Abraham Lincoln

An Abraham Lincoln Biography

Michael Woodford
Copyright © 2017.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION: LEGACY OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN THE
ANCIENT ONE
HONEST ABE’S EARLY YEARS
A SELF-MADE MAN- LINCOLN’S EDUCATION AND EARLY
ADULTHOOD
FORAY INTO LAW PRACTICE- ABRAHAM LINCOLN THE
LAWYER
LINCOLN’S LOVE LIFE MARRIAGE AND FAMILY LIFE
THE RAILWAY CANDIDATE- LINCOLN’S INVOLVEMENT
IN STATE AND NATIONAL POLITICS
THE GREAT EMANCIPATOR- LINCOLN’S PRESIDENCY
THE DEATH OF UNCLE ABE
THE GREAT ORATOR- THE GETTYSBURG ADDRESS
INTRODUCTION: LEGACY OF
ABRAHAM LINCOLN THE ANCIENT
ONE

In Christianity, there is a maxim by which a Christian must evaluate his

future actions in times of a moral crisis. Known famously as “WWJD” i.e.
What Would Jesus Do; it is believed that by putting one’s self in the shoes of
the Great Teacher, one would be better able to make the right decision
appropriate to the moral crisis.
This highlights the great importance and reverence with which the faith views
Jesus. If there is one other person in the whole of history with whom a
question of this sort is popularly associated with, it is the great Abraham
Lincoln.
Countless number of times since his death, Abraham Lincoln’s name has
been invoked by many a politician seeking to associate their lives with his. In
fact, a King James version bible owned by Abraham Lincoln was used at
Barack Obama’s presidential inauguration at the latter’s insistence.
As this biography would explore in the coming chapters, Abraham Lincoln’s
legend started long before he set foot in the White House. His is a story of a
self-made man. Of one who took the crookeds with the straights and through
high moral conduct and well-grounded convictions carved his name in the
tablet of time.
Live on is what this name certainly has done. A number of surveys have been
done over the years on the greatest President to ever lead the United States of
America and consistently, the lanky 16th President’s name appears in the top
three along with George Washington and Franklin D. Roosevelt.
These surveys include both public opinion polls and those carried out by
historians and political scientists. In 2015, the American Political Science
Association conducted a poll among political scientists specializing in
American presidency and Abraham Lincoln ranked top on that list.
While in 2014, in a study carried out by Henry L. Roediger III and K.
Andrew DeSoto; and published in the journal Science in which research
participants were asked to name as many Presidents as possible, Abraham
Lincoln was in fifth place behind names such as Barack Obama, Bill Clinton,
George Bush and George Washington.
Of the names mentioned above, three of them served in more recent history
(1993 and after). Clearly, the name Abraham Lincoln is etched in the minds
of Americans.
It is not just in polls that Abraham Lincoln has been immortalized though. A
number of memorials dedicated to him exist all over the country. Some of
these memorials include:
The name of the capital of Nebraska
A statue in front of the District of Columbia City Hall which was the
first public monument in his honor
The Lincoln Highway which was Abraham Lincoln’s first national
memorial and also the first road for automobiles across the country.
The Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C.
A head sculpture on Mount Rushmore
The list is of course a lot longer than the few mentioned above but of the lot,
the sculpture on Mount Rushmore is among the most visited along with
others like the Lincoln Memorial, Ford’s Theatre (where he was shot) and
Petersen House (where he died).
Abraham Lincoln holds the distinction of being the only United States’
President to appear on a U.S airmail stamp. Besides him, only four other
people have had the honor of being depicted on federal issue United States
paper currency during their lifetime.
His image is currently on the five-dollar bill and the Lincoln cent which is the
first regularly circulating United States coin to feature an actual person’s
image.
To tell Abraham Lincoln’s story without talking about his international
reputation would be to do a huge dis-service to his legacy and monuments in
his honor exist in Scotland, England, Cuba, Dominican Republic and Mexico.
The world of literature and film has also paid homage to Abraham Lincoln.
The poet, Walt Whitman, wrote about him in at least 4 different poems while
it is believed that over a thousand pieces of music have been written about
Lincoln.
It would be practically impossible to list the representations of Lincoln in
television and film over the years. The Oscar winning 2012 movie, Lincoln,
by Steven Spielberg ranks high among the greatest portrayals of Abraham
Lincoln.
In an interview with deadline.com on the movie, the award winning movie
director had this to say, “Lincoln’s leadership is based on a number of
precepts but my favorite one is he acted in the name, and for the good, of the
people. In that sense, the two great things he did at the end of his life, to end
slavery…was for the good and in the name of the people”
Despite Abraham Lincoln’s modern day apotheosis, it is worth noting that the
man revered by the entire world today was not always liked by the people
that he led.
In fact, by the time Abraham Lincoln was seeking re-election for the seat of
the Presidency in 1864, the New York World famously reprinted an editorial
from the Richmond Examiner that stated, “… Abraham Lincoln is lost…he
will never be President again…the obscene ape of Illinois is about to be
deposed from the Washington Purple…and the White House will echo to his
little jokes no more.”
The New York Herald had their own strong words after his emergence as the
Republican nominee as they declared that, “The politicians have again chosen
this Presidential pigmy as their nominee.”
Scathing words indeed that reflect the views of the public towards him in
those dark times of the United States history. A number of his now celebrated
actions such as The Emancipation Proclamation were also looked
unfavorably upon in those times.
The Proclamation was branded by the Chicago Times to be “a monstrous
usurpation, a criminal wrong, and an act of national suicide.”
It is admirable indeed that despite such negative press and hostile words,
Uncle Abe stood by what he believed and successfully led the United States
through those dark times.
His assassination by John Wilkes Booth on 14th April 1965 at Ford’s Theatre
would be responsible for the shift in perspective towards Abraham Lincoln.
To see him for what he truly was- the Great Emancipator.
This biography takes a look at one of America’s most beloved figures and
urges its readers to find in the life and death of Great Abe, the values that
define the American spirit.
HONEST ABE’S EARLY YEARS

The life story of the 16th President of the United States of America began
very humbly on the 12th of February 1809 in an unimpressive one room log
cabin at Sinking Spring farm near Hodgenville in Hardin County, Kentucky.
Hardin County was established in 1792 from a portion of land given by
Nelson County. The county’s name is derived from Colonel John Hardin who
served as a Continental Army officer in the American Revolutionary War.
Colonel Hardin was one of the first Judges in the Washington County but he
would later be killed in the service of his country while acting as a peace
emissary to the Shawnee Indian people under the orders of the President,
George Washington.
Abraham Lincoln may have taken a leaf from Colonel Hardin’s life’s page by
his devotion to public service which would, like Colonel Hardin before him,
ultimately cost him his life.
He was born to Thomas Lincoln and Nancy Hanks who had two other
children- Sarah Lincoln Grigsby and Thomas Lincoln Jr.
His ancestral roots extend beyond the United States, however. In fact, all the
way to England through his first known ancestor, Samuel Lincoln who
emigrated around 1638 to Massachusetts.
The journey of the Lincoln family name towards the Western areas was
started by Samuel Lincoln’s grandson named Mordecai Lincoln. The first
migrator’s great grandson, John Lincoln would continue this westward
movement and settle his family in Augusta County, now known as
Rockingham county, Virginia sometime around 1766.
