, Lincoln Runs for Congress (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1948), 69–70; Lincoln to Morris, Springfield, 26 Mar. 1843, CWL, 1:320–321.

  25. George U. Miles, interview with Herndon, 9 Oct. 1866, HI, 368.

  26. John Bennett to Hardin, Petersburg, 25 Apr. 1843, Hardin Family Papers, ICHi. William G. Spears, sheriff of Menard County, told Hardin that Baker won twenty-one or twenty-two votes at a meeting, which Hardin’s friends virtually boycotted. Offsetting that poll was the vote at a muster in Clary’s Grove, where Spears drafted a set of instructions for the delegates to the Pekin Convention. Only one signer favored Baker, while twenty-five to thirty favored Hardin. Spears to Hardin, Petersburg, Illinois, 24 Apr. 1843, ibid.

  27. Illinois State Register (Springfield), 5 May 1843. See also “Another case of shuffling,” ibid., 21 July 1843.

  28. J.M. Ruggles, “Reminiscences of the Pekin Convention and of Abraham Lincoln” Tarbell Papers, Allegheny College.

  29. Lincoln to Joshua Speed, Springfield, 18 May 1843, CWL, 1:325.

  30. Francis to Hardin, Springfield, 11 May 1843, Hardin Family Papers, ICHi.

  31. Reminiscences of Dr. A. W. French, Chicago Times-Herald, 25 Aug. 1895.

  32. Sophia Bledsoe Herrick, “Personal Recollections of My Father and Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Davis,” Rufus Rockwell Wilson, ed., Intimate Memories of Lincoln (Elmira, NY: Primavera Press, 1945), 61 (originally published in the Methodist Review Quarterly of Nashville, Oct. 1915); Sophia Bledsoe Herrick, Bledsoe Family History, typescript of excerpts made by David Rankin Barbee, Albert Taylor Bledsoe Papers, University of Virginia.

  33. Effie Sparks, “Stories of Abraham Lincoln,” manuscript, Ida M. Tarbell Papers, Allegheny College, 23–24.

  34. Paraphrased remarks of Mrs. John Bradford, a Springfield neighbor of the Lincolns, to Ida Tarbell, memo in “Mary Todd Lincoln” folder, Ida M. Tarbell Papers, Allegheny College; Mrs. John S. Bradford, quoted by Judith Bradner, in Walter B. Stevens, A Reporter’s Lincoln, ed. Michael Burlingame (1916; Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1998), 94. John S. Bradford, a partner in the bookstore-cum-drugstore called Bradford and Johnson, lived at Jackson and Walnut Streets, several blocks from the Lincolns’ house. In the 1860 census he was listed as 45 years old and his wife, identified as A. W. Bradford, was 42.

  35. “Anecdotes of Mrs. Lincoln,” by “a neighbor of the family at the time of President Lincoln’s funeral,” quoted in The News (no city indicated), ca. 17 July 1882, unidentified clipping, LMF.

  36. Mrs. Sina Wilbourn, interviewed by Bond P. Geddes, Omaha Daily News, 24 Jan. 1909. In 1842, Illinois-born Sina Henderson wed Robert W. Wilbourn in Sangamon County.

  37. Boston Courier, n.d., quoted in the Campaign Atlas and Bee (Boston), 1 Sept. 1860.

  38. Harriet Hanks Chapman, interviewed by Jesse W. Weik, Charleston, Illinois, 16 Oct. 1914, Jesse W. Weik, The Real Lincoln: A Portrait, ed. Michael Burlingame (1922; Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2002), 328.

  39. Reminiscences of Page Eaton, Belvedere, Illinois, Standard, 14 Apr. 1868.

  40. Reminiscences of an old settler in Springfield, unidentified newspaper clipping, quoted in a memo in the John J. Duff Papers, box 1, folder 5, IHi.

  41. Mrs. Mary Gaughan of 146 Cornelia Street, Springfield, quoted in “Lincoln’s Domestic Life,” unidentified clipping, LMF.

  42. Elizabeth Todd Grimsley, “Six Months in the White House,” Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society 19 (1926–1927): 54.

  43. Elizabeth Lushbaugh Capps, “Early Recollections of Abraham Lincoln,” reference files of the Abraham Lincoln Association, “Reminiscences,” folder 1, IHi; Elizabeth Capps, interview with Hannah Hinsdale, clipping dated Yakima, Washington, 2 Feb. [1929?], Lincoln Shrine, A. K. Smiley Library, Redlands, California.

