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ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 

[From his first photograph, taken in Chicago in 1857. The original in possession of Mrs. Harriet Chapman, 

Charleston, 111.] 




ABEAHAM LINCOLN 



BY 

CHARLES CAKLETON COFFIN 

AUTHOR OF 

'THE BOYS OF '76" "DRUM-BEAT OF THE NATION" "MARCHING TO VICTORY" 
"REDEEMING THE REPUBLIC" "FREEDOM TRIUMPHANT" ETC. 



Iilu0traicd 




NEW YORK 

HARPER & BROTHERS, FRANKLIN SQUARE 

1893 



Copyright, 1892, by HARPER & BROTHERS. 
All rights reserved. 



4 

. 






BeMcateD 

TO 

MY SISTER AND BROTHERS 
APPHIA C. LITTLE, FREDERICK W. COFFIN 

AND 

ENOCH COFFIN 

AND TO THE MEMORY OF 

MARY K. CARLETON AND ELVIRA AMES 

SISTERS WHO HAVE PASSED TO 

THE LARGER LIFE 



INTRODUCTION. 



A LITTLE more than a quarter of a century has passed since the 
death of Abraham Lincoln. Much has been written concerning 
him, and doubtless much more will be written. My acquaintance with 
him. began in his Springfield home the night following his nomination 
as candidate for the Presidency. It was such an acquaintance as a cor- 
respondent of a leading journal was privileged to have with public men. 
I saw him frequently during his Presidential term met him socially on 
several occasions, and walked with him through the streets of burning 
Richmond. In preparing this work I have visited the scenes of his 
early years the spot where he was born, the sites of his Kentucky and 
Indiana homes, also that at JS"ew Salem, 111. From playmates of his 
childhood, and from those who knew him in later years, I have obtained 
information which may be accepted as authentic. I am especially in- 
debted to Joseph Gentry, of Gentryville, Ind. ; William G. Green, of 
Tolula, and Mrs. Hill, of Petersburg, 111., for information relating to 
Mr. Lincoln's early years ; and to Mrs. Harriet Chapman, of Charleston, 
111., for a copy of the first photograph ever taken of him. 

This volume is to be regarded as a sketch of the life and times of 
Abraham Lincoln rather than as a biography. His intellectual and 
moral qualities will be seen far better in the historic narration than by 
any analysis that might be given. 

The Muse of History has recognized him as the liberator of a race, 
redeemer of a republic, and one of the great benefactors of all time. 
It is to be hoped that eulogy never will place him upon a pedestal or 
smooth out -the lines that make up the true portrait of this man of the 
people, appointed by divine Providence to render inestimable service 
to his fellow-men. 

CHARLES CARLETON COFFIN. 

BOSTON, July, 1892. 



CONTENTS. 



ANCESTRY 



CHAPTER I. 

,..-... 1 



CHAPTER II. 
EARLY YEARS .................................................................. 18 

CHAPTER III. 
LIFE IN INDIANA ............................................................... 30 

CHAPTER IV. 
A CITIZEN OF ILLINOIS ......................................................... 46 



CHAPTER V. 
LIFE AT NEW SALEM 



CHAPTER VI. 
IN PUBLIC LIFE 



CHAPTER VII. 
RIDING THE CIRCUIT 



CHAPTER VIII. 
SEVEN YEARS OF ACTIVE LIFE 



CHAPTER IX. 

BEGINNING OF THE CONFLICT BETWEEN FREEDOM AND SLAVERY ................. 134 

CHAPTER X. 

KANSAS-NEBRASKA STRUGGLE ................................................... 151 

CHAPTER XI. 
NOMINATED FOR THE PRESIDENCY ............................................... 182 



CHAPTER XII. 
THE ELECTION, 1860 ........................................................... 204 



X . CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER XIII. "OK 

OUTBREAK OF THE REBELLION 233 

CHAPTER XIV. 
FIRST MONTHS OF THE WAR 256 

CHAPTER XV. 
AUTUMN OF 1861 274 

CHAPTER XVI. 
WINTER OF 1862 290 

CHAPTER XVII. 
PRELIMINARY TO EMANCIPATION 312 

CHAPTER XVIII. 
EMANCIPATION , 333 

CHAPTER XIX. 
DARKNESS BEFORE THE DAWN 354 

CHAPTER XX. 
GETTYSBURG 378 

CHAPTER XXI. 

SPRING OF 1864 392 

r 

CHAPTER XXII. 
SUMMER OF 1864 411 

CHAPTER XXIII. 
PEACE DEMOCRACY 437 

CHAPTER XXIV. 
RE ELECTED PRESIDENT 455 

CHAPTER XXV. 

THE END OF SLAVERY 472 

CHAPTER XXVI. 

SECOND PRESIDENTIAL TERM 487 

CHAPTER XXVII. 
IN RICHMOND 496 

CHAPTER XXVIII. 
THE CLOSING SCENE 511 

CHAPTER XXIX. 

APOTHEOSIS. . . 527 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 



Abraham Lincoln. (From his first photo- 
graph, taken in Chicago in 1857 '). Frontispiece. 

Norwich Cathedral 2 

Public Square, Norwich 3 

The Meadows of Norfolk 5 

Hiugham Meeting-house 6 

Freehold Meeting-house 7 

Daniel Boone 9 

Captured by the Indians 10 

The Site of Bryant's Fort 11 

Defending the Fort 13 

The Spot once occupied by the Cabin in 

which Abraham Lincoln was Born. (From 

a photograph taken by the author, 1890) 18 

A Dutch-oven. (From a photograph taken 

by the author, Nolin's Creek, Ky. , October, 

1891) 19 

The Listening Boy Hears the Wonderful 

Story 21 

Little Mound Meeting-house, Hodgensville, 
Ky. (From a photograph taken by the au- 
thor, October, 1891) 24 

Site of Thomas Lincoln's Home on Knob 
Creek. (From a photograph taken by the 

author, October, 1891) 25 

Points of Interest in the Early Life of Abra- 
ham Lincoln 26 

Junction of Salt River with the Ohio, where 
Thomas Lincoln's Boat was Capsized. 
(From a photograph taken by the author, 

1890) 27 

Grave of Nancy Hanks Lincoln, Pigeon 
Creek, Ind. (From a photograph taken 

by the author, October, 1890) 28 

Site of Thomas Lincoln's Indiana Home. . .31 



Learning Arithmetic Under Difficulties 33 

Sarah Bush Lincoln. (From a photograph 
in possession of Mrs. Harriet Chapman, 

Charleston, 111.) 36 

Site of Jones's Store at Gentryville, Ind. 
(From a photograph taken by the author, 

1890) 37 

Dennis Hanks. (From a photograph taken 

in 1889) 38 

Two Shining Half-dollars 39 

Planter's Home 41 

Homes of the Slaves 42 

Flat-boats 43 

Making a Camp for the Night 47 

" I cannot bear to see even a puppy in dis- 
tress" 51 

Places in Illinois Frequented by Abraham 

Lincoln 54 

Sangamon River near New Salem. (From 

a photograph taken by the author in. 1890) 55 
" He stood in the auction-room where they 

were sold" 57 

A Creole Home in New Orleans 61 

The Lincoln Home, Farmington, 111. (From 

a photograph taken in 1890) 65 

Rutledge's Mill. (From a photograph by C. S. 

McCullough, Petersburg, 111.) *. 74 

Oak-trees Standing near the Site of Berry & 
Lincoln's Store. (From a photograph by 

C. S. McCullough, Petersburg, 111.) 77 

William G. Green, October, 1890 78 

George D. Prentice 79 

Grave of Ann Rutledge. (From a photograph 

by C. S. McCullough, Petersburg, 111.) 86 

William Lloyd Garrison 92 



"To front a lie in arras and not to yield 
This shows, methinks, God's plan 
And measure of a stalwart man." 

JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 



"There are no mistakes in the universe of God." CHARLES SUMNER. 



"That God rules in the affairs of men is as certain as any truth of physical 
science." GEORGE BANCROFT. 



"The great master-spirits of the world are not so much distinguished, after all, by 
the acts they do as by the sense itself of some mysterious girding of the Almighty 
upon them, whose behests they are set to fulfil." HORACE BUSHNELL. 



" I claim not to have controlled events, but confess plainly that events have con- 
trolled me." 

"No human council has devised, nor hath any mortal hand worked out, these great 
things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God." ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 



LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 



CHAPTER I. 

AXCESTRY. 

FAR back in the centuries the river Witham, which win-ds through 
the lowlands of eastern England, was known as the Lindis. The 
town which the Romans built on the bank of the stream received the 
name of Lindum. When the Normans made themselves masters of 
England they built a castle on the top of the hill that overlooks the 
town and changed the name to Lincoln. (') In the course of years it 
became the name of a family. Possibly there were several families 
bearing the name in Norfolk and Lincoln counties. We know 

1620. 

that one such family had its home in Hingham, and that Samuel 
Lincoln was an infant on that day when the Pilgrims, in December, 
1620, established a government of the people in America. We also 
know that there was an older brother, Thomas ; but it is not certain 
that we shall ever learn much about their parents. It seems probable 
that they were obliged to work hard to obtain a living for themselves 
and their children. We may conclude that their home was a cottage 
thatched with straw. We may think of the brothers as playing in the 
streets, or going into the green fields and gathering daisies, listening to 
the larks and nightingales. They could look across the meadows and 
see the tall spire of Norwich Cathedral, and in the hush and stillness 
hear the great bell sending forth its music. 

Quite likely they heard their parents say that King James had died, 
and that his son, Charles L, was King. Then the talk was about 
troublesome times. The King maintained that he was ordained 
by God to rule the nation, and that it was the duty of the peo- 
ple to obey. The bishop preached that the King could do no wrong. 




NORWICH CATHEDRAL. 



Charles wanted money, and levied taxes without consulting Parliament. 
The Puritans who would not pay, together with those who would not 
accept the ritual prepared by the bishop, were arrested so many that 
the jail and the Guildhall in Norwich were filled. When the officers 
undertook to collect the tax in Lincoln the people pelted them with 



ANCESTRY. 3 

stones. The Puritans all over England were resisting the demands of the 
King. Possibly it was the desire of Charles to get rid of them, that led 
him to grant a charter for a government of their own in America. The 
persecution of the bishop and the arbitrary acts of the King made life so 
bitter that thousands of Puritans were ready to quit England forever. 

Many of the people of Norfolk and Lincoln counties had sailed for 
Massachusetts ; others were ready to join them. The ships Rose and 

H the John and Dorothy were at Yarmouth, preparing to sail. 
Francis Lawes resolved to become an emigrant ; and it seems 
probable that Samuel Lincoln was ready to join his brother, who had 
settled in Hingham, near Boston. ( 2 ) We see them travelling across 
the meadows and lowlands, with others, to Yarmouth town. Together 
the ships sail across the Atlantic, to drop their anchors in Salem Harbor. 

It is probable that Samuel Lincoln, for lack of wool, did not do 




PUBLIC SQUARE, NORWICH. 

[The Guildhall in which the Puritans wore imprisoned is seen in the centre of the picture.] 



4 LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. ' 

much weaving in the town of Ipswich, where his master settled. The 
only sheep in Massachusetts were a few which were pastured on the 
islands in Boston harbor, where the wolves could not get at them. 

When the apprentice became of age he joined his brother Thomas 
in Hingham. He had learned a trade ; it is not certain that he fol- 
lowed it, but probably he became a farmer. A maiden named 
Martha became his wife; her parental name is not known. Their 
children were Samuel, Daniel, Mordecai, Mary, Martha, Sarah, and Re- 
becca. ( 3 ) 

Startling news came that the Indians were murdering the settlers 

of Swanzey. It was the beginning of the war with the Pequots, under 

their chief, Philip. Samuel, the oldest son, seized his father's gun 

and powder-horn and became a soldier. A year passed, in which 

more than six hundred of the settlers were killed ; but the chief was 

dead, and his head was hanging on a gibbet in Plymouth. The 

captured Indians were sold as slaves to the Spaniards. 