Abraham Lincoln was named after his grandfather, Captain Abraham Lincoln
who earned his rank from his service in the Virginia militia. It was Captain
Abraham Lincoln who moved the family name down to Jefferson County,
Kentucky.
Interestingly, Abraham Lincoln might never have been born if the Indian
ambush that claimed Captain Abraham Lincoln’s life in the presence of
Thomas Lincoln had not been thwarted by Mordecai Lincoln, Thomas
Lincoln’s brother who shot the attacker just in time. Fascinating it is, the
small margins that determine fate.
The ancestry of Abraham Lincoln on his maternal side is less clear, however.
Specifically, as regards the identity of his maternal grandfather. It is on
record, though, that the President had mentioned that he was deeply
influenced by him and had inherited key defining features such as his logic,
analytical process and drive from this enigmatic grandfather.
How Nancy Hanks came to be in Kentucky can be attributed to her mother,
Lucy Shipley Hanks who migrated to Kentucky and lived with her sister
Racheal Shipley Berry and her husband. The Berrys lived just under two
miles away from the Lincoln’s and were neighbors for seventeen years.
This is how Thomas Lincoln and Nancy Hanks met and came to be married
on the 12th of June, 1806. Their union will forever be remembered by history
for producing one of the finest men to ever walk the earth- Abraham Lincoln.
There are a number of controversies regarding the ancestry of Abraham
Lincoln. Among which include that his biological father is Abraham Enloe
with whom Nancy Hanks bore Abraham Lincoln while working for the
Enlow family.
There would also be claims after Lincoln entered national politics that he had
“part Negro” blood.
None of the above claims, however, have verifiable evidence.
The late President’s birthplace is now home to the Abraham Lincoln
Birthplace National Historical Park which has a replica cabin of the one in
which he was born. The original cabin is believed to have been dismantled
around the time of his assassination presumably to be used for the
construction of a nearby house.
His early childhood was rough and Lincoln himself is quoted to have
described his origins as “the short and simple annals of the poor”. A mere
two years after his birth, his family was forced to move due to a land title
dispute. There would be more land disputes in the coming years due to
Kentucky’s confusing land laws and defective titles.
Thomas Lincoln had hoped that he would be able to recover the land and so
continued to pursue the case in court. However, six years later, in 1815 the
court battle was lost.
The relocation of the family in 1811 took them to the Knob Creek Farm
where they were still confronted by another land dispute. This time, by
people who claimed to have held prior title over that piece of land.
It is estimated that Thomas Lincoln lost about 600 acres of the 800 acres of
land that he owned in Kentucky. It is the frustration from these lost lands that
prompted Thomas Lincoln to begin to ponder a move to Indiana which had
more secure land laws.
Indiana’s favorable land laws at the time in which federal government owned
lands had been surveyed into sections facilitated easier description in land
claims actually allowed Indiana attract more settlers who were assured that
there would be fewer ownership disputes.
By 1814, Thomas Lincoln had sold what little land he had left in Kentucky
and in 1816, he moved his family to Indiana where Abraham Lincoln would
spend the next fourteen years of his life.
Their point of settlement in Indiana was on a piece of land that had been
ceded to the federal government as part of treaties between the people of
Delaware and the Piankeshaw (Native Indians who were members of the
Miami Indians) in the year 1804.
This area of land lay in the Hurricane Township, Perry County, Indiana. The
choice was not random though as Thomas Lincoln had visited the Indiana
territory before moving his family.
In this area, Thomas Lincoln was able to acquire some degree of stability and
integrated quite well with the local community. The family grew hogs and
corn on their farm after successfully clearing it.
Within two years of their settlement in Indiana, a most unfortunate incident
occurred. Nancy Lincoln came down with an illness called milk sickness
which is caused by drinking contaminated milk from cows that had fed on
white snakeroot.
Nancy Hanks was thirty-four at the time of her death. Historical accounts
describe her as being a strong willed woman who balanced her strength of
character with an amiable disposition. It is from her that Lincoln is believed
to have learned the patience and kindness associated with his character.
This death no doubt rocked the family hard. Abraham Lincoln was only nine
at the time.
Within a year of her death, Thomas Lincoln married again. His new bride
was Sarah Bush Johnston who was a widow with three children. The pair had
known each other back in Kentucky and Thomas Lincoln, having heard that
she was a widow had made the journey back there to seek her hand in
marriage.
Sarah Bush Lincoln would prove to be a wonderful mother figure for
Abraham Lincoln. She treated him just like she did any of her other children
and encouraged him to read and learn. She had a personal collection of books
which she shared with young Abraham Lincoln and stimulated in him his
hunger for learning.
They appear to have had a close relationship and a number of things known
about Lincoln’s childhood years such as his little care for clothes and food
acme from interviews that were conducted with her after Lincoln’s rise to
national fame.
Ten years on from Nancy Hanks’s death in 1818, death would come calling
on the door of the Lincoln family again. This time, it came for Lincoln’s
older sister, Sarah.
She had gotten married to a man named Aaron Grimsby on the 2nd of August,
1826. Two years later, she conceived but sadly passed away during
childbirth. This death also shook Lincoln who was nineteen at the time of her
passing.
That same year, 1828, Lincoln made his way to New Orleans. A trip believed
to be due to his need for a distraction from the death of his sister. He made
this trip with a certain Allen Gentry, the son of a local store owner.
The duo explored New Orleans together and Abraham Lincoln, for the first
time in his life got to see the harsh realities of life in the South for slaves.
Some believe that Lincoln may have witnessed a slave auction and that all of
these left an indelible impression on his mind. The boy, Lincoln, was
gradually becoming a man.
A SELF-MADE MAN- LINCOLN’S
EDUCATION AND EARLY
ADULTHOOD
Upon Lincoln’s entry into limelight, he publicly expressed his regret for not
having had formal education.
It is fascinating that despite not having had formal education, Abraham
Lincoln still was among the most astute thinkers of his time. It is believed
that the total amount of time Lincoln may have spent in a formal education
setup would not have been more than twelve months at most.
He never went to college yet he would later on become an accomplished
lawyer.
As mentioned in the preceding chapter, he developed a voracious appetite for
reading from his step-mother and taught himself a number of the things he
knew. He studied English Grammar on his own in his early twenties and as a
member of Congress acquainted himself with the works of Euclid.
Popular literature that Lincoln is famed to have been a fan of include:
Aesop’s Fables, Pilgrim’s Progress, Robinson Crusoe and the Bible.
Newspapers, songbooks, history books were also among his favored reads.
His intense reading habits put considerable strain on his relationship with his
father who wanted to see Lincoln involved in more manual labor to help
support the family financially. Lincoln, though, preferred the solace he found
in books.
A number of his family members have at different times spoken of their
contributions to Lincoln’s education. A cousin of his mother Nancy, Dennis
Hanks laid claim to giving Lincoln his first lessons in spelling, reading and
writing.
Lincoln’s early attempts at formal education started before his family’s initial
move to Indiana. He started off at a subscription school in Knob Creek,
Kentucky. These schools usually required a monthly tuition fee paid by the
parents to the teachers. It would be up to the teachers to find a suitable place
of study. Classes held for only a few months in a year.
His formal education was halted for a few years after the family’s move to
Indiana but resumed in the year 1819 when the first school in the area was
established about a mile and a quarter from where the Lincoln farm was
located.
