The story of Lincoln, revealing how one American, by his own honest
efforts, rose from the most humble beginning to the most high station of
honor and worth, has inspired millions and will inspire millions more.
The log cabin in which he was born, the ax with which he split the
rails, the few books with which he got the rudiments of an education,
the light of pine knots by which he studied, the flatboat on which he
made the long trip to New Orleans, the slave mart at sight of which his
sympathetic soul revolted against the institution of human
slavery--these are all fraught with intense interest as the rude forces
by which he slowly builded his great character.
Great suffering taught him great sympathy. His great sympathy for men
gave him great influence over men. As a lonely motherless little boy
living in the pitiless poverty of the backwoods he learned both humility
and appreciation. Then from a gentle step-mother he learned the beauty of
kindness.
As a clerk in a small store that failed, as a defeated candidate for the
legislature, as Captain in the Black Hawk War, as student of Law in his
leisure moments, as partner in a small store that failed, as Postmaster
at the little village of New Salem, as Deputy Surveyor of Sangamon
County, as successful candidate for the legislature, as member of the
legislature and as country lawyer, he was learning to love his fellow
men and to get along well with them, while keeping his own conscience
and building a reputation for honesty. When as a member of Congress and
as a successful lawyer his proved ability brings him a measure of
security and comfort he is not elated. And when his fellow men,
reciprocating his great love for them, and manifesting their confidence
in his integrity, make him President of the Republic he still remains
the humble brother of the common people.
But fate did not decree that he should enjoy the honors he had so richly
deserved. The White House was not a resting place for him. In the hour
of his election the Nation for which he prayed was divided and the men
that he loved as brothers were rushing headlong toward fratricidal war.
He who loved peace was to see no more peace except just a few hopeful
days before his own tragic end. He who hated war must captain his dear
people through their long and mighty struggle and share in his gentle
heart their great sacrifices. As the kindly harmonizer of jealous
rivals, as the unifier of a distracted people, as the sagacious leader
of discordant factions, he proved his true greatness in the hours of
the nation's peril. In many a grave crisis when it seemed that the
Confederacy would win and the Union be lost the almost superhuman wisdom
of Lincoln would see the one right way through the storm. For good
reasons, the followers of Lincoln came to believe that he was being
guided by God Himself to save the Union.
The genealogists of Lincoln trace his ancestry back to Virginia and to
Massachusetts and to those Lincolns who came from England about 1635.
The name Abraham recurs frequently among the Lincolns and our President
seems to have been named after his grandfather Abraham who was killed by
the Indians in Kentucky in 1778, when Thomas, the father of the
President, was only ten years of age. Thus left fatherless at a tender
age in a rude pioneer community, Thomas did not even learn to read. He
worked about as best he could to live, became a carpenter, and in 1806
married his cousin, Nancy Hanks, the daughter of Joseph Hanks and his
wife, Nannie Shipley, a sister of Thomas Lincoln's mother, Mary.
The first child of Thomas Lincoln and his wife Nancy was a daughter. Our
President, the second child, was born February 12, 1809, in a log cabin,
three miles from Hodgensville, then Hardin, now LaRue County, Kentucky.
When little Abraham was seven years old his father moved to Indiana and
took up a claim near Gentryville, Spencer County, and built a rude
shelter of unhewn logs without a floor, the large opening protected only
by hanging skins. In this discomfort they lived for a year, when they
erected a log cabin. There was plenty of game, but otherwise the fare
was very poor and the life was hard. In 1818 little Abraham's mother,
delicate, refined, pathetic and too frail for such rude life, sickened
and felt that the end was near. She called her little children to her
bed of leaves and skins and told them to "love their kindred and worship
God," and then she died and left them only the memory of her love.
Thomas Lincoln made a rude coffin himself, but there were no ceremonies
at that most pathetic funeral when he laid his young wife in her
desolate grave in the forest. Little Lincoln was nine years old, and the
mystery of death, the pitiless winter, the lone grave, the deep
forest--shivering with his sister in the cold cabin--it all made a deep
impression on the sensitive boy.
Late in the year 1819 Thomas Lincoln went back to Kentucky, and there
courted and married a widow named Sarah Buck Johnston, who had once been
his sweetheart. She brought with her some household goods and her own
three children. She dressed the forlorn little Lincolns in some of the
clothing belonging to her children. She was described as tall, straight
as an Indian, handsome, fair, talkative and proud. Also she had the
abundant strength for hard labor. She and little Abraham learned to love
each other dearly.