  44. Richardson quoted by William R. Morrison, in the reminiscences of Secretary of Agriculture J. Sterling Morton of Nebraska, in an undated article by Alfred Henry Lewis, copied from Human Life, June [no year given], clipping collection, LMF. This reminiscence dates from 1895.

  45. Interview with John A. Sylvester, Sangamo Monitor (Springfield), 5 Apr. 1893, in Wayne C. Temple, By Square & Compass: Saga of the Lincoln Home (revised ed.; Mahomet, IL: Mayhaven Publishing, 2002), 274–275. Sylvester was a workman who helped add the second story to the house in 1856. Wilkinson lived directly across the street from the Lincoln house.

  46. Reminiscences of Mrs. John S. Bradford, recorded in Eugenia Jones Hunt, “When Mrs. Abe Called Lincoln ‘You Old Fool,’ ” Chicago Tribune, 8 Feb. 1931. Mrs. Hunt, whose father was Albert Jones, a friend and colleague of Lincoln at the bar, commented sarcastically: “Mrs. Lincoln, we knew, was cultured and used choice diction.” See also Eugenia Jones Hunt, My Personal Recollections of Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd Lincoln, ed. Helen A. Moser (Peoria, IL: Helen A. Moser, 1966), 26. Shortly after Lincoln’s death, James Gourley told William Herndon a similar story. HI, 452.

  47. Interview with John A. Sylvester, Sangamo Monitor (Springfield), 5 Apr. 1893, in Temple, By Square & Compass, 275.

  48. Mrs. John Todd Stuart to her daughter Bettie, [Springfield], 3 Apr. [1856], Stuart-Hay Family Papers, IHi.

  49. Elizabeth Irons Folsom, “New Stories of Abraham Lincoln,” The American Magazine, July 1923, 47.

  50. Reminiscences of John E. Roll, Chicago Tribune, 12 Feb. 1900.

  51. The assistant superintendent of Springfield’s schools, Jacob C. Thompson reported this. Article by Louis J. Humphrey, dated Springfield, 12 Feb., unidentified clipping, LMF.

  52. Albert Stevenson Edwards, “The Lincoln Home,” Blue Book of the State of Illinois, ed. James A. Rose (Springfield, IL: Phillips Bros., 1908), 510.

  53. Thomas E. Talmadge to Paul M. Angle, Chicago, 9 Sept. 1930, Abraham Lincoln Association research files, folder “Home (Springfield),” IHi.

  54. Frances Todd Wallace, interview with Herndon, [1865–1866], HI, 486.

  55. Weik, Real Lincoln, ed. Burlingame, 120–121.

  56. Springfield correspondence, 11 June, New York Herald, 26 June 1860.

  57. Herndon to Isaac N. Arnold, Springfield, 24 Oct. [18]83, Lincoln Collection, ICHi.

  58. Henry C. Whitney, Lincoln the Citizen, vol. 1 of A Life of Lincoln, ed. Marion Mills Miller (2 vols.; New York: Baker & Taylor, 1908), 189.

  59. Wilson and Davis, eds., Herndon’s Lincoln, 194.

  60. Davis interview with Herndon, 20 Sept. 1866, HI, 349.

  61. Herndon to Jesse W. Weik, Springfield, 24 Feb. 1887, H-W MSS DLC.

  62. Leonard Swett to Josiah H. Drummond, 27 May 1860, Portland, Maine, Evening Express, n.d., copied in the New York Sun, 26 July 1891. Swett said that in addition to Lincoln and himself, only Ward Hill Lamon and David Davis attended all sessions on the circuit. Swett, lecture on Lincoln, Chicago Times, 21 Feb. 1876.

  63. Herndon to Jesse W. Weik, Springfield, 7 Dec. 1875, Lincoln Collection, RPB.

  64. Mrs. Norman B. Judd, undated interview with Ida Tarbell, Ida M. Tarbell Papers, Allegheny College.

  65. Palmer to his wife, Carrollton, Illinois, 16 Apr. 1852, Palmer Papers, IHi.

  66. Yates to his wife, Washington, 1 Jan. 1852, Richard Yates and Catharine Yates Pickering, Richard Yates: Civil War Governor, ed. John H. Krenkel (Danville, IL: Interstate Printers, 1966), 77. Cf. same to same, Washington, 25 Jan. and 17 July 1852, 18 and 19 Dec. 1853, ibid., 79, 83, 88–90.