It was not just reading that Lincoln got up to in those early years. He also
trained himself to speak and would tell stories and sermons to just about
anyone in the local community.
Lincoln’s transition to young adulthood would be marked by another family
move around March 1830. This time, the destination was Illinois and they
settled in Macon County. At the time of this move, Lincoln had clocked
twenty-one years of age.
The underlying reasons for the move are rather complicated as Thomas
Lincoln seemed to have finally gotten much needed stability for his family at
Indiana. The aforementioned Dennis Hanks was married to Elizabeth,
Abraham Lincoln’s half-sister.
Things were not as good for him as they were for Thomas Lincoln. However,
Sarah Lincoln, was not willing to part with her daughter and so may have
convinced Thomas Lincoln to agree to the move.
In Illinois, the already strained relationship between Abraham Lincoln and
his father worsened.
It was around this time that Abraham Lincoln met Denton Offutt. He was a
general store owner and history will remember him as being the man that
gave Abraham Lincoln his first ever job.
Denton Offutt offered Abraham Lincoln and John Hanks-Abraham’s first
cousin-the job of moving cargo to New Orleans. During the course of this
journey, they would pass by New Salem. New Salem’s location left a mark
on Denton Offutt and after they completed the cargo delivery to New
Orleans, Denton Offutt returned with Abraham Lincoln whom he had hired to
be his new clerk.
Even though the plan was to work for Denton Offutt, it was on hold for a few
months as they all settled in their new environment. They arrived in July and
since the store did not open till September, Lincoln found some work to do
during the time.
He soon developed quite the reputation among the people of the local
community for his incredible work ethic.
Upon the opening of the store, his reputation soared still and one instance
stands out from his time in the store which earned him the nickname “Honest
Abe”. A customer had been overcharged and Lincoln traveled many miles to
return the money to the customer.
It was in New Salem that Lincoln’s involvement in politics began. His
blossoming reputation attracted the attention of some of the leaders of the
town who began to pull his attention towards politics.
This attention was not just derived from his reputation as a store clerk but
also from his involvement in the debating club of New Salem.
Unfortunately for Denton Offutt, his business took a hit in 1832. It was
around this time that the Black Hawk War started.
The Black Hawk War was a war that pitted the United States government
against the Native Americans led by a Sauk leader after whom the war was
named- Black Hawk. Black Hawk was on a mission to reclaim traditional
tribal lands located in Illinois.
Lincoln joined up efforts to repeal Black Hawk’s army in April and was
elected to be captain of his unit. He did not, along with his men, get a taste of
the battle. Lincoln did take a lot of pride in the distinction of having been
named captain of his unit.
His initial time in service was short as his unit got disbanded only a month
after enlisting. He later re-enlisted and served as a private in Captain Jacob
Early’s “independent spy company”.
By July, this company too was mustered out and Lincoln’s military career
came to an end. During the course of his service, Lincoln made numerous
connections that would prove to be significant during the course of his
political career.
Lincoln headed down to Sangamon County in Central Illinois and contested
in the legislative election. Sadly, he failed to secure a seat, finishing eight out
of thirteen candidates that contested.
This loss meant that Lincoln was now without a job and needing to find a
means to pay his bills, Abraham Lincoln teamed up with William F. Berry
whom he had met during the war.
The pair attempted to run a general store but were unsuccessful in their
attempts and the business crashed.
Lincoln actually contemplated leaving New Salem at the time but some of his
friends rallied behind him and ensured that he secured an appointment as the
Postmaster of New Salem from the President, Andrew Johnson.
He was also able to secure a job as an assistant to a county surveyor despite
his lack of experience in the field.
To meet the demands of the job, Lincoln fell back to his usual method of
education- teaching himself and found books from which he could gain
knowledge on surveying methods and relevant trigonometric knowledge.
This phase of his life represented an important phase for Lincoln as he took
his first steps towards a political career while the Black Hawk War, looked
fondly upon by Lincoln himself was responsible for shaping him in defining
ways.
So fond was Abraham Lincoln of the war that he once, while giving a speech
to the United States Congress in 1848, he joked:
“By the way Mr. Speaker, did you know that I am a military hero? Yes, sir, in
the days of the Black Hawk War I fought, bled and came away…”
FORAY INTO LAW PRACTICE-
ABRAHAM LINCOLN THE LAWYER
As mentioned earlier, the period of Abraham Lincoln’s service in the militia
served as a useful period for the political connections that Lincoln made.
It also served the useful purpose of bringing Lincoln into contact with the
man called John Todd Stuart with whom he served during the war in the
same battalion.
John Stuart’s influence on Lincoln is profound and if not for him, Abraham
Lincoln might never have studied law. He was also the cousin of Mary Todd
Lincoln who would end up becoming Abraham Lincoln’s wife.
In the state legislature elections of 1834, Lincoln again ran and this time won
a seat of the four available seats. John T. Stuart also contested in this same
election and took a liking to Lincoln. He felt Lincoln would make a great
lawyer and he told him what he thought.
It is not entirely impossible that Lincoln’s eventual foray into law may have
started even from his humble childhood beginnings. His father was involved
in a number of lawsuits on land dispute cases and so he may have been in to
court rooms at that age.
Following the family move to Indiana, Lincoln probably attended a number
of court sessions at any of the three county courthouses situated some fifteen
miles of the Lincoln house. These sessions offered Lincoln the opportunity to
listen to a lot of oral presentations.
He studied the Declaration of Independence, the United States constitution
and the Revised Statutes of Indiana.
To further enhance his knowledge, Lincoln sought for law books from John
Stuart and another person, Judge Thomas Drummond whom was a fellow
Whig Party member.
Building on the knowledge acquired from these books, Lincoln decided to
quit the surveyor job he had taken up in order to apply to become a lawyer.
On September 9, 1836, Abraham Lincoln obtained his law license.
It was not an uncommon practice of the times then to have used a career in
law as a ladder into the world of politics and Lincoln may perhaps have that
in mind too.
In the year 1837, he entered into partnership with John Stuart who at the time
was more into the politics than he was in to practicing law. This meant that
Lincoln had to handle most of the clients on the books of the partnership and
he proved himself to be as capable a lawyer as any other lawyer around.
A few years into the partnership, especially around the time that John Stuart
got elected into Congress, Lincoln began to get uncomfortable with the idea
of shouldering the weight of the partnership and so decided to get out of it.
In April of 1841, Lincoln was able to get into a partnership with Stephen
Trigg Logan, a man almost a decade older than him. At the time of their
meeting, Stephen Logan was the leading attorney in the Sangamon County
and even though, Lincoln’s pay was considerably less than what he had
earned with John Stuart, this partnership turned out to be a very useful one
for Lincoln.
Under Stephen Logan, Lincoln’s knowledge and practice of law gained a
measure of refinement. Before entering into partnership with Stephen Logan,
Lincoln had not always paid attention to the little details.
However, he began to pay attention to taking time to prepare for his cases.
An improvement which no doubt greatly improved his law practice. Logan
pressed upon Lincoln the importance of precedents and procedures and
Lincoln pored over the books in the Supreme Court Library to improve this
aspect of his learning.
In 1844, Stephen Logan decided to enter into partnership with his son which
meant that for the second time, Lincoln had to find a new partner. He got his
own junior partner, a man named William Herndon.