Abraham went to school in all less than a year, but this good step-mother
encouraged him to study at home and he read every book he heard of
within a circuit of many miles. He read the Bible, Aesop's Fables,
Murray's English Reader, Robinson Crusoe, The Pilgrim's Progress, A
History of the United States, Weem's Life of Washington and the Revised
Statutes of Indiana. He studied by the fire-light and practiced writing
with a pen made from a buzzard's quill dipped in ink made from brier
roots. He practiced writing on the subjects of Temperance, Government,
and Cruelty to Animals. The unkindness so often common to those frontier
folks shocked his sensitive soul. He practiced speaking by imitating the
itinerant preacher and by telling stories to any who would give him an
audience. He walked fifteen miles to Boonville to attend court and
listen to the lawyers.
At nineteen he was six feet and two inches tall, weighed one hundred and
fifty pounds, had long arms and legs, slender body, large and awkward
hands and feet, but not a large head. He is pictured as wearing
coon-skin cap, linsey-woolsey shirt, and buckskin breeches that were
often too short. He said that his father taught him to work but never
taught him to love it--but he did work hard and without complaining. He
was said to do much more work than any ordinary man at splitting rails,
chopping, mowing, ploughing, doing everything that he was asked to do
with all his might. It was at this age that he went on the first trip
with a flat boat down to New Orleans. This was an interesting adventure;
and there had been sorrows, also; his sister Sarah had married and died
in child-birth.
In the spring of 1830 the roving spirit of Thomas Lincoln felt the call
of the West and they set out for Illinois. John Hanks met them five
miles northwest of Decatur in Macon County, where on a bluff
overlooking the muddy Sangamon they built a cabin, split rails, fenced
fifteen acres and broke the prairie. Young Lincoln was twenty-one and
free, but he remained at home during the summer, helping his father and
his devoted step-mother to establish their new home. The following
winter he split the historic rails for Mrs. Nancy Miller--"four hundred
for every yard of jeans dyed with walnut juice necessary to make him a
pair of trowsers."
In the spring, a pioneer adventurer, Denton Offut, engaged Abraham, with
Hanks and one other helper, to take a boat load of provisions to New
Orleans, for the wages of fifty cents a day and a bonus of sixty dollars
for the three. This and the preceding trip down the river gave Lincoln
the sight of slavery which caused him to say, "If ever I get a chance
to hit that thing I'll hit it hard."
New Salem was a very small village destined to be of only a few years
duration. Here Offut erected a small general store and placed Lincoln in
charge while Offut having other unimportant business ventures went about
the community bragging that his clerk, Lincoln, was the best man in the
country and would some day be president of the United States. Offut's
boasting attracted the attention of the Clary's Grove boys, who lived
near New Salem, and they determined upon a wrestling match between
Lincoln and their champion bully, Jack Armstrong. Lincoln did his best
to avoid it, and a prominent citizen stopped the encounter. The result
was that Armstrong and his gang became Lincoln's friends and later gave
him the most hearty political support at times when the support of just
such men as Armstrong was an important political asset.
During this time Lincoln continued his studies, and feeling the need to
study English Grammar he ransacked the neighborhood until he found trace
of one some six miles away and walked over to buy or borrow it; brought
it back in triumph and studied it exhaustively.
About this time we have some narratives concerning his honesty that
compare favorably with the story of Washington and the cherry tree.
While he was keeping Offut's store a woman overpaid him four pence and
when he found the mistake he walked several miles that evening to return
the pennies before he slept. On another occasion in selling a half pound
of tea he discovered that he had used too small a weight and he hastened
forth to make good the deficiency. Indeed one of his chief traits all
his life was absolute honesty.
He was chosen to pilot the first steamboat, the Talisman, up the
Sangamon. At Springfield they held a banquet to celebrate the event but
Lincoln was not invited because they only invited the "gentlemen" and
Lincoln was only the pilot.
He spent all his spare time studying Law or History, and had been from
his youth an admirer of the romantic figure of Henry Clay. He adopted
most of Clay's principles as his own, especially that of the gradual,
compensated emancipation of slaves, to which ideal he clung all his
life. With such interests, it was natural that when Offut failed and
his job as store clerk ended, he should announce himself as a candidate
for the legislature. His campaign was interrupted by the Black Hawk War.
Lincoln volunteered. The Clary's Grove boys enlisted and elected him
captain. He showed his kindness and courage when during the campaign he
found his whole command, mutinous and threatening; and facing them he
placed his own body between them and a poor friendly Indian, who, with
safe conduct from General Cass, had taken refuge in camp. He saw no
fighting and killed no Indians but was long afterward able to convulse
Congress with a humorous account of his "war record." The war ended in
time for him to get back and stump the county just before the election
in which he was defeated.
