The Day Lincoln Lost

by Charles Rosenberg

  Lincoln, seeming to wait for a response but apparently realizing that none was going to be forthcoming, turned to Hotchkiss and said, “My boys seem quite hungry of late, Mr. Hotchkiss. So in lieu of the usual two large loaves, I will take three today. Please just add them to our account. Mrs. Lincoln will take care of it at month’s end.”

  “Very well, sir.” Hotchkiss swiveled around to face five shelves, all laden-down with loaves of bread. He took three and handed them to Lincoln, who slipped them into his basket.

  “Thank you, Mr. Hotchkiss,” Lincoln said. “Good day to you.” He turned briefly toward Clarence. “And to you, Mr. Artemis.”

  Before Lincoln could make it back out the door, Clarence finally found his voice. “Mr. Lincoln, as you already know, I am a journalist. And although I am here with you by happenstance.” He paused. “Well, not exactly happenstance. I wonder if I might again trouble you for an interview.”

  “Ah, yes, I recall that you introduced yourself at my house as the editor of that new newspaper, The Radical Abolitionist.”

  “Yes, and some of my pieces have now also appeared in Harper’s Weekly.”

  Lincoln smiled. “I have read a couple of them.”

  “And so would you grant me a brief interview, sir? I would be most obliged.”

  “Mr. Artemis, I am still not campaigning and as a result not giving interviews. But I admire your persistence.” He glanced at Hotchkiss. “And your cleverness.”

  “Senator Douglas is campaigning,” Clarence said.

  “So I have heard. So I have heard. I am sure he has his reasons, but I know not what they are and therefore cannot comment on them.”

  Lincoln turned once again to try to leave.

  Clarence saw no harm in trying one more time. “But, sir, I could limit my interview to the mundane, to just asking you, for example, what it is like to be here in Springfield as others campaign on your behalf.”

  Lincoln laughed uproariously. “Would it be called ‘Marooned in Springfield’? You know, there is a wonderful story about a hedgehog who was marooned on an island, but I don’t have time to tell it, alas.”

  “No, the interview would not be called anything like that.”

  “It doesn’t matter, Mr. Artemis, because I’m not prepared right now to give you an interview on any subject. But I will offer this. If the American people do me the great honor of electing me as their chief magistrate, I invite you to come to Washington for an interview after I am inaugurated.”

  “That would be a great honor.”

  “There is one condition.”

  “Yes?”

  “You will not write up this interaction we have just had. I’m sure a clever fellow like you could make an article of it, even though I have said nothing. If you do, I will never be able to go into any store in this city in peace. There will always be journalists who are there at the same time...by happenstance.”

  “I can agree to that.”

  “I should add, Mr. Artemis, that if I should lose, and if you prove still interested in asking me questions, which I tend to doubt you will be, come here to Springfield and ask me all you want. And I’ll tell you the hedgehog story.”

  “I will do that, certainly, although I think you are going to win.”

  Lincoln turned to leave and said, over his shoulder, “Do try the bread. You’ve stumbled by happenstance on the best bakery in Springfield.”

  After he had gone, Clarence said to Hotchkiss, “Thank you for making that possible.”

  “You’re quite welcome, young man. How many loaves would you like?”

  “Just one. I feed only myself at this point.”

  As he said it, it hit him. The extra loaf that Lincoln bought could be for Lucy. Could Lincoln himself be hiding her? But that would make no sense whatsoever since it would put the election at risk if it were discovered. He pushed the thought out of his mind.

  Hotchkiss handed him a loaf, still warm. “Don’t forget my free subscription to your new paper.”

  “I won’t.”

  As he left, Clarence noticed a Negro man walk up to the bakery and go in. Clarence lingered a bit in front of the general store that was down the street and pretended to examine items in its window. Several minutes later the man emerged carrying a loaf of bread.

  After the man had departed, Clarence went back into the bakery. Hotchkiss looked surprised to see him again and said, “Need another loaf? Or perhaps a pie? Although you’d need to wait awhile since they aren’t quite ready yet.”

  “No, I came with a question,” Clarence said.

  “What is it, pray tell?”

  “The man who was just here. Is he someone’s servant or a free black?”

  “Well, even if he were a servant, he’d still be free. We do not permit slavery here in Illinois, as you well know.”

  “Let me ask my question a different way. Is it the case that you have no problem selling to Negroes?”

  Hotchkiss reared back slightly and said, “Why ever would I have a problem, sir?”

  “I must apologize. I have simply noticed that at least some merchants in Springfield will not sell to Negroes unless they are accompanied by a white person who is their employer. But you clearly do sell bread to them, from what I just observed.”

  “Yes, they are God’s people, like the rest of us.”

  “Are you an abolitionist, then?”

  “That is a political question, and I am a simple baker, not a politician.”

  “Mr. Hotchkiss, do you believe free blacks should be able to come into Illinois if they want to?”