William Herndon was a good friend of Lincoln’s who regarded him as his
man. He greatly supported Lincoln’s law practice by doing relevant research,
building their law library and tutoring the other young people who came to
learn law at their office.
William Herndon would later become one of Lincoln’s earliest biographers.
Their partnership would extend into Lincoln’s presidency. Lincoln, who prior
to his partnership with Herndon was not a frequent visitor of neighboring
courts began to pay more attention to them and traveled often, earning a
reputation for his integrity and fairness and strengthening his nickname
“Honest Abe”.
Lincoln had quite a successful law practice. He handled a lot of cases through
the course of his career and quite inevitably, cases having to do with slavery
came up.
In one such case, that of Bailey v. Cromwell, an Illinois Supreme Court case
in the year 1841. Lincoln on the premise that the law presumed the freedom
of every human being regardless of the color of their skin was able to ensure
that a woman who had been alleged to be a salve was not sold into slavery.
An opposite spectrum of a case to the one above came up for Lincoln during
the course of his law practice too. In this case, he defended a slave owner
who wanted to reclaim his runaway slaves.
The slave owner, a man named Robert Matson, had brought the slaves from
his plantation in Kentucky to the land he owned in Illinois. The slaves, aware
of the Northwest Ordinance which prohibited slavery in that area inclusive of
Illinois, seized the opportunity to make their escape believing that freedom
acquired in a slavery free state was secure.
To ensure that the man reclaimed his slaves, Lincoln’s argument before the
court was that the right of transit allowed slave owners to move their slaves
temporarily into free territory as far as they did not intend to reside in the free
state permanently.
Lincoln, in this case, failed to get the Judges to agree with him and the slaves
stayed free.
Some might look at this case and wonder about Lincoln’s moral compass in
choosing to defend a slave owner but for Lincoln, the question of morality in
his law practice was guided by what the law permitted or implied could be
done and not based on personal moral directives.
Lincoln, like many of his learned colleagues, took up railroad litigation cases
which at the time was quite profitable.
One of the most popular cases that Lincoln ever took on was when he
defended the son of one of his friends who had been charged for murder.
The accused, a man named William Armstrong, was in a really tight spot as
an eyewitness had claimed to witness the crime by moonlight on the night
that it occurred.
Lincoln took a legal road less travelled by, by using a rule in the law of
evidence called judicial notice. Judicial notice basically allows for the
introduction of a fact as evidence on the basis that that fact could not be
reasonably doubted due to its extreme reliability.
To secure the release of his client, Lincoln used a copy of the Farmers’
Almanac- an annual publication that provided weather predictions and
astronomical data-to show that on the said night, the moon was at a low angle
and thus could not have provided enough illumination for the witness to have
seen the alleged crime.
It was a brilliant and intuitive tactic which automatically ruled out the
eyewitness as a liar and secured the release of William Armstrong.
Some people that Lincoln met during the course of the law practice and
would later play some role in his life include: David Davis, a Whig Party
member like Lincoln. Davis sometimes asked Lincoln to fill in for him as a
Judge over the course of eleven years. Lincoln would later appoint him to the
United States Supreme Court.
Another person was Ward Hill Lamon, a local attorney. The only local
attorney, in fact, with whom Lincoln had a working relationship. He
accompanied Lincoln to Washington in 1861.
It remains a remarkable feat of Lincoln’s life that he was able to take on
varying kinds of law cases using knowledge that he had gained through self-
study and from people like Stephen Logan.
It is believed that Lincoln handled more than five thousand cases throughout
his law practice and appeared before the Illinois State Supreme Court more
than four hundred times.
LINCOLN’S LOVE LIFE, MARRIAGE
AND FAMILY LIFE
When many look at the life of Abraham Lincoln, their interest is most often
drawn to his involvement in politics, his time as the President and his conduct
during the Civil War or even his assassination.
A seldomly looked at part of his life is that of his love life. In being awed by
the greatness of the life of Abraham Lincoln, it is easy to forget that just like
every other human and beyond the love he had for people, he too had
romantic interests.
His love life, marriage and family life was sadly plagued by tragic events at
certain points which this chapter will cover.
As far as his love life is concerned, one name will come to mind readily. That
of Mary Todd, his wife. Yet, his romantic interests preceded Mary Todd.
A lesser remembered name is that of Ann Rutledge. When Lincoln became
President, in a response to a question about whether he had loved Ann, his
reply was: “It is true- true indeed I did. I loved the woman dearly and
soundly: She was a handsome girl…I did honestly and truly love the girl and
think often…of her…”
Ann Rutledge was born near Henderson, Kentucky to James Rutledge and
Mary Ann Miller Rutledge whom had nine other children of which Ann
Rutledge was third. James Rutledge was among the town leaders earlier
mentioned who encouraged Lincoln to pursue politics.
While the details of her life are sketchy, the picture of it that exists suggests
that before she met Abraham Lincoln, she was engaged to marry a man called
John MacNamar who left for New York with a promise to return to marry
her.
While Ann Rutledge waited for his return, she met and fell in love with
Abraham Lincoln who also was in love with her. By the year 1835, they were
in a relationship but not formally engaged as she had not yet been released
from her previous promise to marry John MacNamar. She did promise to get
married to Lincoln if she could get John MacNamar to release her.
That chance would however not present itself as in that year, there was a
typhoid epidemic in the town. The typhoid claimed her life on the 25th of
August, 1835 at the young age of 22.
Her love story with Lincoln is hotly contested as some feel that William
Herndon, the first to reveal the story of their love may have either cooked up
the story or blew its degree out of proportion due to his contempt for Mary
Todd Lincoln.
It is generally believed that his account of their belief is accurate as there
have been other people who claimed to have witnessed the love between
Abraham Lincoln and Ann Rutledge.
Her death is said to have hit Lincoln hard and may have been responsible for
the melancholic mood associated with him.
About a year after the death of Ann Rutledge, Lincoln proposed to Mary
Owens, a young woman he had met after she came down from Kentucky to
visit her sister. The terms of their proposed eventual marriage would be
dependent on her returning to New Salem.
She did return and she and Lincoln courted for a period but their courtship
was not as smooth as they might have hoped as they both had their own
worries about the relationship.
Perhaps to ensure that neither of them felt trapped in the relationship, Lincoln
wrote to Mary Owens sometime in August of 1837 and in the letter he owned
up to the fact that he would not take offence if she chose to end the
relationship. Thus ended the relationship as Mary Owens never even bothered
to reply.
It would be another three years before Lincoln would get involved in another
relationship. This time, with his eventual wife, Mary Todd Lincoln.
She was born in Lexington, Kentucky into a slaveholding family. Her family
was quite wealthy too and Mary Todd was raised in comfort. She also had a
refined education and became fluent in French; learning also dance, drama,
music, and social graces.
She was quite popular and a number of men sought her hand including
Stephen A. Douglas but it was Lincoln to whom she eventually settled on.
They met at Springfield, Illinois in 1839 and projected to get married in
January of 1841. Lincoln got nervous about the whole affair and broke it off.
After the break-up, he got involved with another woman known as Sarah
Rickard whom was very much younger than Lincoln. It is said that their
relationship failed because Sarah Rickard did not share his affections for her
and more so, considered him to be too old for her.
Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd would later meet up again at a party and
were soon married on November 4, 1842.