In partnership with a man named Berry they bought out the little store
in New Salem; but Berry drank and neglected the business. Lincoln was
strictly temperate, but he spent all his spare moments studying
Blackstone, a copy of which legal classic he had fortunately found in a
barrel of rubbish he had obligingly bought from a poor fellow in
trouble.
With both members of the firm thus preoccupied the business "winked
out." Berry died, leaving Lincoln the debts of the firm, twelve hundred
dollars,--to him an appalling sum, which he humorously called "the
national debt"; and on which he continued to make payments when he could
for the next fifteen years. For a time he was postmaster of New Salem,
an office so small that Andrew Jackson must have overlooked it. But the
experience shows how scrupulous he always was; for when years afterward
a government agent came to Springfield to make settlement Lincoln drew
forth the very coins that he had collected in the postoffice, and though
he had sorely needed the loan of them he had never even borrowed them
for temporary use.
For a time he had a better position as Deputy Surveyor of Sangamon
County. His work was accurate and he was doing well when in 1834 he
again announced as a candidate for the legislature and was elected.
At Vandalia at the session of the legislature he first saw Stephen A.
Douglas, then a lobbyist, and said of him, "He is the least man I ever
saw." Lincoln at this session seemed to be learning, studying men and
methods and prudently preparing for future success rather than
endeavoring to seize opportunities prematurely.
This is the time when Lincoln fell in love with Ann Rutledge, a
beautiful young woman of New Salem who was already betrothed to another.
The other lover went East and did not return. Lincoln had hopes, but Ann
took sick and died of brain fever. He was allowed to see her as she lay
near the end, and the effect upon his kindly nature was terrible. There
settled upon him a deep despondency. That fall and winter he wandered
alone in the woods along the Sangamon, almost distracted with sorrow.
When he seemed on the verge of insanity a friend, Bowling Green, took
him to his own home and nursed him back to health, and the grief
settled into that temperamental melancholy, which, relieved only by his
humor, was part of the deep mystic there was in him, part of the
prophet, the sadness that so early baptised him in the tragedy of life,
and taught him to pity a suffering world.
Again he ran for the legislature, announcing his policy: "for all
sharing the privileges of the government who assist in bearing its
burdens; for admitting all whites to the right of suffrage who pay taxes
or bear arms (by no means excluding females). If elected, I shall
consider the whole people of Sangamon as my constituents, as well those
that oppose as those that support me. While acting as their
representative I shall be governed by their will upon all subjects upon
which I have the means of knowing what their will is; and upon all
others I shall do what my own judgment teaches me will best advance
their interests." He was always fundamentally democratic, was so close
to the heart of humanity that he felt its mighty pulsations and knew
intuitively what his people were thinking. His contemporaries thought
that he had a dependable occult sense of public opinion.
One incident of this campaign shows Lincoln's versatility at repartee.
George Forquer, who had been a Whig, changed over to be a Democrat and
was appointed Register of the Land Office. His house, the finest in
Springfield, had a lightning rod, the only one that Springfield had ever
seen. At a meeting near Springfield, Lincoln spoke, and when he had
finished, Forquer replied with some condescension, calling Lincoln the
"young man." Lincoln listened to the attack with folded arms and then
made a spirited reply ending with the words: "The gentleman calls me a
young man. I am older in years than I am in the tricks and trades of
politicians. I desire to live and I desire place and distinction, but I
would rather die now than, like the gentleman, live to see the day that
I would change my politics for an office worth three thousand dollars
per year, and then feel compelled to erect a lightning rod to protect a
guilty conscience from an offended God."
The Whig ticket was elected, Lincoln leading, and the Sangamon
delegation, seven representatives and two senators all over six feet
tall were called the "Long Nine." At Vandalia Lincoln was the leader of
the Long Nine and labored to advance legislation for public improvements
to be financed by the sale of public lands. He confided to a friend that
he was dreaming of the Governorship and was ambitious to become the
"DeWitt Clinton of Illinois."
The Assembly voted for a colossal scheme of railroads and canals, and
authorized a loan of twelve millions. These vast projects afforded
unlimited opportunities for special legislation and in all this
atmosphere of manoeuvre Lincoln was most skillful. He knew human nature
and how to handle it. Log-rolling was the order of the day and so
skillfully did the Long Nine function that they succeeded in removing
the capital from Vandalia to Springfield. Though Lincoln did prove that
he knew "the tricks and trades of the politician" he was true to his
convictions; as shown by the fact that, when the legislature passed
resolutions "highly disapproving" of the formation of abolition
societies and the doctrines promulgated by them, he voted against the
resolutions; and furthermore he drew up a protest against the
resolutions, and inducing his colleague, Dan Stone, to sign it with him,
had his protest entered on the journal for March 3, 1837. While this
protest was cautiously worded it did declare "the institution of slavery
is founded upon injustice and bad policy." This was a real gratuitous
expression of a worthy ideal contrary to self interest, for his
constituents were at that time certainly not in any way opposed to
slavery. It was only within a few months after this very time that the
atrocious persecution and murder of Lovejoy occurred in the neighboring
town of Alton.