  67. Browning to Eliza Caldwell Browning, Lower Blue Licks, Kentucky, 24 July 1844, Ricks Collection, IHi.


  68. Eliza Browning to Ann Browning, 9 Oct. 1838, in Maurice G. Baxter, Orville H. Browning: Lincoln’s Friend and Critic (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1957), 13.

  69. Jesse W. Fell to Hester V. Fell, Washington, 22 June 1841, Fell Papers, DLC.

  70. David Davis to Sarah Walker Davis, Clinton, Illinois, 12 Oct. 1860, Davis Papers, ICHi.

  71. Mary Lincoln to Myra Bradwell, Springfield, 7 July 1876, copy, Robert Todd Lincoln Papers, DLC.

  72. Willard L. King to Ruth Painter Randall, Chicago, 21 Sept. 1953, J. G. Randall Papers, DLC.

  73. Davis to his wife, Pekin, 8 May 1854, in Willard King, Lincoln’s Manager, David Davis (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1960), 94.

  74. Robert Todd Lincoln to J. G. Holland, Chicago, 6 June 1865, Robert Todd Lincoln Papers, DLC.

  75. Lincoln to Samuel Caldwell, Springfield, 27 May 1858, Roy P. Basler and Christian O. Basler, eds., Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln: Second Supplement, 1848–1865 (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1990), 14.

  76. The Rev. Mr. Albert Hale to the Rev. Mr. Theron Baldwin, Springfield, 31 May 1860, Burlingame, ed., Oral History of Lincoln, 95.

  77. Statement of James Gourley, [1865–1866], HI, 453.

  78. Leonard Volk in Wilson, ed., Intimate Memories of Lincoln, 243.

  79. Eulogy on Clay, 6 July 1852, CWL, 1:121–130.

  80. Beverly C. Sandrin to James B. Clay, 20 Feb. 1844, T. J. Clay Papers, quoted in Michael Holt, The Rise and Fall of the Whig Party: Jacksonian Politics and the Onset of the Civil War (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), 162.

  81. Speech of 22 May 1844, in Springfield, CWL, 1:337.

  82. David Davis to Julius Rockwell, Bloomington, Illinois, 14 May 1844, Davis Papers, DLC.

  83. Herndon to Ward Hill Lamon, Springfield, 6 Mar. 1870, Lamon Papers, CSmH; Wilson and Davis, eds., Herndon’s Lincoln, 84.

  84. David Davis to Julius Rockwell, Bloomington, Illinois, 18 Feb. 1858, Davis Papers, DLC.

  85. Anson G. Henry to John J. Hardin, Springfield, 25 Mar. 1844, Hardin Family Papers, ICHi.

  86. James Gourley, interview with Herndon, [1865–1866], HI, 451–452.

  87. John B. Weber, interview with Herndon, Pawnee, Illinois, [ca. 1 Nov. 1866], HI, 388.

  88. Illinois State Register (Springfield), 19 Apr. 1844.

  89. Letter by “J. R. D.” Illinois State Register (Springfield), 12 Apr. 1844.

  90. Milton Hay to John Hay, Springfield, 8 Feb. 1887, John Hay Papers, RPB.

  91. Fell to James R. Doolittle, Bloomington, Illinois, 4 Mar. 1873, reproduced in a pamphlet, “Autobiography of Abraham Lincoln,” p. 7, copy in the Fell Papers, DLC.

  92. David Davis to William P. Walker, Decatur, Illinois, 4 May 1844, David Davis Papers, IHi.

  93. Speech of 1 Mar. 1844, CWL, 1:334.

  94. Debates with John Calhoun and Alfred W. Cavarly, 20–25 Mar. 1844, CWL, 1:334.

  95. Peoria Register, 14 Apr. 1844; Peoria Democratic Press, 17 Apr. 1844; [Thomas J. Pickett], “Anecdotes of Lincoln,” Rock Island, Illinois, Weekly Register, 30 May 1860.

  96. J[eriah] B[onham], “Recollections of Abraham Lincoln,” Chicago Tribune, 5 May 1895; Jeriah Bonham, Fifty Years’ Recollections (Peoria, IL: J. W. Franks & Sons, 1883), 159–160.