Their age difference was ten years and after their marriage, they settled in
Springfield near Lincoln’s law office.
They had four children together, of whom only one lived to adulthood-
Robert Todd Lincoln whom later became a lawyer, businessman and United
States Secretary of War.
The other children they had together include:
Edward Baker Lincoln, born in 1846 but died in 1850 from tuberculosis
William Wallace Lincoln was born in 1850 but he passed on in 1862 at
the age of 12 due to typhoid fever. Lincoln was already President at the
time.
Thomas Lincoln was the third child and he was born in 1853 but did
not make it past the age of 18. The exact cause of his death is not
certain but it may have been due to either pleurisy, pneumonia or
congestive heart failure
These deaths were hard on Lincoln and Mary Todd. Mary Todd would
behave erratically and hold irrational fears especially with regards to the
health of Robert Lincoln.
She once left Florida to go see Robert in Chicago after she was gripped by
the fear that he was sick to the point of death. She arrived in Chicago to meet
Robert in perfect health.
Mary Todd would eventually be institutionalized against her wishes ten years
after her husband’s murder.
Beyond these unfortunate tragedies, they had some good times as they were
both doting parents to their children. It is said that Mary Todd would often
read newspapers while waiting for Lincoln’s arrival so they could have
enough newsworthy items to talk about.
Due to his political commitments and the Civil War that erupted in his
presidency, Lincoln was often away from home and during this period Mary
Todd was a steady rock for the family and even in the time of his protracted
absences from home held the fort for months.
THE RAILWAY CANDIDATE-
LINCOLN’S INVOLVEMENT IN STATE
AND NATIONAL POLITICS
Even though he would later become a Republican, Lincoln’s political party
affiliation actually started with the Whig Party and it was as a member of the
Whig Party that Lincoln served the duration of his four terms in the Illinois
legislature and his one term in the United States congress.
The Whig Party was founded in the year 1834. This was the time of Andrew
Jackson’s presidency. The party was formed by former members of the
National Republican and the Anti-Masonic Parties who opposed the policies
of President Andrew Jackson and his Democratic Party.
They named themselves as “Whigs” after the Patriots who had fought for
independence.
The party ideology which favored modernization in banking, protective
tariffs to fund internal improvements and urbanization appealed to Lincoln
who shared those same beliefs.
By the 1830s, Lincoln was a committed Whig member and considered
himself to be a disciple of Henry Clay
In 1843, a year after his marriage to Mary Todd, Lincoln decided to contest
for the Whig Party nomination ticket for the Illinois 7th district of the United
States House of Representatives. His bid failed as John Hardin won the ticket
instead.
Lincoln suggested that the party adopt a rotational system for the nomination
ticket and was able to secure the support of other Party members to back this
system. Through this system, John Hardin would serve only one term and
then retire to allow for the nomination of another candidate. This system
meant that Lincoln would be able to secure the party ticket by 1846 which he
did.
His moves against slavery started in this period as he teamed up with a
Congressman, Joshua R. Giddings to write a bill proposing the end of slavery
in the District of Colombia with due compensation for the slave-owners. The
bill failed to gather enough Whig supporters and Lincoln dropped the project.
As the 1848 presidential election approached, Lincoln despite being a
supporter of Henry Clay backed Zachary Taylor whom was more popular and
had the reputation of being a war hero. Prior to this nomination, Zachary
Taylor had no previous political exposure but his social standing won him the
nomination ahead of Whig Party heavyweights like Henry Clay.
It was Lincoln’s hope that he would secure a political appointment as the
Commissioner of the General Land Office. He was to be disappointed in that
regard and the job was handed over to Justin Butterfield.
To offer Lincoln some form of consolation, the administration offered him
the position of secretary or governor of the Oregon territory. Due to the
political implications of this for Lincoln as the Oregon territory was a
democratic stronghold, Lincoln declined the offer.
Lincoln would depart the political scene for a while due to the demise of the
Whig Party. The fall of the Whig Party can be traced to the Compromise of
1850 which was basically a set of bills designed to settle the status of
territories acquired during the Mexican-American war to ease tensions
between the slave and free states.
The Compromise was the idea of Henry Clay but Zachary Taylor, as
President, was opposed to the idea. His death would change things though as
Millard Fillmore upon ascension into the Presidency pushed for the passage
of the Compromise through Congress.
By 1850, the Northeastern Whigs and the Southern Whigs were at logger
heads over the issue of slavery. The Northern Whigs were of the opinion that
slavery was a restriction to free labor and free market economy.
Things got worse in 1852. Henry Clay died that year and his death weakened
the party due to his high standing within the party. The anti-slavery faction of
the Whig Party then denied Fillmore the party’s nomination in the election.
Their nominee for President, General Winfield Scott lost heavily to the
Democratic Party nominee, Franklin Pierce.
The final nail in the coffin of the Whig Party would be hammered in 1854 by
the Kansas-Nebraska Act which allowed for slavery in the new territories of
Kansas and Nebraska. As expected, the Whigs in the South gave the Act their
support while their counterparts up North opposed it.
Many of those Whigs in the North joined the newly formed Republican Party
which explains Lincoln’s membership in the Republican Party. This newly
formed Party had members from the Free Soil, Liberty and antislavery
Democratic Party members.
Lincoln’s entry into the Party was not immediate as he still sought to bring
back Whig Party members but it soon became clear that that pursuit was a
wild goose chase.
It was the Kansas-Nebraska Act that marked Lincoln’s return to politics and
he publicly condemned the Act stating that even though it had an indifferent
tone, it had a “covert zeal” for the spread of slavery.
In the year 1854, Lincoln pursued election into the United States Senate but
he failed in this bid largely due to the antislavery Democrats who had
obstinately refused to offer support to any Whig.
The 1856 elections saw Lincoln fully identify with the Republican Party. He
was present at the Bloomington Convention in May 1856 which was the
convention at which the Illinois Republican Party was formally established.
For the Presidential elections that year, there was a lot of support for Lincoln
to clinch the Vice-Presidential ticket. The ticket did not go to him though and
the Republican Party presented John Fremont and William Dayton as their
Presidential and Vice Presidential nominee.
Lincoln was a good sport about it and actively campaigned for the Party
ticket’s choice. Though the Democrats would win the election that year,
Lincoln earned a lot of admirers for his Party first spirit and vigorous
campaigning in Illinois.
In 1858, Abraham Lincoln went up against incumbent Stephen Douglas for
the candidacy of the United States Senate from Illinois. This period is well
remembered for seven debates between the duo and centered on slavery.
A total of seven towns were visited for the debates including Ottawa,
Freeport, Jonesboro, Charleston, Galesburg, Quincy and Alton.
The debates received national coverage and a lot of dirty politics as pro-
Lincoln newspapers often edited his words to remove any errors while that of
his opponent were left as said. Pro-Douglas newspapers also did the same
thing.
Lincoln upheld his stance throughout the debates that Blacks did have equal
rights of liberty while Douglas declared Lincoln to be an abolitionist and
accused him of attempting to reverse state laws that did not permit for the
inclusion of Blacks in states like Illinois.
Lincoln warned that Douglas’ indifferent stance to slavery would actually
encourage the spread of slavery as it would shape public sentiment towards it.