  Hotchkiss was becoming visibly upset. Indeed, despite the chill of the early morning, beads of perspiration had appeared on his forehead. “Mr. Artemis, is this an interview for your newspaper? I am a quiet baker. I have my opinions, but I keep them largely to myself.”

  “I’m not trying to interview you, just trying to understand the sweep of opinions in the city as the election approaches.” Clarence knew that was a half-truth, but it was a convenient half-truth because it seemed to calm Hotchkiss.

  “Good,” Hotchkiss said. He took a kerchief from his pocket and wiped his brow. “I have many customers, who hold many different opinions. Were my views, one way or the other, to appear in your paper, I might lose fully half of them. These are bitter times.” He paused. “In case you haven’t noticed.”

  “I have of course noticed. But let me be candid, sir. The reason I was asking you about the status of free blacks in Springfield is simply that I am looking for my next big story.”

  “Which is what?”

  “Where the escaped slave Lucy Battelle is.”

  “Likely in Canada via the Railroad, wouldn’t you guess?”

  “Perhaps she is. But I am nevertheless looking for an entrée into the community of free blacks hereabout. They might know something more. I was hoping you might provide that entrée.”

  “Alas, Mr. Artemis, aside from the few free blacks who buy bread here, I know no one in that community. Now, if you have nothing further, I have baking left to attend to.”

  Clarence thanked him and left. He would have to try to find Lucy some other way.

  27

  Chicago, Illinois

  Offices of the Pinkerton National Detective Agency

  “Are you sure he was dead?” Pinkerton said.

  “He had no pulse and his skin was already slightly blue by the time I finally left. How much deader can you get?” Annabelle said.

  “Did you stay to see him buried?”

  “No. We waited for his brother to come back and when he got there, he said he would take care of things. Since you still pay me by the hour, Allan, I didn’t want to waste your money watching someone stuck in the ground.” She put on her best smile.

  “Alright, alright. I take your point. Have you learned anything at al
l about where Lucy Battelle might be?”

  “Nothing, despite much asking around. I assume she is either dead or in Canada by now.”

  “Did you ask the newspaper fellow if he knew where she was?”

  Annabelle paused before answering, as she realized she was about to admit a failure. “I didn’t. I guess I tend to think of people from the press as useless.” She shrugged. “The few times I have been involved with something that appeared in the papers, they always got the facts wrong. Sometimes wildly wrong.”

  “That was a beginner’s mistake,” Pinkerton said. “Reporters can often be very useful. They may have different motives than detectives, but they sometimes know things. Important things.”

  “I’m not a beginner,” she said.

  “No, you’re not, which is what makes it particularly disappointing.” Pinkerton pointed his finger at her—something she’d never seen him do before—and said, “Go befriend him.”

  She was not sure if she was shocked by the idea or titillated by it, but in response said only, “Do you mean socialize with him? Women don’t ask men they hardly know to dine with them. Or even go for a walk down a city street.”

  Pinkerton grinned. “Here I thought you were a modern woman. And, as I recall, you have been married, so it’s not as if you need a chaperone.”

  “He’s not the type of man to whom I am attracted, Allan.”

  “Not handsome?”

  “In a New England kind of way, perhaps. But not what I’m looking for.”

  “Give it some thought.”

  “I will,” she said. “But before I sidle up to that reporter—if I do—there is another possibility to explore about what happened to Lucy.”

  “Which is?”

  “That slave catchers may already have found her and taken her directly back to Kentucky,” she said. “Without worrying about complying with the Fugitive Slave Act—first taking her into court and all of that.”

  “Do you have a way to find that out?” Pinkerton said.

  “Perhaps. If Lucy has been taken back to Riverview, my mother would surely have heard about it and let me know. She always writes to me about the local gossip. But since letters take a while, I could send a carefully worded telegram to my sister and find out what she knows. She’s close to one of the dead man’s sons.”

  Pinkerton looked skeptical. “If the slave catchers found Lucy they could instead have just gotten a bill of sale from the owner—that would be the eldest son now that the father’s dead—and taken her directly to a slave market somewhere and sold her south without ever taking her back to the plantation.”

  “That could be. What do you want me to do now, Allan? Other than befriend that reporter?”

  “I want you to go on looking for Lucy.”

  “Dear God, why? Isn’t it obvious, like I just said, that she’s either dead or in Canada by now? Or sold south, which is pretty much the same as dead.”

  Pinkerton got up from behind his desk and began to pace the room. Annabelle sat, watching him, saying nothing. After a minute or two, he stopped, faced her and said, “I will tell you something, but I must ask you to swear to keep what I tell you secret.”

  “I swear that I will.”

  “So... I am the Railroad Stationmaster in Chicago.”

  “That is widely rumored, Allan, so hardly a secret.”

  “I know. However, I do want you to keep my confirmation of that fact secret. But that is not the only important part.”

  “What is?”

  “That we keep a list of passengers. I think it will be useful to show it to you, but I must first ask you to leave the building and come back in a few minutes.”