Mordecai Lincoln, the while, was blowing the bellows and making 

the anvil ring in a blacksmith's shop. When he became of age he set 

up his own forge in Hull. Perhaps Sarah Jones may have influenced 

him in settling there, for she soon became his wife.( 4 ) 

The year 1686 was a memorable one to the blacksmith, for a son 
w r as born to him Mordecai, junior. Just before his birth the frigate 
Rose sailed into Boston harbor, bringing 1 Sir Edmund Andros, 
who had been appointed Governor of Massachusetts, Plymouth, 
Rhode Island, and Connecticut. He had brought over two companies 
of troops to aid him in upsetting the government of the people. It 
seems that Mordecai Lincoln could look from his shop door and see 
the frigate running out its guns and firing a salute, and the cannon of 
the castle replying. James II. had determined to overthrow the Puri- 
tan commonwealth. The people were no longer to assemble in town 
meeting or make their own laws. We may be sure that the farmers 
who came to have their horses shod or their ploughshares sharpened, 
or fishermen who wanted work done, expressed their minds freely upon 
public affairs, and that the blacksmith had something to say while 
making the anvil ring by his sturdy blows. Three years passed, and 
Sir Edmund Andros saw the streets of Boston suddenly sw r arming with 
armed men, w r ho came from Cambridge, Roxbury, Hingham, Hull. 
and other towns, put an end to his government, and re-established 
their own. 

Blacksmith Lincoln thought the time had come when the people of 



ANCESTRY. 5 

Massachusetts should no longer be dependent on England for iron. 

There was an abundant supply of ore in the bogs and meadows of Scitu- 

ate and Hingham. Through his efforts a furnace was constructed, 

1 *7AJ. 

' and the ore dug from a bog and smelted. It was the beginning 
of an industry which lasted many years. His enterprise went further. 
He built a mill on Bound Brook, where the water tumbled over the 
rocks on its way to the sea. The brook at the falls was the boundary 




THE MEADOWS OF NORFOLK. 



between the colonies of Plymouth and Massachusetts. It was of great 
service for a large section of the country in both colonies. ( 5 ) 

Mordecai Lincoln helped build the Hingham meeting-house. The 
elders decided just what seats people should occupy, and they assigned 
an honorable seat to him in the front gallery. 

He wanted his grandchildren to be well educated, and in his will 
bequeathed 10 to aid them in Harvard College. ( 6 ) We do not know 
in what year the blacksmith's oldest son, Mordecai, junior, married ; 
neither is the maiden name of his wife to be found on any record. 
We only know that after the birth of a son the husband became a 
widower. 

Although Massachusetts was sparsely settled, people were emigrating 
from the province. Mordecai Lincoln, with his son John, made his way 
to Freehold, Monmouth County, N. J. The citizens of that county re- 
garded him as being worthy of their esteem. Hannah Salter, daugh- 
ter of Eichard and Sarah Bowne Salter, gave him her hand in mar- 
riage. Mr. Salter was a lawyer, judge, and member of the Provincial 
Assembly. Hannah's uncle, Captain John Bowne, was rich. He re- 
membered Hannah Salter Lincoln in his will, giving her 250. Her 
husband was so greatly esteemed that in title-deeds he was styled 
"gentleman." He was thrifty, and purchased several hundred acres 



6 LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 

of land. (') He wanted more, and visited the valley of the Schuylkill, 
in Pennsylvania, to see for himself whether or not the lands there were 
as fertile and beautiful as reported. He was so well pleased that he 
resolved to become a citizen of Pennsylvania, and removed to Amity 
township. 

It seems conclusive that John did not go with his father, but re- 
mained in Freehold, and married there. We shall see him, together 
with his sons, further on.( 8 ) 

Mordecai Lincoln became near neighbor to George Boone, who came 
from England with eleven children. He had such pleasant memories 

of his old home in the valley of the Exe that he named his 

1717 

new home Exeter, after the old town whose cathedral bells had 
charmed him with their music. He found that many of his neighbors 
were Germans who could not speak the English language. Farther 
down the valley of the Schuylkill the settlers were mostly from 
Wales, who gave Welsh names to the towns. In Gwynedd were four 
brothers Thomas, Robert, Owen, and Cadwallader Evans. They could 
trace their ancestral line back to Lludd, King of Britain, who fought 
the Romans when Julius Caesar was Emperor of Rome. ( 9 ) Cadwal- 
lader was the youngest of the brothers. He became a preacher after 
joining the Friends. Before leaving England he married Ellen Morris, 
of Bryn Gwyn, which means White Hill. They had a beautiful and 
queenly daughter, Sarah. We need not think it strange that John 




HINGHAM MEETING-HOUSE. 



ANCESTRY. 



1711. 




FREEHOLD MEETING-HOUSE. 



Hanks, of Whitemarsh, found pleasure in her society and asked her to 
be his wife. 

The autumn leaves were changing, and there was glory on the hills, 
October 12, 1711, when John Hanks and Sarah Evans stood before the 

congregation of Friends, in Gwynedd, he promising to love and 

honor her as a husband, 
she to be a true and faithful 
wife. The clerk who recorded 
the marriage put John down as 
"yeoman," and Sarah as "spin- 
ster."^ ) Their home was in 
"Whitemarsh. Children made 
it musical with their prattle 
John, William, Samuel, Jane, 
and Elizabeth. The eldest 
reaches manhood, marries 
whom we do not know ; but he 
finds a home in Union town- 
ship, on the west bank of the 

Schuylkill. His neighbor is John Lincoln, from Freehold. Across the 
river are the homes of Mordecai Lincoln and George Boone, and that 
of his son, Squire Boone. 

Settlers were building their homes in the surrounding country, but 
there were still vast reaches of forest abounding with game. One of 
Squire Boone's sons Daniel found great pleasure in listening to the 
singing of the birds, the chattering of squirrels. He loved hunting, and 
before he was ten years old could bring down a deer when it was upon 
the run. His parents allowed him to go out alone, for on dark and 
cloudy days he could keep the points of compass, and was never in dan- 
ger of being lost. One night he did not return. The second night 
came, and Daniel was still absent. His father and the neighbors 
searched the woods, and found that he had built a camp, killed a deer, 
kindled a fire, and was broiling venison for his dinner. ( n ) 

A warm friendship sprang up between the Boone, Lincoln, and Hanks 
families. They were on the frontier ; many of the settlers around them 
could not speak English. It does not appear that Mordecai or John 
Lincoln ever joined the Friends, and it is not certain that George Boone 
was a member of the society; but they attended the meetings, and all 
lived together in brotherly love. Mordecai Lincoln, in his last will and 
testament, appointed George Boone to assist in settling the estate. He 



8 LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 

had many hundred acres of land. He bequeathed" 1000 acres to be di- 
vided between Mordecai, junior, Thomas, and Abraham; 100 to Ann and 
Sarah, the children of Hannah Salter Lincoln ; and 300 acres to John, 
the eldest son, born in Massachusetts. (" ) 

A fever of unrest was upon the people of Pennsylvania, causing 

them to move southward, through Maryland, across the Potomac, into 

the valley of the Shenandoah, and settling upon lands which 

George Washington had surveyed. John Hanks, junior, and 

John and Thomas Lincoln sold their farms in Union, made their 

way across the Potomac River, and settled near Harrisonburg, Va. 

Squire Boone, with his family, went farther south, and settled at 

Holman's Ford, on the Yadkin River, not far from Wilkesborough, 

KG. 

It was a memorable year in the history of America ; for while these 
families were seeking new homes, the flag of France was giving place to 
England's banner at Quebec. The settlers along the frontier who had 
been disturbed by the Indians could lie down at night and sleep in 
peace. 

When John Lincoln's eldest son, Abraham, born in Pennsylvania, be- 
came of age, he left the Harrisonburg home to visit his friends, the 
Boones, in North Carolina, where he made the acquaintance of Mary 
Shipley, who became his wife. ( l8 ) He built a cabin, and opened a farm 
on the banks of the Yadkin. 

Daniel Boone knew there was a beautiful country beyond the mount- 
ains westward. In 1748 Thomas Walker and three others had dis- 
covered a remarkable gateway in the mountains, which they 
called Cumberland Gap, in honor of the Duke of Cumberland, 
Prime-minister to King George. They beheld a beautiful region, abound- 
ing with game. It is not surprising that Daniel Boone resolved to 
explore it. With four companions he passed through Cumberland Gap 
and travelled many miles beyond, finding meadows waving with grass, 
the. haunt of buffalo and deer. He and one of his companions were 
captured by the Indians, but made their escape. When they returned 
to their camp the other two men were gone. They never knew what 
became of them. Boone remained so long that his family became 
alarmed. His younger brother, accompanied by another man, came in 
search of him. Daniel, instead of returning, sent him back to tell his 
friends that he was safe ; he was to return with powder and bullets. 
Three months went by before the younger brother came. Daniel was 
alone the while. He knew the Indians would be glad to capture him ; 



ANCESTRY. 



9 



but he knew their wiles, and eluded them. After being absent nearly 
a year, he returned to his home. 

People were crossing the mountains to make their homes in Ken- 
tucky. Daniel Boone organized a company of fifty, who made a settle- 
ment at Boonsborough. The Revolutionary War had begun, and 
the Indians were being supplied with arms and ammunition by the 
British at Detroit. The settlers built a fort, which was often beset by the 
Indians. They captured Jemima Boone, and Elizabeth and Frances Cal- 
laway, who were seized while in a canoe on the Kentucky Ei\ T er. The 
people in the fort heard their cries and started in pursuit of the Indians, 



1775. 




DANIEL BOONE. 



10 



LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 




CAPTUHED BY THE INDIANS. 



who were hurrying their captives towards the Ohio Kiver. Boone, with 
several others, followed in pursuit. When night came they were obliged 
to halt, but at daylight were pressing on once more. Boone had roamed 
the forest so long that he could easily keep the trail. When the sun 



ANCESTRY. 



11 



went down the second day he knew the Indians were not far in ad- 
vance. With the first flush of daylight on the third day the pursuers 
were hastening on. Noiselessly, no one speaking above a whisper, they 
glided through the woods. Suddenly, at a sign from Boone, they drop 
upon the ground, for just ahead a fire is blazing, and the Indians are 
broiling their breakfast of venison. Four of the pursuers are to fire 
when Boone gives the signal ; the other three, with himself, are to be 
ready to encounter the remaining Indians. Four rifles flash, and then 






THE SITE OF BRYANT'S FOKT. 

with gleaming knives all rush forward. Four of the Indians have fall- 
en ; the others are fleeing, leaving the three girls unharmed and over- 
whelmed with joy at their rescue. 

The tide of emigration to Kentucky was increasing. A second fort 
was constructed near Lexington ; a third was built by Joseph Bryant 
and his companions five miles distant. They made a mistake in not 
enclosing a spring of water. No well had been dug, when the place 
was suddenly besieged by several hundred Indians. The settlers had 
plenty of food, but no water. They knew the Indians were secreted 
in the bushes near the spring, and if a man were to go for water he 
would be killed. It was thought if the women and girls were to go 
with buckets, the Indians would think they had not been discovered, 
and would not harm them. The brave -hearted wives and daughters 
went down the path chattering and laughing, filled their buckets, and 
returned to the fort unharmed. Two men mounted on fleet horses 



12 LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 

dashed out from the gateway, and rode so swiftly that before the Ind- 
ians could recover from their surprise they were beyond the reach of 
their rifles, riding to Lexington to give the alarm. The Indians began 
the attack; the settlers' rifles flashed in return. The women were as 
brave as the men ; they moulded bullets, cared for the wounded, encour- 
aged their husbands, and assisted in every possible way in maintaining 
the defence till reinforcements came and compelled the Indians to flee. 