During the course of the debates, Lincoln was forced to declare that he was
not an abolitionist. He publicly stated that he was “not in favor of bringing
about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black
races”
Since the eventual winner of the election would be elected by state
legislature, Lincoln lost out on the senate seat due to the fact that the
Democratic Party won more seats even though they lost the popular vote.
The national focus on the debates put the spotlight on Lincoln and not a few
were drawn to him and many looked to the year 1860 as a possible time for
Lincoln to run for the Presidency.
Offered the opportunity to speak to New York Party leaders, Lincoln on the
27th if February, 1860 delivered a speech at Cooper union. Lincoln used the
speech, which was above 7000 words long, to reaffirm his views on slavery.
The speech left an indelible mark on the minds of those who listened to him
and it is said that this speech played a strong role in securing for Lincoln, the
Presidential nomination ticket.
The Republican National Convention of 1860 was the second ever
convention held by the Party and it took place between the 16th-18th of May in
Chicago, Illinois. The convention was practically a Northern affair as the pro-
slavery South sent no delegates. David Wilmort, a former United States
Representative from Pennsylvania was elected as temporary chairman.
The candidates seeking the nomination for Presidency included: Senator
William Seward, a United States Senator and former two term governor of
New York; Salmon P. Chase, the Governor of Ohio at the time; Edward
Bates, a former United States House of Representative from Missouri; Simon
Cameron, a United States Senator of Pennsylvania; and the eventual winner,
Abraham Lincoln.
It was widely expected that the hugely popular William Seward would win
the ticket. However, there were concerns that he was too radical and
Lincoln’s associates seized the opportunity to secure votes for Lincoln.
In exchange for the promise of a position on the Cabinet, Simon Cameron of
Pennsylvania swayed his own voters towards Lincoln having realized that he
had no realistic chance of claiming the ticket himself.
Lincoln had his reservations about this deal and did not authorize it but his
associates went ahead to make the deal. Simon Cameron would later be
appointed Secretary of War when Lincoln became President.
The first day of voting offered no surprises as William Seward took a healthy
lead. The alliance with the Pennsylvania delegates would push Lincoln
almost level with William Seward on the second day of nominations while on
the third day, more voters swayed to Lincoln and Abraham Lincoln thus
became the Republican Party nominee for President, defeating Seward by
over 200 votes.
For the seat of the Vice-President, Senator Hannibal Hamlin of Maine
claimed the Republican Party ticket having gone against: Governor Nathaniel
P. Banks; John Hickman of Pennsylvania; Cassius M. Clay of Kentucky;
former Governor of Kansas, Andrew H. Reeder; former United States
Senator, William Dayton; and Supreme Court Justice John McLean of Ohio.
The Democratic Party ticket for the elections was won by Stephen A.
Douglas and Herschel V. Johnson for President and Vice-President
respectively. The Southern Democrats held their own nomination convention
and presented John C. Breckinridge for President and Joseph Lane for Vice-
President.
Other nominees for President and Vice-President from other Parties included:
John Bell and Edward Everett for the Constitutional Union Party; Gerrit
Smith and Samuel McFarland for the Liberty Party; and Governor Sam
Houston of Texas for the People’s Party although he would later withdraw
from the race and urge support for Lincoln.
The election was shrouded by the fear of secession should Lincoln emerge
winner and a number of army officers in Virginia, Kansas and South Carolina
did warn Lincoln about plans being made to that effect. Lincoln and his
advisors however saw these threats to secede as being election trickery.
The election held on the 6th of November, 1860 and had a massive voter
turnout (around 81.2%, the highest ever recorded in American History up to
that time).
Lincoln emerged as President by winning the electoral college even though
he had less than 40% of the popular votes. Of all the candidates that contested
that year, only Douglas was able to pull votes in both slave and free states.
He ended up last in the electoral college despite finishing second in the
popular vote with 25.9%.
The 1860 Presidential election was significant in that it was the first
successful national ticket to not feature a Southerner. The South, up to that
point, had controlled much of the United States political scene, holding the
seat of the President for two-thirds of United States history and majority in
Congress since 1791.
Lincoln’s victory would result in the secession of 7 states- South Carolina,
Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana and Texas- to form the
Confederate States of America otherwise known as the Confederacy.
The secession of the South had to do with their belief that the emergence of
Lincoln was a threat to their expansive social system as thousands of
Southerners had over two million slaves working in their private households.
The South considered the view of the North as an affront to God’s natural
laws and thus a great sin.
Lincoln, from the first day of his Presidency, already had an uphill battle to
fight. The United States of America would be defined by the events to come.
THE GREAT EMANCIPATOR-
LINCOLN’S PRESIDENCY
Despite the fact that no ballots were cast for him in ten out of the fifteen
Southern slave states and that he was only able to secure 2 of the 996
counties in the Southern states, Lincoln emerged President.
In the electoral college, Lincoln polled 180 votes while all his opponents
combined had only 123.
On the 20th of December, 1860, of the Southern States that had threatened to
secede, South Carolina was the first to make a move.
Their announcement was simple. At a special convention organized in the
state, they declared, “...the Union now subsisting between South Carolina and
other states under the name of the ‘United States of America’ is hereby
dissolved”.
The stage was set for an interesting Presidency under Lincoln.
Since the inauguration was not to hold till March, it was up to the incumbent
President, James Buchanan to hold the fort in the face of the secessionist
threats till then.
President James Buchanan took a caught-in-the-middle approach and
declared that the secession was illegal but said that the government did not
have any power to prevent the secession.
During this waiting period, Lincoln needed to have a plan ready by the time
he would take office and naturally, his advisers provided tons of it. There
were those who felt that it would be best if Lincoln would assure the South
that their interests would be protected during his administration while others
still felt that Lincoln should assert that the unity of the Union would not be
threatened.
The trouble with following the advice of those who wanted Lincoln to cuddle
up with the Southern slave owners was that it would isolate the Republican
base while asserting the indestructibility of the Union would be rubbing salt
in the wound of the Southerners.
Lincoln chose to be silent. It was his hope that those in the South still loyal to
the Union would be able to push for the rebelling Southern states to return to
the Union.
In December 1860, the House and the Senate created committees dedicated to
solving the crisis that was threatening to rip the country apart.
Lincoln appealed to Congressmen on these committees pleading that no
consideration should be given to whatever compromise that would only serve
to ensure that slavery spread.
By mid-December, the special Senate committee had come up with a plan.
Led by Senator John J. Crittenden of Kentucky, the committee proposed what
was called the Crittenden Compromise.
The Crittenden Compromise proposed six constitutional amendments and
four Congressional resolutions.
The Compromise proposed that the following Constitutional amendments be
made:
Slavery would be prohibited in areas north of the latitude 36 degrees,
30 minutes’ line while slavery was allowed in territories South of the
line and Congress was not to interfere in any way.
Congress was not to abolish slavery in those areas under its control
within slave states such as a military post.
As far as the District of Colombia was concerned, Congress did not
have the power to abolish slavery there so long as the District existed in
the adjacent states of Virginia and Maryland and without the express
permission of the District’s inhabitants. Should any slave owner refuse
to consent to the abolition of slavery, they would be due compensation.
Congress had no powers to disrupt interstate slave trade.
Congress was required to provide full compensation to owners of
rescued fugitive slaves.
 No future amendment could be made to the Constitution to alter the
proposed changes of the Crittenden compromise nor could Congress be
empowered to interfere with slavery within the slave state
The following Congressional resolutions were made:
Fugitive slave laws were constitutional and had to be upheld.
