On the way to the sculptor’s studio a conversation occurred of much
significance, in view of the terrible tragedy so soon to paralyze every
loyal heart in the nation. A late number of the New York “Tribune”
had contained an account from a correspondent within the Rebel
lines, of an elaborate conspiracy, matured in Richmond, to abduct,
or assassinate--if the first was not found practicable--the person
of the President. A secret organization, composed, it was stated,
of five hundred or a thousand men, had solemnly sworn to accomplish
the deed. Mr. Lincoln had not seen or heard of this account, and at
his request, I gave him the details. Upon the conclusion, he smiled
incredulously, and said: “Well, even if true, I do not see what the
Rebels would gain by killing or getting possession of me. I am but
a single individual, and it would not help their cause or make the
least difference in the progress of the war. Everything would go right
on just the same. Soon after I was nominated at Chicago, I began to
receive letters threatening my life. The first one or two made me
a little uncomfortable, but I came at length to look for a regular
instalment of this kind of correspondence in every week’s mail, and up
to inauguration day I was in constant receipt of such letters. It is no
uncommon thing to receive them now; but they have ceased to give me any
apprehension.” I expressed some surprise at this, but he replied in
his peculiar way, “Oh, there is nothing like getting _used_ to things!”
In connection with this, Mr. Noah Brooks,--who was to have been Mr.
Nicolay’s successor as private secretary to the President,--and
Colonel Charles G. Halpine, of New York, have referred to personal
conversations of exceeding interest, which I transcribe.
In an article contributed to “Harper’s Magazine,” soon after the
assassination, Mr. Brooks says:--
“The simple habits of Mr. Lincoln were so well known that it is a
subject for surprise that watchful and malignant treason did not sooner
take that precious life which he seemed to hold so lightly. He had
an almost morbid dislike for an escort, or guide, and daily exposed
himself to the deadly aim of an assassin. One summer morning, passing
by the White House at an early hour, I saw the President standing at
the gateway, looking anxiously down the street; and, in reply to a
salutation, he said, ‘Good morning, good morning! I am looking for a
newsboy; when you get to that corner, I wish you would start one up
this way.’ In reply to the remonstrances of friends, who were afraid
of his constant exposure to danger, he had but one answer: ‘If they
kill me, the next man will be just as bad for them; and in a country
like this, where our habits are simple, and must be, assassination is
always possible, and will come, if they are determined upon it.’”
A cavalry guard was once placed at the gates of the White House for a
while, and he said, privately, that “he worried until he got rid of
it.” While the President’s family were at their summer-house, near
Washington, he rode into town of a morning, or out at night, attended
by a mounted escort; but if he returned to town for a while after dark,
he rode in unguarded, and often alone, in his open carriage. On more
than one occasion the writer has gone through the streets of Washington
at a late hour of the night with the President, without escort, or even
the company of a servant, walking all of the way, going and returning.
Considering the many open and secret threats to take his life, it is
not surprising that Mr. Lincoln had many thoughts about his coming to
a sudden and violent end. He once said that he felt the force of the
expression, “To take one’s life in his hand;” but that he would not
like to face death suddenly. He said that he thought himself a great
coward physically, and was sure that he would make a poor soldier, for,
unless there was something inspiriting in the excitement of a battle,
he was sure that he would drop his gun and run, at the first symptom
of danger. That was said sportively, and he added, “Moral cowardice is
something which I think I never had.”
Colonel Halpine, while serving as a member of General Halleck’s staff,
had frequently to wait upon the President, both during official hours
and at other times. On one of these occasions, Mr. Lincoln concluded
some interesting remarks with these words: “It would never do for
a President to have guards with drawn sabres at his door, as if he
fancied he were, or were trying to be, or were assuming to be, an
emperor.”
“This expression,” writes Colonel Halpine, “called my attention afresh
to what I had remarked to myself almost every time I entered the White
House, and to which I had very frequently called the attention both of
Major Hay and General Halleck--the utterly unprotected condition of the
President’s person, and the fact that any assassin or maniac, seeking
his life, could enter his presence without the interference of a single
armed man to hold him back. The entrance-doors, and all doors on the
official side of the building, were open at all hours of the day, and
very late into the evening; and I have many times entered the mansion,
and walked up to the rooms of the two private secretaries, as late
as nine or ten o’clock at night, without seeing or being challenged
by a single soul. There were, indeed, two attendants,--one for the
outer door, and the other for the door of the official chambers; but
these--thinking, I suppose, that none would call after office hours
save persons who were personally acquainted, or had the right of
official entry--were, not unfrequently, somewhat remiss in their
duties.
“To this fact I now ventured to call the President’s attention,
saying that to me--perhaps from my European education--it appeared a
deliberate courting of danger, even if the country were in a state of
the profoundest peace, for the person at the head of the nation to
remain so unprotected.
“‘There are two dangers,’ I wound up by saying; ‘the danger of
deliberate political assassination, and the mere brute violence of
insanity.’
“Mr. Lincoln heard me through with a smile, his hands locked across his
knees, his body rocking back and forth,--the common indication that he
was amused.
“‘Now, as to political assassination,’ he said, ‘do you think the
Richmond people would like to have Hannibal Hamlin here any better
than myself? In that one alternative, I have an insurance on my
life worth half the prairie land of Illinois. And beside,’--this
more gravely,--‘if there were such a plot, and they wanted to get
at me, no vigilance could keep them out. We are so mixed up in our
affairs, that--no matter what the system established--a conspiracy to
assassinate, if such there were, could easily obtain a pass to see me
for any one or more of its instruments.
“‘To betray fear of this, by placing guards or so forth, would only be
to put the idea into their heads, and perhaps lead to the very result
it was intended to prevent. As to the crazy folks, Major, why I must
only take my chances,--the worst crazy people at present, I fear, being
some of my own too zealous adherents. That there may be such dangers
as you and many others have suggested to me, is quite possible; but I
guess it wouldn’t improve things any to publish that we were afraid of
them in advance.’
“Upon another occasion I remember his coming over one evening after
dinner, to General Halleck’s private quarters, to protest--half
jocularly, half in earnest--against a small detachment of cavalry which
had been detailed without his request, and partly against his will, by
the lamented General Wadsworth, as a guard for his carriage in going
to and returning from the Soldiers’ Home. The burden of his complaint
was that he and Mrs. Lincoln ‘couldn’t hear themselves talk,’ for the
clatter of their sabres and spurs; and that, as many of them appeared
new hands and very awkward, he was more afraid of being shot by the
accidental discharge of one of their carbines or revolvers, than of any
attempt upon his life or for his capture by the roving squads of Jeb
Stuart’s cavalry, then hovering all round the exterior works of the
city.”