  97. [Thomas J. Pickett], “Anecdotes of Lincoln,” Rock Island, Illinois, Weekly Register, 30 May 1860; Thomas J. Pickett’s recollections in the Lincoln, Nebraska, Daily State Journal, 12 Apr. 1881, Wilson, ed., Intimate Memories of Lincoln, 190–191; Enoch P. Sloan to the editor, Peoria Daily Transcript, 21 Apr. 1881; Jonathan K. Cooper to the same editor, ibid., 23 Apr. 1881.

  98. Lincoln to James E. Harvey, [Springfield], 2 Oct. 1860, CWL, 4:125.

  99. Sangamo Journal, 2 May 1844.

  100. Resolutions, 12 June 1844, CWL, 1:337–338. Robert W. Johannsen stated that in 1844 Lincoln “was said to be one of the supporters of the nativist movement.” No evidence suggests that Lincoln in fact sympathized with or supported nativists. To the contrary, surviving evidence indicates that he opposed them and their principles. Robert W. Johannsen, Stephen A. Douglas (New York: Oxford University Press, 1973), 151.

  101. Illinois State Register (Springfield), 21 June 1844.

  102. Sangamo Journal, 4 July 1844.

  103. George H. Honig, “Abe Lincoln and the Cosmic Ray,” p. 12, typescript dated 11 Aug. 1947, Honig Papers, Willard Library, Evansville, Indiana.

  104. Rockport Herald, 1 Nov. 1844, copied in the Grandview Monitor, 24 Oct. 1934.

  105. T. Hardy Masterson, “Lincoln’s Life in Indiana,” Rockport, Indiana, Journal, 12 Feb. 1897.

  106. Josiah G. Holland, The Life of Abraham Lincoln (Springfield, MA: Gurdon Bill, 1866), 94; John G. Nicolay and John Hay, Abraham Lincoln: A History (10 vols.; New York: Century, 1890), 1:235.

  107. David Davis to Julius Rockwell, Bloomington, Illinois, 17 Dec. 1845, Davis Papers, DLC.

  108. Lincoln to Williamson Durely, Springfield, 3 Oct. 1845, CWL, 1:347.

  109. John W. Bunn quoted in “Memorandum dictated this 13th day of December 1917 by Clinton L. Conkling,” Weik, Real Lincoln, ed. Burlingame, 337.

  110. Herndon to Theodore Parker, Springfield, 24 Nov. 1858, Herndon-Parker Papers, University of Iowa.

  111. Herndon to Caroline Dall, Springfield, 30 Dec. 1866, Dall Papers, MHi; Herndon in conversation with Caroline Dall in the fall of 1866, recorded in Dall’s “Journal of a tour through Illinois, Wisconsin and Ohio, Oct. & Nov. 1866,” entry for 29 Oct. 1866, Dall Papers, Bryn Mawr College.

  112. Herndon to Jesse Weik, Springfield, 24 Feb. 1887, H-W MSS DLC.

  113. William E. Barton’s notes of an interview with Clinton L. Conkling, Springfield, 9 Mar. 1920, Barton Papers, University of Chicago.

  114. Mrs. William Bailhache, wife of the co-owner of the Illinois State Journal, told this to Truman H. Bartlett. Truman Bartlett to Charles L. McLellan, Chocorua, New Hampshire, 6 Oct. 1908, Lincoln Collection, RPB.

  115. Herndon told this to Caroline Dall in 1866. Dall, “Journal of a tour through Illinois, Wisconsin and Ohio, Oct. & Nov. 1866,” entry for 29 Oct. 1866, Dall Papers, Bryn Mawr College.

  116. Herndon, “Analysis of the Character of Lincoln,” 417; Herndon to Francis B. Carpenter, Springfield, 11 Dec. 1866, H-W MSS DLC; Herndon to Caroline Dall, Springfield, 28 Oct. 1866, Dall Papers, MHi.

  117. David Donald, Lincoln’s Herndon (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1948), 13–14, 65–71, 129.

  118. Herndon, “Analysis of the Character of Lincoln,” 411–412.

  119. Reminiscences of John H. Littlefield, in “Abe Lincoln’s Wisdom,” unidentified clipping, LMF; Littlefield’s lecture, “Personal Recollections of Abraham Lincoln,” 2 Dec. 1875, Brooklyn Daily Eagle, 3 Dec. 1875.