The hardships of a journey of 500 miles on horseback did not 

deter Abraham and Mary Shipley Lincoln from leaving their home 

on the Yadkin to establish a new home in Kentucky. They had 

1778 " 

three children, Mordecai, Josiah, and Thomas, the last a babe in 
the arms of the mother. They settled near Bear -grass Fort, a short 
distance from what is now the City of Louisville. ( 14 ) 

The war with England was over, but the Indians were angry because 
the settlers were taking possession of their hunting-grounds. It was a 
pleasure to them to creep stealthily through the forest, come upon 
the unsuspecting white man, bring him down with a bullet, and 
take his scalp. Abraham Lincoln was at work in the clearing with his 
three boys Mordecai, ten years old; Josiah, eight; and Thomas, six. 
A bullet fired by an Indian pierced his heart. The scene is one for a 
painter : Mordecai running towards the cabin, animated by a great re- 
solve; Josiah fleeing towards the fort; and the Indian who had fired 
the fatal bullet seizing Thomas by the arm to lead him away. Sud- 
denly a rifle flashes and the savage falls, shot dead by Mordecai. (") 

Such was the tragedy in the life of Mary Shipley Lincoln. She was 
a widow with five young children, for two daughters had come to the 
cabin home. She did all that she could for them. Xo schools had been 
established in Kentucky, and her children grew to manhood and woman- 
hood without any opportunity to obtain an education. 

The Lincoln family through all the generations had been on the 
frontier of civilization. Few of the ancestors of Thomas had ever at- 
tended school. Their education was not from books, but from the hard- 
ships of life. They had lived righteous lives, and transmitted to their 
children successively the inheritance of the manly character and Puritan 
faith bequeathed by the weaver apprentice. Under the law of entail in 
Kentucky the eldest son inherited the estate of a father, and so Morde- 
cai Lincoln came into possession of the farm, and Josiah and Thomas 
must begin life in poverty. 

We have seen John Lincoln and. John Hanks settling side by side 
in the Shenandoah Valley. The children of Abraham Lincoln were in 




DEFENDING THE FORT. 



ANCESTRY- 15 

Kentucky. It is not strange that the descendants of John Hanks should 
also be there. Joseph Hanks had emigrated to Kentucky. He was a 
carpenter of Elizabethtown. Shall we think it strange that Thorn- 
as Lincoln, who was working with him, found pleasure in the so- 
ciety of his nieces Lucy, Elizabeth, Polly, and Nancy Hanks ? Nancy 
was tall, dark -haired, comely, dignified, and winsome by her grace and 
kindness. She seemed at times as if looking far away seeing what 
others did not see. She had attended school in Virginia, and stood 
upon a higher intellectual plane than most of those around her. The 
Bible was read morning and evening, and her conduct was in accordance 
with its precepts. She was on the frontier, where few books were to 
be had to satisfy her thirst for knowledge, and where there was little 
intellectual culture. Through the summer days she heard the mourn- 
ful cooing of the ring-doves, the mimicry of the mocking-bird, and the 
tender notes of the hermit-thrush in the forest. In winter the voices 
were harsh and discordant the barking of foxes and the howling of 
wolves. Her eyes, so sad at times, looked into an uncongenial present 
and unpromising future. 

Thomas Lincoln was twenty-eight years old and Nancy Hanks twen- 
ty-three when they were united in marriage by Rev. Jesse Head. Their 
h'rst home was a cabin in Elizabethtown. ( 18 ) They had but few articles 
for house-keeping, but Thomas Lincoln was a kind and loving husband, 
and she a helpful wife, ever regardful of his happiness and welfare. A 
daughter was born to them in this uncongenial home. As their ances- 
tors had done, they turned to the Bible for a name, and selected Sarah 
the princess. ( n ) 

NOTES TO CHAPTER I. 

(') "History of Lincolnshire." 

( 2 ) "The Original List of Persons of Quality Emigrants from Great Britain to the 
American Plantations, 1600-1700," edited by John Carnden Hutton, p. 290. 

( 3 ) Samuel Barnard Eliot, in "Cincinnati Gazette," October 6, 1882. 

( 4 ) George Lincoln, in " Boston Transcript," January, 1892. 

(5) Ibid. 

( 6 ) Will of Mordecai Lincoln, Plymouth, Mass., "Records." 
(') Samuel Shackford, in " Chicago Tribune," April 14, 1883. 
( s ) Ibid. 

( 9 ) H. M. Jenkins, "Historical Collections of Gwynedd," p. 143. 

( 10 ) Ibid., p. 110. 

( u ) Cecil B. Hartley, "Life of Daniel Boone." 

( 12 ) Samuel Shackford, in " Chicago Tribune," April 14, 1883. 

( 13 ) Ibid. 



16 LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 

( 14 ) Ibid. 

( 16 ) Nicolay and Hay, "Abraham Liucolu : A History," "Century Magazine," No- 
vember, 1886. 

('<>) Ibid. 

(") President Lincoln knew very little about bis ancestry. In a letter written in 
1848, he said : "My grandfather went from Rockiiigham County, Va., to Kentucky, about 
1782, and two years afterwards was killed by the Indians. We have a vague tradition 
that my grandfather went from Pennsylvania to Virginia; that he was a Quaker. 
Further than that I have never heard anything." 

It has long been known that the first emigrants from England bearing the name of 
Lincoln came from Hingharn, England, and settled in Hingham, Mass. Recent investi- 
gations show that Thomas Lincoln became an emigrant in 1633 ; that his younger brother, 
Samuel, apprenticed to Francis Lawes, landed at Salem, Mass., 1637 ; that he was eigh- 
teen years of age, and subsequently settled in Hingham, and was the ancestor of the Pres- 
ident. The maiden name of his wife was Martha, but her family name is not known. 
Their children were : 

1. Samuel, born August 25, 1G50. 

2. Daniel, born January 2, 1653. 

3. Mordecai, born June 19, 1655 ; died in infancy. 

4. Mordecai, born June 14, 1657. 

5. Mary, born March 27, 1662. 

6. Thomas, born August 20, 1664. 

7. Martha, born December 11, 1667. 

8. A daughter, born August 3, 1669 ; died in infancy. 

9. Sarah, born June 17, 1671. 

10. Rebecca, born March 16, 1674. 

The fourth son, Mordecai, born in 1657, became a blacksmith. He married Sarah 
Jones, of Hull, daughter of Abraham Jones, of whom he learned his trade. The shop was 
on a point of laud which projects into Boston harbor. It seems probable that the set- 
tlers in that vicinity may have been fishermen rather than farmers. He subsequently 
lived in Hingham, and with his elder brother Samuel was employed, in 1679, in building the 
meeting-house, still standing (1892) in Hingham. His father, Samuel, and himself paid 
taxes in that town in 1680, and the blacksmith was assigned a seat in the front gallery. 
It is probable that he moved into Cohasset, the adjoining town, about 1700, and with his 
neighbors established iron-works and built a mill. He died in 1727. His grave is in the 
cemetery in North Scituate. 

Children of Mordecai and Sarah Jones Lincoln : 

1. Mordecai, born April 24, 1686. 

2. Abraham, born January 13, 1689. 

3. Isaac, born October 21, 1691. 

4. Sarah, boru July 27, 1694. 

5. Elizabeth. 

6. Jacob. 

It seems that the two last-named were children of a second wife. The will of the 
iron-founder was made in 1727, and Jacob was sixteen years of ago at the time. 

Mordecai Lincoln, junior, born 1686, was the ancestor of President Lincoln. No record 
of his marriage has been found. We only know that he emigrated to Freehold, Moii- 
inouth County, N. J., accompanied by his brother Abraham, and that he had one son, 
John. He was married to Hannah Salter, of Freehold, before 1714 the date of his 
uncle's will, which bequeathed to Hannah Salter Lincoln 250. It appears that he moved 
to Amity township, Pa., and became near neighbor to George Boonc. His will bears 



ANCESTRY. 17 

date February 22, 1735-36, providing for John, Mordecai, Ann, Sarah, and a posthumous 
child which was named Abraham. 

John Lincoln, born in Massachusetts, ancestor of the President, married and resided 
in Freebold, but moved to Union, Pa., in 1758, where he was assessed for taxes. His 
children were Thomas, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. It is probable that all his children 
were born at Union, and that he moved to Virginia in 1759. 

Abrabam, his second son, joined tbe family of Squire Boone at Holman's Ford, eight 
miles from Wilkesborough, N. C., where he married Mary Shipley. Their children were 
Mordecai, Josiah, Thomas, born in North Carolina, and Mary and Sarah, born at Bear- 
grass Fort, Ky. The paternal line of descent is : 1. Samuel ; 2. Mordecai ; 3. Mordecai ; 
4. John ; 5. Abraham ; 6. Thomas ; 7. Abraham President. 

The maternal ancestry of President Lincoln cannot to a certainty be traced continu- 
ously from his mother, Nancy Hanks, back to John Hanks, who married Sarah Evans, 
of Gwynedd, in 1711. It is very probable that the mother of the President was a descend- 
ant of their son John, who settled in Union township, Pa., and who probably moved to 
Kockingham County, Va., in 1759. Presumably Nancy Hanks was his granddaughter. 
It appears that John Hanks, who lived in Whiteinarsh. made his will December 12, 
1730. It was admitted to probate in May, 1731. His wife was executrix, and he mentions 
seven children. From the records of marriages among the Friends of Gwynedd, it seems 
that Sarah Evans Hanks, widow, married Thomas Williams, widower, of Montgomery 
township, Pa. The witnesses of the marriage were her seven children. "Historical 
Collections of Gwynedd," p. 116. 

Mrs. William Parker Faulke, in " Historical Collections of Gwyuedd," informs us that 
Sarah Evans was the daughter of Cadwallader Evans, who, with three brothers, emigrated 
from Merioneth County, in Wales, which, together with Montgomery, Flint, Denbig, 
Carnavon, and Anglesey constituted the ancient Gwynedd. The Evans family occupied 
an exalted position. Their ownership of land extends back to the twelfth century. The 
genealogical line has been traced to Mervyn Vrych, King of Man, who married Essylt, 
daughter of the King of Wales, in 820, both of whom traced their ancestral line to Lludd, 
King of Britain, who resisted the Roman invasion. 

It does not appear that any of the paternal ancestors of President Lincoln in Pennsyl- 
vania belonged to the Society of Friends, but rather that they attended the religious 
meetings of the Friends, and lived in harmonious relations with them. It seems probable 
that John Hanks, of Whitemarsh, joined the society, and that his sou John remained 
a Friend ; but his nieces, who emigrated to Kentucky, were not Friends. On the paternal 
and maternal side it was a religious ancestry. Author. 
2 



18 



LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 



1809. 



CHAPTEE II. 

EARLY YEARS. 

THOMAS LINCOLN" selected a quarter -sect ion of land situated on 
Nolin's Creek, near Hodgensville, for a farm. The site chosen for 
his home was near an ever-flowing spring of pure, cool, refreshing water, 
issuing from a cleft in a rock shaded by forest trees. Asters, 
columbines, and other flowers bloomed around it, drawing their 
moisture from the crystal fountain. 