  “Alright.” She left and busied herself outside, talking to the guard by the front door. Eventually, Allan poked his head out and bade her return.

  When they were back in his office, he handed her a piece of paper and said, “This is the list of those who have reached Chicago on the Railroad in the last several weeks. It contains their names and a description of each. In not too long, we will destroy it and start a new list.”

  She took it and read through it, noting that it contained around a dozen names.

  “It seems risky to keep this list. Why do you?”

  “Because we need to make sure that those who came through here were transported on to the next station without being captured along the way. This area is thick with slave catchers, and if they succeed we try to learn how they did it and change our routes.”

  “So you check the names off when you hear that they have gotten through?”

  “Yes, and since we dare not use telegrams or the post office to check, we must wait ’til a worker from the Railroad’s next station shows up here and tells us that such and such a slave made it at least that far.”

  “To Canada?”

  “To wherever they were going.”

  “And if a lot of them do not make it to wherever that is?” Annabelle said.

  “Then we need to figure out how to change our methods or our routes.”

  “What do you want me to take away from seeing this list, Allan?”

  “Did you see Lucy Battelle’s name on it?”

  “No. But she might have given a false name.”

  “Do you see any description that might fit what we know of her from the affidavit her master filed, the one we all discussed during dinner? Young? Tall for her age? Thin?”

  “No.”

  “What that means, Annabelle, is that she has not come through here in the last few weeks.”

  “Perhaps she took a different route.”

  “This is the main Railroad route from the Springfield area.”

  “She could have taken a branch.”

  “If there is a branch, I don’t know about it.”

  “So she is either...”

  “Dead, sold south or still in Springfield or nearby, but almost surely not in Canada.”

  “As I said, Allan, what do you want me to do now?”

  “Go on looking for her. I have traded telegrams with Lincoln, using an alias with which he’s familiar, and he still wants her found if at all possible.”

  “I may not be the best person to do that. I had thought my abolitionism, even though not absolute, would help open doors, but as soon as they hear my Kentucky accent, the doors slam shut.”

  “You are clever, my dear, and I am sure you can figure it out.”

  “That is not very helpful, Allan.”

  He thought for a moment, opened a desk drawer and pulled out a blank sheet of paper. Then he wrote something on it, folded it and handed it to her.

  “Shall I read it?”

  “Of course.”

  She unfolded it and read it to herself. It said simply, “This woman is to be trusted.” It was signed “Henry.”

  “What am I to do with it?” she said.

  “Fold it back up and hide in on your person in a place that most men would hesitate to search. Then go to Springfield and go to see the baker, Mr. Hotchkiss. His bakery is on Fourth Street.”

  “And show him the note?”

  “Yes, and tell him what you are trying to do. He might help you.”

  28

  Sangamon County Jail

  The jail, which was in the back of the courthouse, had seven cells in all. Four were off the corridor leading directly to the sheriff’s office and were usually filled with drunks—those who’d gotten violent—spending the night. The final three, always referred to as the “far set,” was on the other side of the building, guarded by an armed deputy. Those cells were used for real criminals.

  When the federal magistrate requested Sheriff Stromberg to house Abby Kelley Foster while she awaited trial—the federal court lacked its own jail cells—the far set was empty. Which enabled them to put Mrs. Foster over there without hou
sing her alongside men.

  Not that the sheriff had been at all happy about it. In fact, he had tried to talk the magistrate out of jailing her at all.

  “Bert, why are you doing this?” he had asked after Mrs. Foster had been settled in her cell. “They didn’t even lock up that woman last year who was accused of hacking up her husband with a hand ax.”

  “Mrs. O’Brien?”

  “Yes, her. We all knew her, and she was a hellcat. And yet she went free until her trial.”

  “She was a state prisoner, Sheriff,” Bert said. “The state has its own policies about such things. Mrs. Foster is a federal prisoner, and Judge Treat wants her held under lock and key.”

  “Why don’t you grant her bail? As the magistrate, you have the authority to do that, and Judge Treat be damned. Set a high bail and one of her fancy abolitionist friends from back East will surely post it.”

  “Do you recall what must be done before someone can be bailed out, Sheriff?”

  He knew it was a trick question, and he hated to be tricked, so he just said, “Uh, not exactly. What?”

  “They have to apply for bail, and she hasn’t done that. And even if she were to do so, I wouldn’t grant it. She has no local ties and she could easily flee.”

  “I thought she came here to look after a close friend who is ill. Wouldn’t that be ties enough, Bert?”

  The magistrate smiled a very broad smile. “He died two days ago. So I guess he ain’t a local tie anymore, eh?”

  “I still don’t like the idea of holding her, but I guess I am stuck with her.”

  “Yes, you have an agreement with the federal court to house our prisoners, and I assume you’ll keep on honoring it.”

  The sheriff shrugged. “It’s good money, I suppose.”

  “So you’ll honor the agreement?”

  “Yes. And perhaps I’ll go and pay her a visit. She’s the most famous prisoner we’ve had here in a long time.”