  120. Herndon interviewed in Volney Hickox, “Lincoln at Home,” Illinois State Journal (Springfield), 15 Oct. 1874.

  121. Herndon’s account in Caroline Dall, “Journal of a tour through Illinois, Wisconsin and Ohio, Oct. & Nov. 1866,” entry for 29 Oct. 1866, Dall Papers, Bryn Mawr College.

  122. Lincoln to Benjamin F. James, Springfield, 9 Dec. 1845, Roy P. Basler, ed., Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, 1832–1865, First Supplement (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1974), 9.

  123. Lincoln to Benjamin F. James, Springfield, 17 Nov. 1845, CWL, 1:349.

  124. Ford paraphrased in Robert Boal to Hardin, Lacon, 10 Jan. 1846, Hardin Family Papers, ICHi.

  125. Lincoln to Hardin, Springfield, 7 Feb. 1846, CWL, 1:363.

  126. Harris, “My Recollections of Abraham Lincoln,” Woman’s Home Companion, Dec. 1903, p. 15.

  127. Franklin T. King to Herndon, Kumler, Illinois, 12 Sept. 1890, HI, 700.

  128. Lincoln to Williamson Durley, Springfield, 3 Oct. 1845, CWL, 1:348.

  129. Lincoln to Boal, Springfield, 7 Jan. 1846, CWL, 1:353.

  130. Robert Boal to Hardin, Lacon, 10 Jan. 1846, Hardin Family Papers, ICHi.

  131. Donald W. Riddle, Lincoln Runs for Congress (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers Univ
ersity Press, 1948), 93.

  132. Tazewell Whig, 21 Feb. 1846, in Paul Findley, A. Lincoln: The Crucible of Congress (New York: Crown, 1979), 31.

  133. Ira J. Fenn to Hardin, Lacon, 23 Jan. 1846, Hardin Family Papers, ICHi.

  134. Thompson to Hardin, Pekin, 12 Jan. 1846, Hardin Family Papers, ICHi.

  135. Morrison to Hardin, Tremont, 2 Feb. 1846, Hardin Family Papers, ICHi.

  136. Hardin to Stephen A. Douglas, Jacksonville, 5 Feb. 1846, Douglas Papers, University of Chicago.

  137. Lincoln to B. F. James, Springfield, 16 Jan. 1846, CWL, 1:355–356.

  138. Lincoln to Hardin, Springfield, 19 Jan. 1846, CWL, 1:356–357.

  139. Lincoln to Hardin Springfield 7 Feb. 1846, CWL, 1:360–365.

  140. Lincoln to Benjamin F. James, Springfield, 6 Dec. 1845, Basler, ed., Collected Works of Lincoln, First Supplement, 9.

  141. Harris, “My Recollections of Abraham Lincoln,” Woman’s Home Companion, Dec. 1903, p. 15.

  142. Sangamo Journal, 26 Feb. 1846.

  143. Riddle, Lincoln Runs for Congress, 124–125, 127.

  144. Hardin to the voters of the Seventh Congressional District, Jacksonville, 16 Feb. 1846, Sangamo Journal, 26 Feb. 1846.

  145. Stephen T. Logan, interview with Herndon, [1865–1866], HI, 468.

  146. James H. Matheny, interview with Herndon, [1865–1866], HI, 471.

  147. Sangamo Journal, 26 Feb. 1846.

  148. Hardin to Simeon Francis, Jacksonville, 20 Feb. 1846, Illinois Gazette (Lacon), 28 Feb. 1846.

  149. David Davis to [William P. Walker], Springfield, 25 June 1847, David Davis Papers, IHi.

  150. “The Journal & Mr. Calhoun,” Illinois State Register (Springfield), 15 Jan. 1846.

  151. Robert Bray, Peter Cartwright: Legendary Frontier Preacher (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2005), 159.

  152. T. G. Onstot, Pioneers of Menard and Mason Counties (Forest City, IL: Onstot, 1902), 112, 103.

  153. Wilson and Davis, eds., Herndon’s Lincoln, 172.

  154. James Gourley, interview with Herndon, [1865–1866], HI, 452.

  155. Speech in Lacon, 18 July 1846, The Illinois Gazette (Lacon), 25 July 1846.

 

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