We may justly infer that the carpenter could not earn much money 
by working at his trade. Not many mills had been built for sawing 

lumber, and consequently 
the time had not come 
for erecting frame-houses. 
A log-cabin could be easi- 
ly constructed by the set- 
tler himself felling the 
trees and notching the 
logs. His neighbors would 
manifest their friendship 
by coming to the "roll- 
ing," lifting the logs that 
were to form the cabin 
walls, and partaking free- 
ly of the whiskey pro- 



vided for the occasion. 
The owner of the house 
could lay the stones for 
the fireplace and hew 
the timbers for the floor. 
The cabin built by Thom- 
as Lincoln had but one 
room. The floor was not laid, no glass had been purchased for a window, 
or boards provided for a door, when it became the home of the family. 




THE SPOT ONCE OCCUPIED BY THE CABIN IN WHICH 
ABRAHAM LINCOLN WAS BORN. 

[From a photograph taken by the author, 1890. The stones at the 
foot of the pear-tree mark the locality of the fireplace.] 



EARLY YEARS. 



19 




The wife had not many utensils for house - keeping probably a 
Dutch-oven, frying-pan, a few tin dishes, wooden plates, and a bucket. 
None of his ancestors could have ever lived in a home more destitute of 
needed articles or one more cheerless. Perchance the cabin of his father 
on the Yadkin or that at Bear-grass Fort may have been but little bet- 
ter; but the home of Mordecai, the 
iron-founder of Scituate, and that 
of Mordecai, the land proprietor 
of Freehold and Amity, were 
palaces in comparison with this 
habitation. Shall we conclude 
that inability to acquire wealth 
or that intellectual decadence are 
the natural outcome of the ad- 
verse circumstances of life on the 
picket -line of civilization? It is 
not probable that the grandfa- 
ther or father of Thomas Lincoln 
had much opportunity to attend 
school. Theirs was a limited 
education. The owner of the 
home on Nolin's Creek did not 
know the letters of the alpha- 
bet until taught them by his devoted wife. How shall we account 
for the gradual waning of intellectual endowment in the genera- 
tions between the active and energetic "gentleman," the landed pro- 
prietor of Freehold, and the unambitious carpenter of Hodgensville ? 
Though the roots of the husband's ancestral tree reached down to 
Puritan England, and, on the part of the wife, to the days when a 
King of Britain confronted imperial Rome, nature gave no intimation, 
through hereditary descent, of the coming of one who should be a re- 
deemer to millions of his fellow-men. The evolution had been down- 
ward rather than upward. No prophetic voice whispered of coming 
greatness ; no sign appeared ; no star rested above the cheerless cabin 
by Rock Spring, in which, February 12, 1809, Abraham Lincoln, son of 
Thomas and Nancy Hanks Lincoln, was born. 

To keep out the snow and rain possibly the skin of a bear may have 
hung across the doorway of the cabin, or that of a deer over the open- 
ing left for a window ; but the wintry winds had free access through the 
unplastered crevices between the logs. Here the mother folds in her 



A DUTCH-OVEN. 

[From a photograph taken by the author, Nolin's Crock, 
Ky., October, 1891.] 



20 LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 

arms her infant son. Here she attends to her household duties living 
the routine of drudgery, baking the corn-bread, frying the bacon, dress- 
ing the skins of the deer brought down by her husband's rifle, making 
his clothing, carding cotton and wool to obtain a dress for herself and 
garments for her children. 

It was not a difficult matter for Thomas Lincoln to obtain meat for 
his family, as the woods abounded with deer and wild turkeys. It was 
more of a task to obtain corn. When obtained, it must be taken to Mr. 
Hodgen's mill for grinding. What other home surpasses this in exhibi- 
tion of pathetic scenes ? Another child came, to live only a few hours. 
Nancy Hanks Lincoln queenly in personal appearance, imperial in her 
aspirations attends to her wifely duties. The day begins and ends with 
religious service. The cultured wife reads the Bible to the uncultured 
husband. His lips utter the prayer. The Puritan instinct in the hus- 
band has come down through the successive generations from the Hing- 
hara straw-thatched cottage in old England, and in the wife from the 
Friends' home on the white hills of Wales. In the gloaming, when work 
for the day is done, the mother tells the stories of Abraham, Moses, 
David, and the Child of Nazareth. The horizon of her life was wider 
than the walls of her home. That her kind-hearted husband might be 
more than he was to her, himself, and his fellow-men, she taught him 
the alphabet ; but he never was able to construct sentences. She 
showed him how to write his name, but his proficiency with the pen 
ended with that attainment. The iron which had given vigor to his 
ancestors seems to have been wanting in his blood. Little did this 
mother know how deeply her lessons of truth and virtue went down 
into the heart of her listening son ; how in the fulness of time the germs 
would put forth their tender shoots ; how her own spirit would reap- 
pear in his, and the beauty of her soul glorify his life. 

She had few opportunities to gratify her longings or enlarge her 
sphere of usefulness. Occasionally a preacher came to the log meeting- 
house at Little Mound to hold services on Sunday. Like her own home, 
it had no floor. Logs split in halves served for seats. Public spirit in 
Hodgensville had erected the building, but had not provided glass for 
the windows. To this meeting-house, located three miles from the Lin- 
coln home, settlers came from far and near parents and children, on foot 
or on horseback. It was not only a place for religious service, but the 
news exchange, where, before and after the sermon, they could hear what 
was going on in the community and in the world outside of Kolin's 
Creek. At Little Mound young men could look into the faces of the 



EARLY YEARS. 23 

maidens, thinking possibly quite as much of their charming countenances 
as of the heads of the preacher's sermon. 

Abraham Lincoln, five years old, was not unmindful of what he saw 
and heard in Little Mound meeting - house, for usually, after reaching 
home, he mounted a stool and preached a sermon of his own, shouting 
in imitation of the minister, and pounding the table with his little fist. 
He especially liked the Rev. David Elkin. The preacher may have seen 
something in Thomas Lincoln's boy that attracted his particular atten- 
tion. It may have been the purity, earnestness, and sadness of the 
mother's countenance reproduced in the face of the son ; perchance the 
boy asked him questions when he stepped down from the pulpit to shake 
hands with the father and mother. "Whatever the mutual attraction may 
have been, David Elkin and Abraham Lincoln became fast friends. 

It is plain that the settlers of Hodgensville had no very exalted ideas 
concerning the education of their children. No school-house had been 
provided when Zachariah Riney proposed to open a school. He was a 
Roman Catholic priest, who travelled through the settlements teach- 
ing a few weeks in a place. The people were too poor to pay him 
much money, nor was it much that he could teach. The children of 
Hodgensville and along Nolin's Creek, those living at Little Mound, 
boys and girls verging upon manhood and womanhood, flocked to the 
cabin which served for a school -house. The teacher had only a spell- 
ing-book containing easy lessons for reading. Quite likely the young 
men were somewhat chagrined when Abraham Lincoln, five years old, 
marched to the head of the class. His mother had been his teacher. 

Thomas Lincoln made no headway in paying for his farm. He tried 
to better his fortune by bargaining for 200 acres of land on Knob Creek, 
seven miles from Nolin's. He built a cabin, but it was little bet- 
ter than the one he abandoned. (') Another teacher came 
George Hazel who, like Riney, had only a spelling-book. When the 
most advanced pupils finished it, he started them once more in words of 
one syllable. ( 2 ) No other book was studied. He did not teach writing. 

"We have seen Thomas Lincoln's oldest brother inheriting all the 
property of their father's estate. The law of entail was no longer in 
force^ but the titles of land which had been granted by Virginia to in- 
dividuals before Kentucky became a State were not always clear. Set- 
tlers, after building their houses and improving the land, frequently found 
they were not the legal owners of the property. Under such a condition 
of affairs people were moving to Indiana, where they could buy land for $2 
an acre, and obtain an unclouded title from the United States. Slavery 



24 



LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 



existed in Kentucky. Poor men were conscious of an assumed supe- 
riority on the part of those who owned slaves. The lands in Indiana 
were fertile. It was a free State, in which rich and poor alike were 
respected. Thomas Lincoln, in common with many others in Ken- 




LITTLE MOUND MEETING-HOUSE, HODGENSVILLE, KY. 

[From a photograph taken by the author. October, 1891.] 

tucky, resolved to live where there would be no distinction between rich 
and poor, and where he would have a better chance to get on in the 
world. He had bargained for the Knob Creek farm, built a cabin, dug a 
well, and cleared a portion of the land. He was fortunate enough to find 
a settler who would purchase the improvements. He took in payment 
400 gallons of whiskey, which was everywhere a marketable commod- 
ity. ( 3 ) Nearly everybody drank spirituous liquors, in accordance with 
the custom of the times. .Instead of being disreputable to drink, it was 
regarded as ungracious not to drink, especially when invited to do so. 
Only when people became senseless or quarrelsome was the drinking 
regarded as harmful. Next to silver coin, whiskey came nearest to being- 
legal tender in business. 

At the junction of Knob Creek with Eolling Fork, Mr. Lincoln 
constructed a boat. The barrels of liquor were placed on board, togeth- 



EARLY YEARS. 



25 



er with his carpenter's tools. Without any mishap he floated down 
Rollins: Fork to Salt River, and with the current of that stream to the 

O " 

Ohio, which had overflowed its banks. Suddenly his frail craft was cap- 
sized in the swirling water, and whiskey and tools went to the bottom 
of the river. He swam to the shore and stood penniless upon the bank ; 
but when the water receded, a few days later, he regained his prop- 
erty, obtained another boat, and floated down the Ohio to Thompson's 
Landing. Leaving his property in a storehouse, he went northward 
twenty miles through the forest to Pigeon Creek. He was charmed with 
the country. The soil was fertile. Mr. Gentry had built a cabin ; other 
settlers were selecting lands. He made choice of a quarter- section, and 
travelled seventy miles to Vincennes to enter his claim, and returned to 
Kentucky. 

The November winds were rattling the acorns and walnuts to the 

ground, and the ripened leaves were falling, when the family moved to 

Indiana. The nig-hts were cold. No shelter had been provided. 

1817 

The late autumn rains were setting in. It was only a "camp" 
that the carpenter could build, one side of which was open to the 
weather. ( 4 ) The hard-working wife, as in the floorless cabin at Nolin's 
Creek, baked the corn-bread and went on with the making and mending. 
It seems probable that while occupying this camp she taught writing to 
Abraham. We know that George Hazel did not teach it, but further 
on we shall see Abraham writing a letter to a friend in Kentucky. 




SITE OF THOMAS LINCOLN'S HOME ON KNOB CREEK. 

[From a photograph taken by the author, October, 1891. The well dug by Thomas Lincoln is seen 
in the centre of the picture.] 



26 



LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 




POtNTS OF INTEREST IN THE EARLY LIFE 
OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 



Through the winter carpenter Lincoln was hewing timber for his 
future home, which was to be something more than a cabin. Although 
there would be but one room on the ground, he would build the walls 
high enough for a loft, which would give sleeping accommodations to 
Sarah and Abraham. Built of hewn logs, it would be palatial in com- 
parison with his former homes. Picture it as we may, we shall not be 
able to portray the desolateness of the winter passed in the Pigeon 
Creek camp, and the weariness of spirit on the part of one endowed as 
was the mother to adorn a palace. We are not to think that Thomas 
Lincoln was idle, nor that he was altogether shiftless. He was in pov- 
erty. The family must have food. A home must be built. The ground 
must be cleared for planting corn. There is no evidence that he was 
idle. Other settlers, more industrious than he, could not accumulate 
much property in a section of country covered by a dense forest. Many 
sturdy blows must be given with the axe before he could complete his 
house and clear the ground for raising corn. 