Personal liberty laws which interfered with the operation of fugitive
slave laws were unconstitutional and were to be repealed.
The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 needed to be amended and made less
objectionable to the North
Laws existent for the suppression of African slave trade should be
executed.
Lincoln strongly disagreed with the Compromise and privately asked the
Republican senators to ensure the failure of the proposal. The Compromise
failed to pass in Congress.
Over the course of the next forty days after the secession of South Carolina,
six other states seceded. The Union was getting fractured even before Lincoln
took over as President.
By February, a month before the inauguration of Lincoln as President, the
Confederate States of America was formed to be led by Jefferson Davis who
was elected as provisional President.
Despite the formation of the Confederate States of America, some other slave
holding Southern states did not join them. They were- Arkansas, North
Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri.
Lincoln departed for Washington and during his train journey often stopped
to make speeches along the way, stressing his views. There were fears that
Lincoln would be assassinated on these travels and extra measures were taken
to ensure his safety such as altering travel schedule and hiring a detective
called Allan Pinkerton.
On March 4, 1861, Abraham Lincoln was sworn in as President of the United
States of America. He was not unaware of the expectations that the citizens of
the country would have for his inaugural address and he sought advice from a
number of people about his speech draft.
Among the people that Lincoln sought advice from was William Seward, the
man that he had pipped to the Republican nominee ticket. William Seward
had his own ideas about the speech and suggested a total of forty-nine
changes of which Lincoln adopted twenty-seven into the final speech he
made.
In his speech, Lincoln touched particularly on the issue of slavery and his
opinion of the South. As far as slavery was, Lincoln said that he did not
intend to disrupt the business of slavery in the states where it already existed
as he did not have the legal backing nor the inclination to do so.
He promised to do his utmost best to defend the Constitution in all the States
even those in the South that had seceded. He said that the government would
not hesitate to fight back if the South decided to fight the government but that
he would not order the use of force against the South without provocation.
On the states that had seceded, Lincoln made it clear that the law required the
Northern and Southern states all agree to any form of secession thus
declaring the secession to be illegal.
Lincoln would end his speech with these famous words, “I am loath to close.
We are not enemies but friends… Though passion may have strained it but it
must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic cords of memory,
stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and
hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union,
when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature”
On Lincoln’s first full day in office, word came to him from Major Robert
Anderson, the commander at Fort Sumter that the troops would run out of
provisions in about six weeks.
There were disagreements as to whether it would be possible to supply the
fort in time. General Winfield Scott thought it impossible while Postmaster
General Blair felt that the fort should be secured. He introduced the president
to his brother-in-law, Gustavus V. Fox.
Gustavus Fox presented a plan for the reinforcement of the Fort but Lincoln
still sought advice from all the members of his cabinet. To further aid his
decision making, Lincoln asked Gustavus fox, Stephen Hulburt and Ward
Lamon to go down to South Carolina and determine the need for
reinforcement. They judged it necessary.
Lincoln would later order Gustavus Fox to begin the plans to reinforce the
fort. This information reached the Confederate President Jefferson Davis and
after his demand for the surrender of the fort was refused, he ordered an
attack on the Fort.
Fort Sumter would be the site where the first shots of the Civil War would be
fired. The fort was taken by the Confederate States as the Union army sent to
provide reinforcements failed to reach the Fort in time.
After this attack, President Abraham Lincoln declared that the Confederate
States were in a state of rebellion and mobilized an army. Lincoln also called
for the support of Congress to approve the release of funds required to
support the war. Congress approved and supported Lincoln’s war proposals.
Lincoln also suspended Habeas Corpus-which basically is an action that can
be taken by an individual or body to remedy a legal problem by reporting an
illegal detention to a court and request that the court order the person who has
done the imprisonment to come to court to determine the legality of the
detention.
In 1862, the Battle of Antietam was fought on the 17th of September, 1862
between the armies of the Confederate General Robert E. Lee and the Union
General George B. McClellan. The battle took place at the Antietam Creek
and is regarded as one of the bloodiest in the entire history of the United
States as a total of 22,717 people were either dead, wounded or missing.
Victory at the battle would belong to the Union forces and buoyed by this
victory, Lincoln made known that he would be issuing an Emancipation
Proclamation.
By the powers of the Emancipation Proclamation, over three million slaves
had their legal status changed from slave to free in those states that were in
rebellion. The Proclamation showed that while Lincoln’s initial intention is
wading into the war was to preserve the Union, he now considered the issue
of slavery to be important.
In 1863, the Union forces were plagued by desertions and a number of
Republicans with radical leanings such as Lyman Trumbull and Benjamin
Wade began to increase public scrutiny on Lincoln as they felt that he had
mishandled the war.
As the war dragged on, Lincoln had to sign an Enrollment Act which
required that every male citizen and immigrant who had filed for citizenship
between twenty and forty-five.
The Enrollment Act would spark the New York City draft riots which
claimed the life of about one hundred and twenty people.
The Confederate Army claimed an important victory at the Battle of
Chancellorsville and in June, 1863; the Confederate Army went on the
Gettysburg campaign hoping that victory there would strike fear in the hearts
of the Union.
On the 1st of July at the Battle of Gettysburg which dragged on for three days,
the Union forces finally prevailed.
Later that year in November, Lincoln would deliver the Gettysburg address at
the dedication of the first national cemetery ever to honor those soldiers
whose blood had been spilled in the war.
In March 1864, Lincoln appointed Ulysses Grant to be General of the Union
forces and this appointment would provide a much needed spark for the
Union army.
As the year wore on with the war still on, Lincoln knew that he had to find a
way to end the war before the Presidential elections. His prospects of getting
back into office were, even without the war, grim as no President had won a
second term since Andrew Jackson.
Lincoln would eventually secure the Party nomination while Andrew Johnson
won the Vice Presidential nominee ticket ahead of the incumbent Vice
President, Hamlin.
More Union victories in the war improved Lincoln’s approval ratings and by
the time the elections came, he secured 55% of the popular vote and 212 out
of 233 electoral votes. The margin with which he won the popular vote was
the largest margin since Andrew Jackson’s re-election in 1832.
General Grant continued to push on in the battlefield, thinning General Lee’s
army. By April, the Confederate army led by General Lee had been massively
decimated and on the 9th of that month, General Lee surrendered to General
Grant at Appomattox thus bringing an end to the American Civil War.
On the 18th of December, 1865, the Secretary of State, William Seward
proclaimed the adoption of the Thirteenth amendment.
The Thirteenth Amendment said:
Section 1: Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as
punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted,
shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their
jurisdiction
Section 2: Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by
appropriate legislation
Lincoln, the Great Emancipator had won.
THE DEATH OF UNCLE ABE
Following his successful navigation of the country through the war, Lincoln
was supposed to lead the country along a new course, one of recovery and
prosperity but the man, John Wilkes Booth had other ideas.
John Wilkes Booth was born in Bel Air, Maryland on May 10, 1838 to the
prominent booth family, known for their presence in theatre mostly as
Shakespearean actors. He was the ninth of ten children and attended Bel Air
Academy and then the Milton boarding school for boys in Sparks, Maryland.

A perhaps very odd event took place when John Wilkes Booth was still in
school. He met a Gypsy fortune-teller who after reading his palm told him
that he would have an outstanding life but was fated to die young.