When the Long Nine came home bringing the capital with them Springfield
planned such a celebration as had not been seen since the day the
Talisman came up the Sangamon. To this banquet Lincoln was not only
invited but placed at the head of the board; having been only the pilot
of the enterprise this time did not exclude him. He made a speech and
made many friends in Springfield. The time was now opportune for him to
move to Springfield. So in the year 1837, Abraham Lincoln, being
twenty-eight years of age and a lawyer, packed his meager possessions in
a pair of saddle-bags and moved to the new Capital, then a town of less
than two thousand inhabitants, here to begin a new era in his life.
Besides being very poor he still carried the burden of the "national
debt" left to him from the failure of the partnership with Berry, but he
had friends and a reputation for honesty. In time he pays the debt, and
his friends increase in numbers.
The morning that Lincoln went into the store of Joshua Speed in
Springfield, and indicated that he was looking for a place to stay,
Speed said: "The young man had the saddest face I ever saw." Speed
indicated that Lincoln could share Speed's own bed in a room above;
Lincoln shambled up, dropped his saddle bags, shambled down again and
said: "Well, Speed, I am moved." With John T. Stewart, his comrade in
the Black Hawk campaign, he formed a law partnership. Lincoln and
Stewart were both too much interested in politics to give their
undivided devotion to the law. During their four years together they
made a living, and had work enough to keep them busy but it was not of
the kind that proved either very interesting or lucrative.
He spent much time making public speeches on a variety of occasions and
subjects, obviously practicing the art of eloquent address for his own
improvement. In 1838 he was again elected to the legislature and was
minority candidate for Speaker.
Now Mrs. N. W. Edwards was one of the local aristocrats of Springfield,
and her sister, Mary Todd from Kentucky, came to visit her. Mary Todd
was beautiful and Lincoln and Douglas were rivals for her hand.
Observers at the time thought that with a brilliant and talented girl
the graceful and dashing Douglas would surely be preferred. But Miss
Todd made her own selection and she and Lincoln were engaged to be
married on New Year's day, 1841.
The day came and the wedding was not solemnized. Now there came upon him
again that black and awful melancholy. He wandered about in utter gloom.
To help him, his good friend Joshua Speed took him away to Kentucky for
a trip. Upon his return a reconciliation with Mary Todd led to their
marriage, November, 1842. To Lincoln's kindly manner, his
considerateness and his self-control, she was the opposite. The rule
"opposites attract" may explain the union, and if the marriage was not
ideally happy it may be conjectured that one more happy might have
interfered with that career for which Destiny was preparing him.
In 1841, Stewart went to Congress and Lincoln dissolved the partnership
to form another with Judge Stephen T. Logan who was accounted the best
lawyer in Illinois. Contact with Logan made Lincoln a more diligent
student and an abler practitioner of the law. But two such positive
personalities could not long work in harmony, so in 1843 Lincoln formed
a partnership with William H. Herndon, a man of abolitionist
inclinations who remained Lincoln's junior partner until Lincoln's death
and became his biographer. But they were very poor. The struggle was
hard, and Lincoln and his bride were of necessity very frugal. In 1841
he might have had the nomination for Governor, but he declined it;
having given up his ambition to become the "DeWitt Clinton of Illinois."
It will be remembered that the internal improvement theories had not
worked so well in practice. The panic of 1837 had convinced both him and
his supporters of the unwisdom of attempting such improvements on too
large a scale at one time. Though he had been mistaken he seems not to
have lost the support of his followers, for they were mistaken with him;
and the experience shows that "it is more popular for a politician to be
with his constituents in the wrong than to be in the right against
them."
Though he declined the nomination for Governor, his ambitious wife
encouraged his natural inclination to keep his eye on the political
field, and to glance in the direction of Congress. His ambitions were
temporarily thwarted. On Washington's birthday in 1842, during the
Washington Temperance movement he made a speech on temperance. While the
whole address was admirable and conceived in a high humanitarian tone
it did not please all. He was full of a wise and gentle tolerance that
sprang alike from his knowledge and his love of men.