The new home was not finished when the family moved into it the 
floor not laid, no boards provided for a door. The moving was hastened 
by the arrival of Thomas Sparrow, whose wife was Mrs. Lincoln's 
sister. Dennis Hanks, a nephew, came with them. Without doubt 
it was a glad day when they arrived, but the joy was quickly changed 
to mourning. A few weeks later Mr. and Mrs. Sparrow were borne to 
their graves. Sickness, which became epidemic, appeared throughout 
southern Indiana, attacking cattle and human beings alike, caused, as 
is supposed, by herbs which poisoned the milk of the cows. The physi- 
cian had no counteracting medicine. The illness was brief ; the result, 
in most cases, fatal. 

Nancy Hanks Lincoln was thirty-three years old. Life as found by 



1818. 



EARLY YEARS. 



27 



her had presented few attractions. It seems probable that not much 
sunshine fell across her path, even during her girlhood, in Virginia. 
She had been dependent upon friends for a home. By circumstances 
beyond her control she had been compelled to accept uncongenial life 
on the frontier. Her aspirations were far different from those of her 
kind-hearted husband. She heard voices which he could not hear. 
Her discerning eyes beheld what he never would, be able to see. Shall 
we wonder that the sadness deepened upon her countenance ? Seem- 
ingly it was not much she could do to lift her offspring to a better life 
than her own had been ; but human vision does not reach down to the 
springs which underlie character. The world never will know the great- 
ness of its debt to her for doing what she could in stamping her own 
lofty conception of duty and obligation upon the hearts and consciences 
of her children. 

October had come. The forest was arrayed in glory. The harvest 
was at hand. There had ever been loving intimacy and sympathy be- 




JUNCTION OF SALT RIVEK WITH THE OHIO, WHERE THOMAS LINCOLN'S BOAT WAS 

CAPSIZED. 

[From a photograph taken by the author, 1890.] 



28 



LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 




tween Mrs. Lincoln and 
her children. She had 
discerned what the father 
had not seen in their boy 
a nature rich and rare : 
kindness of heart, sym- 
pathy with suffering, re- 
gard for what was right, 
impatience with wrong. 
She had watched the un- 
folding of his intellect. 
He had asked questions 
which others of his age 
did not ask. She knows 
that her work for this 
life is ended. Her boy 
stands by her bedside. 

"I am going away 
from you, Abraham, and 
shall not return. I know 
that you will be a good 
boy; that you will be 
kind to Sarah and to 
your father. I want you 

to live as I have taught you, and to love your Heavenly Father." 
Through life he will hear her last words. In the full vigor of manhood 
he will not think it unmanly to say, with tearful eyes, "All that I am, 
all that I hope to be, I OAve to my angel mother." ( 5 ) Death came. 
The husband made the coffin. No preacher was near, but sympathizing 
neighbors bore all that was mortal of her to the summit of a hill that 
overlooked the unfinished home the site selected for her resting-place. 
That his mother had been buried without a religious service cut 
Abraham Lincoln to the heart. In the lonesomeness and desolation of 
the winter's camp she had trained his hand in holding the pen. Is 
it probable that there was any other boy only ten years old in the 
State of Indiana or in the country who would have set himself to 
write a letter inviting a minister 100 miles distant to come and preach 
a funeral sermon? But Kev. David Elkin, at Little Mound, received 
such a letter. (") Abraham Lincoln! That must be Nancy Hanks 
Lincoln's boy. Yes, he would go, although it was so many miles to 



GUAVE OF NANCY HANKS LINCOLN, PIGEON CREEK, 1ND. 

[From a photograph taken by the author, October, 1890. The marble 
slab and surrounding fence were erected by P. E. Studebaker, of South 
Bend, Ind. The stone bears the following inscription : " Nancy Hanks 
Lincoln, mother of President Lincoln, died October 5, A. D. 1818, aged 35 
years. Erected by a friend of her martyred son, 1879."! 



EARLY YEARS. 29 

Pigeon Creek. The appointment was made. From far and near the 
settlers gathered round the newly-made grave. The hymn was sung, 
the sermon preached, the prayer offered. So the departed mother was 
committed to God's keeping. 



NOTES TO CHAPTER II. 

(') In several of the biographies of Abraham Lincoln it is stated that the land select- 
ed on Nolin's Creek by Thomas Lincoln was worthless. 

" The ground had nothing attractive about it but its cheapness. It was hardly more 
grateful than the rocky hill-sides of New England. It required full as earnest and intel- 
ligent industry to persuade a living out of those barren hillocks and weedy hollows, 
covered with stunted and scrubby underbrush, as it would amid the sands on the Northern 
coast." Nicolay and Hay, vol. i. 

"The land he occupied was sterile and broken a mere barren glade, and destitute of 
timber. It required a persistent effort to coax a living out of it,' and to one of his easy- 
going disposition life was a never-ending struggle." Herndou, vol. i., p. 18. 

Having- visited the spot where Abraham Lincoln was born, the farm on Nolin's Creek, 
and also the farm on Knob Creek, I do not coincide with these estimates of the quality 
of the land. That on Nolin's Creek is a fair representative section of the land in the im- 
mediate region. It was under cultivation (1890), yielding an average crop. The farm on 
Knob Creek, while embracing a rocky hill, has many acres which are very fertile. It 
would seem that, his selections of land cannot with justice be cited as evidence of in- 
efficiency or want of judgment. Author. 

( 2 ) Austin Gollaher, schoolmate of Abraham Lincoln, to Author. 

( 3 ) William H. Herndon, "Lincoln," p. 19 (edition .1889). 

( 4 ) Nicolay and Hay, " Century Magazine," November, 1886. 

( 5 ) Joshua F. Speed, Lecture on Abraham Lincoln. 
( e ) J. G. Holland, "Life of Abraham Lincoln," p. 29. 



30 LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 



CHAPTER III. 

LIFE IN INDIANA. 

THE unfinished cabin of Thomas Lincoln was a cheerless home. He 
had not found time to hew " puncheons " for a floor, saw boards 
for a door, make a sash for the window, or plaster the crevices between 
the timbers to exclude the driving rain or drifting snow. (') 
Sarah Lincoln, twelve years old, baked the corn-bread, fried the 
bacon, and did what she could to make the cabin cheerful ; but no fire, 
be it ever so bright, during the winter days and nights could dissipate 
the cheerlessness of such a home. In the evening the shadows of the 
father, Sarah, Abraham, and that of Dennis Hanks danced on the walls 
in the flickering light, but the mother's was not there. The nearest 
neighbors were so far away that voices other than their own seldom 
broke the silence. 

It is not strange that Abraham Lincoln became grave and thoughtful, 
or that a sadness like that seen in the countenance of his mother ap- 
peared on his face at times. Dennis Hanks found pleasure in treeing 
raccoons, but Abraham did not care much for 'coon hunting. Most of 
the boys in Pigeon Creek delighted to trap wild turkeys or bring down 
a deer with the rifle. Abraham once shot a turkey with his father's 
gun by firing through the crevice between the timbers, for he did not 
like to see any animal put to death. He was growing rapidly, and 
was so strong that he could throw an iron bar farther than any other 
boy in Pigeon Creek. 

It was a delightful book that came to his hands "JEsop's Fables;" 
also an arithmetic. Where he obtained them we do not know. For 
want of a slate and pencil he used a wooden shovel and a charred stick. 
When the shovel was covered with figures he wiped them off and began 
again. ( a ) 

Sarah and Abraham were outgrowing their clothing. They needed 
some one to care for them. A year had gone since the death of their 
mother. Their father was silent and thoughtful. Suddenly he left 



LIFE IN INDIANA. 



31 



1820. 




home. He did not say whither he was going; possibly he had some 
misgivings as to the outcome of his journey, and thought it wise to say 
nothing. He reached Elizabethtown, Kentucky, where he had 
learned to be a carpenter. He called upon Sarah Bush Johnston, 
a widow with three chil- 
dren John, Sarah, and 
Matilda. Mrs. Johnston 
had been his playmate 
in his boyhood. "When 
he became a young man 
he asked her to marry 
him ; but she had ac- 
cepted Mr. Johnston in- 
stead. It was evening 
when Mr. Lincoln en- 
tered her home. 

"Do you remember 
me, Mrs. Johnston ?" 

" Oh yes ; you are 
Tommy Lincoln. It is 
long since you moved 
from Elizabethtown 
fourteen years or more." 

" Yes ; but I have come, Mrs. Johnston, to see if you will be my 
wife. You and I are old friends. My children need a mother, and I 
would like to have you go home with me." 

It was an unexpected request. 

" Why, Mr. Lincoln ! I could not go at once. I am owing some 
debts, and I could not go till they are paid." 

Such in substance was the conversation, according to the story that 
has come to us. Mr. Lincoln found she owed about $12, and he called 
upon the creditors and paid them. In the morning a marriage-license 
was obtained, and they became husband and wife during the day. (') 

Ralph Krume, who married Mr. Lincoln's sister, kindly offered to 
take the whole family to Indiana in his four-horse wagon. They reached 
the Ohio River, were ferried across in a flat-boat, and then made their 
way through the woods to Pigeon Creek. Just what Sarah and Abra- 
ham Lincoln thought when they saw a wagon drawn by four horses, in 
which was a new mother, a new brother, and two new sisters, a bureau, 
feather - beds, and chairs, we do not know ; neither do we know the 



SITE OP THOMAS LINCOLN S INDIANA HOME. 



32 LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 

thoughts that flashed through the mind of Sarah Bush Lincoln as she 
entered the uncompleted cabin, and beheld her newly-acquired daughter 
and son, their clothes worn to tatters. But her coming brought about 
a new order of things. A door was hung, a floor laid, a window pro- 
vided, and neatness and order established. 

With eight in the family three romping girls and three rollicking 
boys, for Dennis Hanks was there the cabin was no longer a place of 
gloom, but a home ringing with merry voices. It was Abraham who 
told funny stories and asked puzzling questions. 

The time had come for Pigeon Creek to have a school - house. The 
settlers felled the trees, cut the trunks into suitable lengths, notched 
the logs, and rolled them into place. Having no glass, thin strips 
of wood were fastened across the opening left for a window, on 
which greased paper was pasted. Azel Dorsey was employed as teach- 
er. Heading, writing, spelling, and arithmetic were taught. The am- 
bition of the boys of Pigeon Creek was not to stand at the head of the 
class, but to be champions in wrestling, throw a weight farthest, and, in 
a fight, strike the hardest blow. 

Abraham Lincoln was ready to try his strength with them in wrest- 
ling, and if any fun was going on he could do his part in making things 
lively. He began no quarrel, but allowed no one to pick upon him. 
Somehow, if there was any dispute, the other boys appealed to him to 
say what was right and fair. 

There is humor in the lines which he wrote in his arithmetic : 

"Abraham Lincoln, 

His hand and pen ; 
He will be good, 
But God knows when."( 4 ) 

After a few weeks with Dorsey, two years went by before the settlers 
felt able to employ another teacher. Abraham Lincoln, the while, was 
reading Defoe's " Robinson Crusoe," Bunyan's " Pilgrim's Prog- 
ress," and Weems' "Life of Washington." ( 6 ) He borrowed the 
last-named book of Josiah Crawford, and unfortunately laid it where the 
rain wet the leaves. Mr. Crawford charged him 75 cents for the dam- 
age done the volume. Having no money, he paid the bill by working 
three days in Crawford's cornfield. (') He was growing strong enough 
to swing an axe, and help clear the land and hoe corn. His father 
wanted him to be a carpenter, and was teaching him to use the saw and 
chisel. 