John Wilkes Booth was a well-known actor but he was also a Confederate
spy from Maryland. Even though he never joined the Confederate army, he
had contacts with the Confederate secret service.
He was an even more famous confederate supporter, passionate in his
denunciation of President Lincoln and greatly opposed to the abolition of
slavery in the United States.
In 1864, Booth devised a plan to kidnap Lincoln in exchange for the release
of Confederate prisoners.
After attending an April 11 1865 speech which saw Lincoln promote voting
rights for African-Americans, Booth immediately became infuriated and
proceeded to change his plans and became determined to assassinate the
President. His initial plan to abduct Lincoln was very similar to one of
Thomas N. Conrad previously authorized by the Confederacy.
Booth had also assigned Lewis Powell to kill the then Secretary of State
William H. Seward who had already been bedridden after suffering a broken
arm, a broken jaw and a concussion when he was thrown from his carriage.
Powell arrived at Seward’s house in Lafayette Park and told the butler that he
had some medicine from Seward’s doctor and proceeded to stab him in the
face with a bowie knife. However, Seward’s doctors had fit a neck brace
around him and the knife missed his jugular. Seward survived but with
serious injuries to his face.
George Atzerodt, who was tasked with killing Andrew Johnson, decided
against it when he lost the nerve and ended up drinking alcohol. He didn’t
make an effort to assassinate Andrew Johnson.
On Good Friday, April 14, 1865 as the American Civil War was drawing to a
close, Abraham Lincoln was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth. The
president was attending a play at Ford's Theatre. The assassination occurred
five days after Robert E. Lee and the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia
had surrendered.
After getting information that the President would be attending Ford's
Theatre, Booth hatched a plan with co-conspirators to assassinate Lincoln and
Gen and Mrs. Ulysses S. Grant at the theatre where they were seeing the play,
Our American Cousin.
Booth planned to assassinate the President and his two immediate successors
in order to decimate the union government. He had free access to the theatre
and its numerous rooms and at around 10 PM, he slipped to Lincoln’s box
and fired a .41 Philadelphia Deringer to the back of his head.
After this he jumped to the stage and yelled ’Sic Simper Tyrannis’ which is
Latin for ‘thus always to tyrants’ which is attributed to Brutus at Caesar’s
assassination.
An Army surgeon, Doctor Charles Leale, found the President unconscious,
barely breathing and with no visible pulse. He made an attempt to clear the
blood clot from the gunshot wound, after which the President started to
breathe naturally. He was taken across the street to Petersen House and he
remained in a coma for nine hours. The President Lincoln died at 7:22 am on
April 15. Eyewitnesses report that his face was fixed in a smile when he
passed on.
Lincoln's body was then enfolded in the American flag and was escorted to
the White House in the rain by bareheaded Union officers. The city's church
bells rang ominously, accompanying the procession and President Johnson
was sworn in at 10:00 AM, less than 3 hours after Lincoln's death.
The late President lay in state in the East Room in the White House, and then
in the Capitol Rotunda for three days from April 19 through April 21.
For three weeks the Lincoln Special funeral train decorated in black bunting
bore Lincoln's remains on a slow unhurried waypoint journey from
Washington D.C. to Springfield, Illinois, stopping at many cities across the
North for large-scale memorials attended by hundreds of thousands of people,
as well as many people who gathered in informal tributes with bonfires,
bonds and hymn singing or silent reverence with hat in hand as the railway
procession passed by unhurriedly.
Historians have highlighted the widespread shock and sorrow, while also
pointed out that some Lincoln haters cheered when they heard the news,
African-Americans were particularly moved; as they had lost 'their Moses'.
In a larger sense, the immense expression of grief and the shedding of tears
were not only for Lincoln but for the men who had lost their lives in the just
concluded war.
John Wilkes Booth arrived at the Mudd farm on April 15, the same day that
General Grant released the army to track down and find Booth and Herold.
The next four days saw the both of them waiting in hiding near Zekiah
Swamp.
They crossed the Potomac on April 22 to go to Queensberry’s house. They
were found on a farm in Virginia, about 70 miles (110 km) south of
Washington. Booth was killed by Sergeant Boston Corbett on April 26 after
refusing to surrender to Union troops while Herold turned himself in. They
had been on the run for about 12 days.
After a trial that lasted a long time, Mrs. Surratt (at whose home the
conspirators had held their meetings), Herold, Payne, George Atzerodt were
found guilty and executed.
The case of Mrs. Surratt caused a lot of controversy because she became the
first woman hanged by the federal government. It was however revealed that
the court had reduced her sentence to life imprisonment and that president
Andrew Johnson might not have been aware of this fact when he signed her
death sentence.
There are theories that John Wilkes Booth did not die in Garret’s barn and
that someone else was killed in his place. It was also said that government
officials who had a hand in Lincoln’s death has made booth escape in order
to cover up their own participation in the killing of the president.
John Wilkes Booth’s remains were buried without ceremony on the grounds
of the United States of America. He was later buried in Green Mount
cemetery in an unmarked grave in the Booth family plot on June 26th 1869.
Attempts were made by historians and Booth’s descendants over the years to
obtain permission to exhume his body for DNA testing but all requests so far
have been denied.
THE GREAT ORATOR- THE
GETTYSBURG ADDRESS

Abraham Lincoln, like many of us, had his flaws and made mistakes. He
even made errors in his judgement of things too. One error that stands out
among all the others remains these words: “…the world will little note, nor
long remember what we say here...”
Those words would prove to be among the most wrong that Lincoln would
utter throughout his lifetime as the Gettysburg address remains one of his
most famous speeches.
The speech was made at the Soldiers’ National Cemetery in Gettysburg,
Pennsylvania on the 19th of November, 1863 just after the Battle of
Gettysburg. The speech was only 271 words long and was said in honor of
the slain soldiers of the Battle of Gettysburg.
The speech goes thus:
“Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent,
a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all
men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any
nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a
great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that
field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that
nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate—we cannot consecrate—we
cannot hallow—this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled
here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract.
The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can
never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated
here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so
nobly advanced.
It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—
that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for
which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly
resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under
God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people,
by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

It is believed that in crafting this speech, Lincoln drew on Thucydides’

description of the Pericles’s Funeral Oration during the Peloponnesian War.
His quote on democracy may have been derived from the sermon of a certain
abolitionist minister, Theodore Parker who said that, “…democracy is direct
self-government over all the people, for all the people, by the people”
There are five known manuscripts of the address named for those who
received it from Lincoln. John Nicolay and John Hay, both Lincoln’s private
secretaries, received private copies. The other three copies were written for
charity and they include the Everett, Bancroft and Bliss copies.
The Bliss copy which was signed and dated by Lincoln is usually used as the
reference text of the Gettysburg address.
The address has endured for well over a hundred years and is carved into a
stone cella on the south wall of the Lincoln memorial.
The speech was referenced by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. when he delivered
his “I Have A Dream” speech.
The Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library Foundation has a book
compilation of 272 word replies by world leaders to celebrate Lincoln, the
Gettysburg address or any other related topic.
The speech will continue to be quoted centuries from now even; and when it
is, the world will be always reminded of the American Civil War and its
wartime President, Abraham Lincoln, who in the pursuit of liberty for all men
laid down his life.