LIFE IN INDIANA. 35 

"With eight in the family, a bag of meal quickly disappeared. It was 
fifteen miles or more to the nearest corn-mill, which was not driven by 
water, but by a horse attached to a sweep and going round in a circle. 
The customer furnished the horse for the grinding. Abraham went 
to the mill with a bag of corn, harnessed the mare, and struck her 
with a stick. lie was going to say, " Get up, you old hussy !" The 
words "get up" fell from his lips, and then he became unconscious, 
caused by a kick from the mare. Hours passed. Suddenly those who 
stood around him heard the rest of the sentence " you old hussy." In 
after-years he thus explained it : " Probably the muscles of my tongue 
had been set to speak the words when the animal's heels knocked me 
down, and my mind, like a gun, stopped half-cocked, and only went off 
when consciousness returned." ( 7 ) 

People in Pigeon Creek had few opportunities of hearing what was 
going on in the world. Once in a while a newspaper found its way 
into the settlement. By going to Gentry's Landing, on the Ohio Eiver, 
they could have a talk with boatmen from Cincinnati and Louisville. 
Occasionally a traveller passed a night at Gentryville, and talked with 
those who spent their evenings in Jones's store. Abraham Lincoln was 
the one who usually asked questions. ( 8 ) He made everybody good-na- 
tured by what he himself had to say. People were talking of the " hard 
times." At Pittsburg flour would bring only $1 a barrel. Whiskey 
could be had for 15 cents a gallon. Tea cost $1 a pound. Twelve bar- 
rels of flour would purchase one yard of " broad" cloth. ( 9 ) Times were 
hard in the Eastern as well as the Western States. People had doleful 
stories to tell of privation and suffering : how the sheriffs of Pennsyl- 
vania and other States were turning men and women out of doors be- 
cause they could not pay their debts. The jails were filled with poor 
debtors. ( 10 ) But good news came from Washington. Congress had 
passed a law reducing the price of land to $1.25 per acre. 

With whiskey costing only 15 cents a gallon, we need not wonder 
that men drank more than was good for them. Abraham Lincoln did 
not drink intoxicating liquor. ( u ) On a bitter cold night, as he and 
others were on their way home from Jones's store, they came upon a 
drunken man. The others went on, but Abraham, sixteen years old, 
strong and kind-hearted, shouldered the man and carried him to a cabin, 
doubtless saving the poor fellow from freezing. ( 12 ) 

Thomas Lincoln thought that his son had been to school long 
enough. He could read, write, and cipher, and was ahead of any other 
boy in Pigeon Creek. Was not that sufficient ? He wanted him to help 



36 



LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 



grub the ground for the next year's crop of corn. ( 13 ) An affectionate 
intimacy the while had sprung up between the stepmother and Abra- 
ham. He was ever ready to help her, and she ever solicitous for his 
welfare. ( H ) Through her influence the three boys and three girls from 
the Lincoln cabin made their way to the school taught by Andrew 
Crawford. Some of the boys found pleasure in tormenting dogs and 




SARAH BUSH LINCOLN. 

[From a photograph in possession of Mrs. Harriot Chapman, Charleston, 111.] 

cats. Abraham wrote a composition upon cruelty to animals, in which 
he maintained that to give pain to a dumb animal was contemptible, 
cruel, and wicked. 

A few weeks at school, and he was once more at work. It was irk- 
some to swing an axe and grub with a hoe. Without doubt Mr. Lin- 



LIFE IN INDIANA. 



37 



coin had his patience sorely tried by three boys who loved fun, and who 
had rollicking times when he was not with them. They had " spoken 
pieces " at school, and 
it was far more agree- 
able to Abraham to 
mount a stump and re- 
hearse what he had 
learned from the 
" American Precept- 
or," or make an im- 
promptu political 
speech than to w r ork. 
His audience John 
Johnston, Dennis 
Hanks, and the three 
girls were ever 
ready to clap their 
hands at his perform- 
ance. ( I6 ) 

Abraham was hun- 
gry for intellectual 

fo J SITE OF JONES 8 STORE AT GENTKYVILLE, IND. 

lOOd. He Walked [From a photograph taken by the author, 1890 ] 

twelve miles to David 

Turnham's home to obtain a copy of the laws of Indiana. A man 
accused of committing murder was arraigned at Booneville, the county 
seat, fifteen miles distant. Abraham attended the trial. He had great 
respect for the judge, who represented the majesty of the law. He list- 
ened with intense interest to the argument of Mr. Breckenridge, the 
lawyer who defended the accused man. When the argument was fin- 
ished there occurred a scene for an artist. Abraham Lincoln, tall, slim, 
with bare feet, wearing buckskin trousers and a jean coat, walked across 
the room and shook hands with him. " That is the best speech I ever 
heard," he said.(' e ) 

Once more Abraham was in school one taught by Master Swaney. 

He helped Katy Roby in spelling. Several scholars in the class had 

failed in their attempts to spell the word "defied." " D-e-f," said Katy, 

and stopped. Should she say i or y f She saw the tall young 

man raise a finger and touch his eye, and, comprehending the 

meaning of the action, spelled the word correctly. When the term 

closed his school- days were over. Putting all the weeks together, 




38 



LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 



they were less than a twelvemonth. He had not seen a geography or 
grammar. 

The time had come when he must earn money. He was employed 
by James Taylor to ferry people across the Ohio River at Gentry's 
Landing. His wages were $2.50 a week. His earnings were for his 
father, and not for his own personal benefit. It was a memorable event 
when two strangers came to the landing and were taken out to a pass- 
ing steamboat. Each gentleman tossed him a shining half-dollar. One 

dollar for a few minutes labor ! 
As he rowed back to the shore his 
world was larger, and the possi- 
bilities of life far greater than 
he had supposed them to be. ( I7 ) 

Katy Roby lived near by, and 
made time fly more swiftly by 
chatting with him while he was 
waiting for travellers. It Avas a 
pleasure to take her up-stream on 
a moonlight evening, and float 
down with the current to the 
landing. They see the moon and 
Venus sinking towards the western 
horizon. 

"We say the moon goes down," 
said Abraham, " and the stars rise 
and set ; but they do not come up 
and go down. It is we who do the 
rising and setting." 

" You are a fool, Abe. Don't 
you see that the moon and Venus 
are going down ?" 

" No, they are not. The earth 
turns over every twenty -four 
hours; it is that which makes them 
seem to rise and set. It is only an 
illusion, Katy." He went on and 
explained it so clearly that she 
gazed with increasing admiration 

DENNIS HANKS. ftt tlie y OUn g ^^ Wh 

[From a photograph taken in 1889.] had helped her in spelling. ( 18 ) 




LIFE IN INDIANA. 41 

Possibly Judge Pitcher, who lived near the landing, saw something 
unusually attractive in the boy who, while waiting for travellers, came 
into his office and asked if he might look at the books on his shelves. 
The ferry-boy saw people make fools of themselves by drinking too 




PLANTER'S HOME. 

much whiskey. He could not discover that any good came from drink- 
ing liquor. On the contrary, it made men silly, or cross and ugly, and 
brought misery to themselves and their families. He wrote a composi- 
tion on the foolishness of drinking, and the evils that come from the 
habit. The judge was pleased with it, and handed it to Kev. Mr. Farmer; 
he in turn sent it to an editor, who gladly printed it. So Abraham Lin- 
coln, five years before the beginning of a great temperance reformation 
which swept over the country, did what he could to bring it about. (") 

The ferry-boy probably never had seen a geography. Possibly he 
may have seen a map of the United States. He knew the passing 
steamboats made their way to New Orleans or St. Louis. He may 
have heard of the journey of exploration by Captain Lewis and George 
Rogers Clarke, of Kentucky, up the Missouri and down the Columbia to 
the Pacific Ocean. He knew the United States was a vast country. 
He was thinking about its form of government the Constitution and 
the Union. He wrote out his thoughts several years before Daniel 
"Webster uttered the words, " The Constitution and the Union now and 
forever : one and inseparable." 

"Winter came, and there were so few travellers that Mr. Taylor no 
longer needed him. He returned to Pigeon Creek to attend the wed- 
ding of his sister Sarah, who married Mr. Grigsby. 



1828. 



42 LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 

Mr. Gentry had purchased a large quantity of corn, pork, and other 
produce, which he determined to send to New Orleans. He had seen 
enough of Abraham Lincoln to know that he was honest and faith- 
ful, so engaged him to take charge of the flat-boat which he was 
loading for that market. Allan Gentry was to accompany him. The 
boat was wide and flat ; the steamboat men called it a " broad horn." It 
had a little caboose, in which they could sleep. Clay several inches in 
depth was spread upon the bottom of the boat, upon which they could 
kindle a fire, bake their corn-bread, and fry their meat. 

Abraham Lincoln, captain of the craft, was nineteen years old. For 
pulling an oar and assuming responsibility in marketing the produce he 
was to receive $8.50 a month. 

The two boatmen did not see many settlements along the river. 
Here and there they beheld a clearing and a solitary cabin. In spring- 
time the Mississippi overflowed its banks, and all the lowlands were 
flooded. The settlements, consequently, were mostly inland, upon high- 
er ground. Memphis was only a collection of huts. The country behind 
it was still the hunting-ground of the Cherokee Indians. It was a lone- 
ly voyage. At times they met a steamboat. After passing the mouth 




HOMES OF THE SLAVES. 



LIFE IN INDIANA. 



43 




FLAT-BOATS. 



of the Arkansas River they saw alligators sunning themselves along the 
banks. Farther down they beheld live-oaks with festoons of moss trail- 
ing from the wide-spreading branches. 

At Baton Rouge the two boatmen had an opportunity to show of 
what stuff they were made. Their boat was moored for the night at the 
landing. They were awakened by a gang of negroes, who leaped on 
board, intending to help themselves to plunder. The negroes were 
slaves. White men had stolen them their manhood, their natural 
rights, their labor. Why should they not help themselves to whatever 
they could find? The boatmen leap from their bunks and rush out 
from the caboose. They have no weapons, but Captain Lincoln pitches 
two into the river, a third is felled by Gentry, and the others, seeing 
the fate of their companions, take to their heels. 

They had reached a section of the country where the people used the 
French language. Natchez was a very old town. The French settled 
it when they took possession of Louisiana. The people, language, 
houses, manners, and customs all were different from what Lincoln and 



44 LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 

his fellow-boatman had ever seen. At intervals they beheld large plan- 
tations with collections of cabins the homes of the slaves. 

The two young men beheld strange sights at New Orleans. Hun- 
dreds of flat-boats were moored along the levees ; steamboats were com- 
ing and going ; ships were anchored in the river. They heard lan- 
guages which they could not understand French and Spanish and 
saw sailors from all parts of the world. In the old part of the city 
that settled by the French they felt themselves, as it were, in a for- 
eign land. Having disposed of the cargo, they returned to Indiana. Mr. 
Gentry was well satisfied with the result of his venture. 

Abraham Lincoln had reached a period in life which many another 
boy has reached the period of restlessness and discontent. His father 
wanted him to be a carpenter, but he would like to do something more 
than push the plane and use a saw all his days. His world is larger 
than it was before he floated down the great river and saw vessels that 
had come from foreign lands. The money which he had earned is not 
his own, but his father's. It is lonesome in Pigeon Creek. Why stay at 
home ? Why not strike out for himself ? But before going he will talk 
about it with his good friend William Wood, at Gentry's Landing. 

" No, Abraham, you must not go ; you must stay at home till you 
are of age and can leave rightfully. It is a duty which you owe to 
yourself and to your parents." ( 20 ) 

The question is settled duty! obligation! On Sunday evenings, 
in the old Kentucky home, when he was a little boy, his mother talked 
about doing right. He hears once more the words that fell from her 
lips as he stood by her side for the last time " Be kind to your father !" 
With new strength and resolution he goes back to the Pigeon Creek 
home as went the Child of Nazareth to be obedient to his parents. 



NOTES TO CHAPTER III. 

(!) William H. Herndon, "Lincoln," p. 23 (edition 1889). 
() Ibid., p. 28. 

( 3 ) Ibid., p. 29. " Letters of Samuel Haycraft." 

( 4 ) Ibid., p. 40. 

( 5 ) J. G. Holland, "Life of Abraham Lincoln," p. 31. 

( 6 ) Ibid., p. 32. 

(') William H. Herudon, "Lincoln," p. 59 (edition 1889). 

( 8 ) Joseph Gentry, of Gentry ville, to Author, September, 1890. 

( 9 ) " Annals of North America," edited by Edward Howland. 
( J0 ) Ibid. 



LIFE IN INDIANA. 45 

( n ) Joseph Gentry to Author, September, 1890. 

( 12 ) J. G. Holland, "Life of Abraham Lincoln," p. 33. 

( 13 ) William H. Herndon, " Lincoln," p. 36 (edition 1889). 
(") Ibid., p. 31. 

(") Ibid., p. 44. 
( 16 ) Ibid., p. 58. 
( n ) J. G. Holland, " Life of Abraham Lincoln," p. 34. 

( 18 ) William H. Herudon, "Lincoln," p. 39 (edition 1889). 

( 19 ) Ibid., p. 61. 

(20) Ibid., p. 62. 



46 LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



CHAPTER IY. 

A CITIZEN OF ILLINOIS. 

A LETTER came to Thomas Lincoln, postmarked Decatur, 111., writ- 
-*- ten by John Hanks, formerly of Elizabethtown, Ky. He said 
that Illinois was a beautiful State : there were vast reaches of prairie"; 
the soil was rich ; there were winding rivers and creeks, and 
groves of oak, maple, elm, and gum trees. Settlers were pouring 
in, many from Kentucky. If Thomas Lincoln would come, he would 
select a quarter-section of land for him, and have logs cut for a cabin. (') 
The prospect was inviting. The disease which carried the first Mrs. 
Lincoln to her grave reappeared every autumn. There was no partic- 
ular reason why the family should remain at Pigeon Creek. One of the 
step - daughters had married Levi Hall, and the other Dennis Hanks. 
They were ready to go. His own daughter Sarah, who married Aaron 
Grigsby, had died. There were no tender ties to be severed. Abraham 
was twenty-one years old, but ready to cast his lot with the rest. It 
would be a long and tedious journey, but by starting in March they 
w r ould reach the Sangamon country with the beginning of spring. So 
the farm was sold and preparations made for the journey. 

They were eight in all, besides beds, bedding, frying-pan, skillet, 
Dutch-oven, bags of meal, hams, and sides of bacon, in wagons drawn by 
oxen. It was in March the month of snow, sleet, rain, mud, chilling 
winds. The rivers were filled with floating ice or overflowing their 
banks. If they could not find shelter in a cabin at night, they must 
build a camp in the woods or sleep in the wagons. 

Abraham Lincoln is free to go where he will, but the fever and 
restlessness of former days have passed away. He has been a dutiful 
son, and will see his parents in their new home before he strikes out for 
himself. He drives the oxen, or takes his turn in swinging the axe 
to build a camp or a bridge across a creek. When the wagon sinks 
hub-deep in the mire he puts his shoulder to the wheel and lifts it out. 
A little dog trots by the side of the teamster. They come to a river 



A CITIZEN OF ILLINOIS. 49 

with ice upon its banks and in its surging current. The reluctant cat- 
tle wallow the stream with all hands in the wagons. Unwittingly the 
puppy has been left behind; they hear it yelping. It is a worthless 
cur, but Abraham Lincoln has not the heart to leave it. He will not 
have the shivering cattle wade the stream again, but barefooted he re- 
crosses the water, takes the dog in his arms, and returns to the wagons. 
" I cannot bear to see even a puppy in distress," he says, as he brings 
the cur up the bank. ( 2 ) 

Before they reached Decatur two weeks went by days of hardship 
and suffering, the severest weather of the winter. John Hanks had 
been true to his promise ; the logs had been made ready, and, with all 
hands to help, a cabin was quickly constructed. 

At the age of twenty-one, Abraham Lincoln, wearing a jean jacket, 
shrunken buckskin trousers, and 'coon-skin cap, driving an ox-team, 
entered Illinois, to be thenceforth a citizen of that State. He had 
reached the years of manhood. What would he do with himself? For 
what was he fitted? He was so strong of muscle that he could sink 
an axe into a hickory log deeper than any other man in Pigeon Creek ; 
he could pull an oar on a flat-boat ; he could take charge of the cargo 
and successfully dispose of it in New Orleans. He did not like manual 
labor ; it was vastly easier and more delightful to read books. He could 
not teach school for a living, for he did not know enough. What prob- 
ability was there that he would ever do anything beyond chopping, 
rowing, or driving a team ? There was nothing before him except to 
help his father plough fifteen acres of land and split enough rails to 
fence it, and then help plough fifty acres for another settler. His 
clothes were wearing out so fast that he was ashamed to appear in de- 
cent society. He had no money, but bargained with Nancy Miller to 
make him a pair of trousers, he to split 400 fence rails for each yard of 
cloth required 1400 rails in all. It was three miles from his father's 
cabin to her wood -lot, where he made the forest ring through the long 
summer day with his chopping. 

Of the 150,000 people in the State of Illinois in that summer, was 
there one lower down in poverty than he? Was there an individual 
whose outlook for the future was more cheerless? Would he ever be 
able to make headway against the adverse tides of life? For what 
could he hope ? 

The year 1830, which marked his arrival to manhood, may be taken 
as the initial of a new era the beginning of the development of material 
forces and a corresponding advancement of moral ideas. The Erie Canal, 

4 



50 LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 

connecting the Hudson Kiver with the great lakes, had been opened five 
years, and the country was beginning to feel the impetus of that achieve- 
ment. "While he was splitting fence rails, workmen in Massachusetts 
were laying the iron for a railroad between Boston and Lowell the 
first to be completed in the country. The invention of the machine for 
cleaning cotton, separating the fibre from the seed, greatly cheapening 
the cost of cotton cloth and creating a demand for it the world over, 
was setting mill-wheels in motion, and Lowell and other towns were 
becoming busy places of industry. Inventors were making spindles and 
shuttles do the work formerly done by hands. The stage-coach was 
giving place to the locomotive engine. People from Europe were cross- 
ing the Atlantic to find homes in the United States. Twenty thousand 
emigrants came in 1820 ; in 1830 no less than 80,000 arrived ; and by 
an instinct as true as that of the honey-bee winging its way to sweet 
flowers, they selected their homes in those States where there were 
no slaves. With the rivers of New England setting machinery in mo- 
tion for the manufacture of cloth more cotton was called for, and more 
ships were needed to transport it from Charleston and New Orleans 
and other southern ports to Boston. The cotton planters wanted more 
slaves to work in the cotton-fields. As the plant could not be grown in 
Maryland, Virginia, Kentucky, and Missouri, and as slaves were called 
for to cultivate it in the more southern States, the slave-holders in the 
border States began to raise slaves for the Southern markets. Traders 
set up their marts in Baltimore, Washington, Alexandria, Kichmond, 
Louisville, and St. Louis. Gangs of negroes in chains were taken from 
Baltimore across the country, or shipped on vessels to southern ports. 
Steamboats descending the Mississippi Kiver transported other gangs 
from Missouri and Kentucky to the greatest of all markets New Or- 
leans. 

During the days when Abraham Lincoln was floating down the Mis- 
sissippi on a flat-boat, Congress passed a law imposing a duty on cotton 
goods manufactured in other countries. The law was opposed by the 
slave-holders of South Carolina. They regarded it as damaging to their 
interests, for England manufactured far more cotton cloth and yarn 
than was produced by Massachusetts and Ehode Island. More ships 
sailed from Charleston for Liverpool loaded with cotton than for Boston. 
The planters of that State determined to pay no attention to the law, 
but to do as they pleased. Under the clause in the Constitution of the 
United States which counted slaves in the basis of representation in 
Congress, and through the rapid increase of slaves, the institution had 




LIBRARY 
UNIVERSITY 



A CITIZEN OF ILLINOIS. 53 

become a great political power, controlling the Government. Good men 
doctors of divinity, judges, senators, members of Congress men hon- 
ored and respected, saw no moral wrong in holding negroes as slaves. 
There always had been slaves. In Bible times, Moses, who gave laws 
to the children of Israel, established statutes relating to bondmen. 
Abraham had bond-servants. There were slaves in the time of Christ 
and the apostles. Paul told the slaves of his time that they must be 
obedient to their masters. If it was right to hold slaves in those days, 
where was the wrong in holding them in the United States in the year 
1830 ? "Was it not a beneficent institution, divinely ordained by Al- 
mighty God for the best welfare of the human race? So reasoned men 
renowned for learning. 

A young man, born in Newburyport, Mass., was setting type in a 
newspaper office in Baltimore. He did not agree with the general sen- 
timent in regard to slavery. He saw a gang of slaves taken from jail, 
where they had been placed under lock and key to prevent their run- 
ning away, and put on board a ship which was owned and commanded 
by a sea-captain from his native town. Congress had prohibited the 
bringing of slaves from Africa to the United States, and any person vio- 
lating the law was to be regarded as a pirate. The young printer, Will- 
iam Lloyd Garrison, could not see why it was not just as much a crime 
to ship slaves from Baltimore to New Orleans, or anywhere else in 
the country, as to bring them from Africa to Baltimore. He printed 
an article which denounced the act of his fellow-townsman as piracy, 
for doing which he was arrested for libel, tried before the court, 
found guilty, and, because he had no money to pay the fine, was put 
in prison. 

A large-hearted merchant in New York, Arthur Tappan, heard what 
had taken place and paid the money, securing his liberty. We are not 
to conclude that the printer was the first person in the United States 
who saw the iniquity of slave-holding. Forty years before this occur- 
rence Dr. George Buchanan delivered an address before a society which 
had been organized in Baltimore to bring about the abolition of slavery. 
He said that Africans were born free and independent, and that to keep 
them in slavery was an infringement of the laws of God. Other anti- 
slavery societies had been formed before the year 1800 one in Virginia ; 
but at that time slavery was not regarded as profitable, and it had not 
become a great political power, as in 1830. 

The young printer went to Boston to give lectures upon the iniquity 
of the slave-traffic. He found, to his amazement, that people were not 



LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 



1831. 



willing to listen to him. He discovered that there was an intense prej- 
udice against the negro in the Northern States. Being of indomitable 
energy, he established a paper, "The Liberator," which advocated the im- 
mediate abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia and the Terri- 
tories over which Congress had jurisdiction. 

So it came about that at the time when Nancy Miller was making a 
pair of jean trousers, and Abraham Lincoln was splitting rails to pay 
for them, William Lloyd Garrison was issuing the first number of his 
paper. 

The country was divided into two political parties Whig and Dem- 
ocratic. The Democratic party was in power, with Andrew Jackson 
as President. Henry Clay, Senator from Kentucky, was an ac- 
knowledged leader of the Whig party. A book had been pub- 
lished setting forth the political principles of Mr. Clay, which Abraham 
Lincoln read during the days when he could get nothing to do. He 
thought that the principles held by the Senator from Kentucky were 
better for the country than those held by President Jackson. 

The month of March saw John Hanks and Abraham Lincoln pad- 
dling down the Sangamon Kiver in a boat to meet Denton Oifut, of 
Springfield, who was buying corn, beef, pork, and pigs, which they were 
to take to New Orleans. John Johnston was to go with them. Offut 
agreed to give them 50 cents per day and $60 besides. The boat was to 
be ready for them at Judy's Ferry, five miles from Springfield. They 
found Oifut at the Buckhorn Tavern, taking things easy. He had no 

boat, but would like to have 
them build one. He would just 
as soon pay them as anybody 
else. The timber would cost 
them nothing, 
for there was 
an abundance 
along the San- 
gamon, on 
land owned by 
the Govern- 
ment. They 
could get it 

sawed at Mr. Kirkpatrick's mill.( 3 ) Abraham had at one time worked 
with his father at carpentering, and could superintend the construc- 
tion of the boat. The bargain was made. A shanty was built on 




PLACES IN ILLINOIS FREQUENTED BY ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 



A CITIZEN OF ILLINOIS. 



55 







SANGAMON RIVER NEAR NEW SALEM. 

[From a photograph taken by the author in 1890. The view looks down the river towards Petersburg. The mill 
stood at the left. The village of New Salem was amid the trees at the top of the hill.] 



the bank of the river, in which they slept and ate their meals. Abra- 
ham, besides being the head-carpenter, took charge of the cooking. An 
axe, saw, chisel, and auger were the only tools needed. Two great 
trees were felled and hewn for the sides, upon which the planking was 
pinned ; the seams were calked and smeared with pitch. Offut and a 
large number of his friends came out from Springfield to the launch- 
ing, bringing a supply of whiskey. Speeches were made some uphold- 
ing Jackson, others supporting Henry Clay. The cook told funny 
stories and declared himself in favor of Clay. A sleight-of-hand per- 
former was along, and, among other tricks performed, eggs were fried 
in the cook's hat. ( 4 ) 

On April 19th, with the barrels of pork and beef on board, the 
three boatmen bade good-bye to Sangamon town, and floated down the 
river to New Salem. Mr. Rutledge had built a dam at a bend in the 
river and erected a mill on the western bank. The boat, instead of 
gliding over the dam, hung fast upon it. Abraham thought a while, 
and showed John the way out of the difficulty. They must take to the 



56 LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 

shore some of the barrels at the forward end. The seams had not been 
made tight, and the boat was partly filled with water. He would bore 
a hole in the bottom at the end projecting over the dam, which would 
let the water out and lighten the craft. Then he would plug up the 
hole, roll the barrels to the bow, and the boat would slide over. When 
below the dam they could put more oakum in the seams, daub on more 
pitch, and be in good shape for their trip. It was done, with the people 
of New Salem looking on and admiring the ingenuity of the young man 
who devised the plan. 

At Blue Banks a herd of pigs which Offut had purchased of Squire 
Godbey were to be taken on board. The animals were determined not 
to embark on such a craft. The more the three boatmen and Squire 
Godbey tried to drive them, the more they would not go. They munched 
the corn strewn on the ground, but showed no disposition to eat that on 
the boat. 

" We might sew up their eyes, and then they would have to go it 
blind," said Abraham. ( B ) 

As the pigs would not be coaxed, he carried them one by one in his 
arms down the bank and put them on board. (*) Once more they were 
floating with the stream down the Sangamon to the Illinois, where final 
preparations were made for the trip to New Orleans. 

They set up a mast, and, having no canvas, rigged a wooden sail. 
People at Beardstown, Alton, and St. Louis laughed when they be- 
held the contrivance ; the pilots of steamboats, when they saw it, won- 
dered what was coming ; but their wooden sail helped them on when 
the wind was in the right direction to use it. 

They reached New Orleans without special adventure. Abraham 
Lincoln, with no responsibility upon him in disposing of the cargo, as 
when upon the first trip, wandered about the city. He visited the sec- 
tion settled by the Spaniards, and also the quarter occupied by the 
French and Creole population. He saw gangs of slaves which had 
come from Kentucky and Tennessee marched to the sugar-cane and 
cotton plantations. He stood in the auction -room where they were 
sold, and saw women and girls stripped to the waist, men handling 
them as they handled cows and calves : making them run to see if they 
were lame, looking into their mouths to ascertain if their teeth were 
sound, calculating their age, and whether they would bear children. 
He hears the auctioneer telling their good points : how much work they 
can do, what they are fitted for, how good and kind and religious they 
are. He hears the bidding, and beholds maidens shrinking from men 



A CITIZEN OF ILLINOIS. 59 

who look them over with leering eyes. He hears the wailing and sees 
the weeping, as husbands, wives, and children are separated, never to 
meet again. 

The boatman turns away with something rising in his throat, and 
goes out with John Hanks into the sunshine. His lips are quivering, 
for his soul is on fire. 

"John, if I ever get a chance to hit that institution, Pll hit it hard, 
by the Eternal GodF^) 

Who is he, to hit the institution of slavery a blow ? He is only a 
boatman, a wood - chopper, teamster, backwoodsman nothing more. 
What position of influence is he likely to attain to enable him to strike 
at slavery? His school -days have been less than a year. He is 
unknown, except to a few people. Slavery is incorporated into the 
framework of society and legalized in half of the States of the Ke- 
public. It is intrenched in Church and State alike ; pronounced by 
doctors of divinity and statesmen to be divinely established for the good 
of the human race. It is a political force, recognized by the Constitu- 
tion of the United States ; it enters into the organization of Congress, 
and dictates as to the affairs of government and the election of Presi- 
dents. Is there the remotest probability that he will ever be able to 
strike a blow at such an institution ? Why does he speak the words ? 
Why lift his right hand to heaven and swear a solemn oath ? Is it that 
those eyes, looking as his mother's looked, far away, catch some dim 
vision of what may be by-and-by ? Does the thought come that in the 
unfolding years an all-directing Providence in human affairs has some- 
thing especially marked out for him to accomplish ? Is it an illumina- 
tion by some spirit-force of a coming conflict in which he is to take a 
conspicuous part the whispering of some messenger from an unseen 
realm that he is the one chosen to give freedom to millions of slaves? 
Be that as it may, certainly no words ever spoken by the prophets of 
Israel have had a larger fulfilment than those uttered by Abraham 
Lincoln in the streets of New Orleans. 

As we thus go over the events in the life of this carpenter's son, we 
think of the Son of another carpenter, and recall his words: "Wist ye 
not that I must be about my Father's business ?" 

The three boatmen returned to St. Louis, accompanied by their em- 
ployer, who was intending to open a store in New Salem, where Abra- 
ham Lincoln had exhibited his ingenuity in getting the flat-boat over 
Kutledge's mill-dam. Offut remained at St. Louis to purchase goods, 
and the three boatmen made their way on foot across the country to 



60 LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 

Farmington, near the eastern boundary of Illinois, where Thomas Lin- 
coln was preparing to build a new house. On an appointed day Abra- 
ham was to meet Offut at New Salem, and begin business with him as 
clerk and salesman. 

Keaching Farmington, he assisted his father in building a cabin con- 
taining two rooms. It was of hewn logs, and much superior to any of 
the former dwellings. 

We have seen that the recreations and pleasures of people on the 
frontier were exhibitions of physical strength. Daniel Needham, cham- 
pion wrestler of Coles County, had put many men on their backs, and 
boasted loudly of his powers. Having heard that there was a strong 
young flat -boatman in Farmington, he sent him a special challenge, 
which the boatman accepted. Abraham Lincoln found his highest 
pleasure in reading, but he was by no means indifferent to the pleasure 
that comes from putting forth physical strength. The match was held 
at Wabash Point. Needham soon found himself on the ground. Cha- 
grined at his discomfiture, he demanded a second trial, to be again 
vanquished. The boatman, in consequence of his victory, became very 
popular with the young men of Coles County. (") 

On the day appointed, the clerk engaged by Offut stepped from a 
canoe at Rutledge's mill. He had paddled down the river from Decatur. 
New Salem was a collection of log-houses overlooking the beautiful val- 
ley of the Sangamon. Offut was there to welcome him, but the goods 
had not arrived. The future clerk had time, therefore, to make the ac- 
quaintance of the people. The day for the annual election came. Men- 
tor Graham was clerk, but the assistant clerk was not present. Mr. 
Graham noticed a tall young man loitering about the village, and vent- 
ured to ask him if he could write. " I can make a few rabbit-tracks," 
was the reply ; whereupon he was installed in office. The voters were 
not long in discovering that the assistant clerk was honest and fair, 
and performed his duties faithfully. More than that, he entertained 
them with stories. (") 

One of the citizens of New Salem was departing for Texas with his 
family. It was not far to the Illinois River, and the most expeditious 
way of reaching Beardstovvn, where he could take a steamboat for St. 
Louis, would be by flat-boat down the Sangamon. The assistant clerk 
of elections engaged to convey the family to the Illinois, and once more 
was pulling an oar. The water was low, and the boat often grounded 
on the sand-bars ; but all obstacles were surmounted, and the trip suc- 
cessfully accomplished. 




A CREOLE HOME IN NEW ORLEANS. 



A CITIZEN OF ILLINOIS. 63 

Upon the arrival of Offut's goods, the boatman became clerk and 
salesman. It was a country store, and the articles for sale were such 
as a newly-settled agricultural community on the frontier would espe- 
cially need. Women wanted pins, needles, thread ; they asked if the 
calico which they examined would " wash ;" they " chinked " the crock- 
ery to discover a possible crack. Their presence, in comparison with the 
men whom he met on flat-boats, made the air sweet and pure. He 
greeted them with a pleasant smile, and was so truthful in Avhat he said 
about the goods, and gave such just Aveight, that they soon had implicit 
confidence in him. In keeping accounts he was careful to reckon the 
half and quarter cents. We are to remember that the mint at Phil- 
adelphia for coining money had been in operation but little more than 
thirty years ; not many dimes and twenty - five cent pieces were in 
circulation, but fourpence, sixpence, ninepence, and shilling pieces of 
English coinage, together with many Spanish coins, were in use. A 
silver fourpence coin was valued at six and one-fourth cents. A nine- 
pence coin was worth twelve and one-half cents. If Abraham Lincoln 
made a mistake in reckoning or weighing he was quick to rectify it the 
moment he discovered the error. He was closing the store one evening 
when a woman came for a half-pound of tea. In the morning he saw 
from the weight in the scale that he had given her only one-quarter of a 
pound. Leaving everything else he weighed out the other ounces and 
carried them to her. Another customer paid him six and one-quarter 
cents more than was his due, and when the store was closed at night he 
hastened to correct the mistake, although she lived two miles away. ( 10 ) 

Denton Offut's store was the social exchange for a wide extent of 
country along the Sangamon the place where people could hear from 
his clerk what was going on in the world. After the arrival of the 
mail (which brought his newspaper, the " Louisville Journal "), he could 
tell them what Congress was doing, and what was occurring throughout 
the country and on the other side of the Atlantic. They discovered that 
he could talk intelligently upon a great many questions. Some of the 
fellows who made the store a lounging-place while their corn was grind- 
ing at Eutledge's mill used profane language. One of them had so little 
sense of what was decent that he used vile words when women were 
present. 

" Don't use such language here," said Lincoln. 

" Who are you ? I'll swear when and where I please. I can lick 
you," said the fellow. 

" When the ladies are gone I'll let you have a chance to do so." 



64 LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 

The women departed, and the bully dared Lincoln to touch him. 
Little did the ruffian comprehend the strength and resolution of the man 
whom he had incensed. Suddenly he found himself lying on the ground 
and blows falling upon him like the strokes of a hammer. He begged 
for mercy, and Lincoln bathed the fellow's face with water to relieve 
the pain.( n ) 

" He can lift more than any other man in Sangamon County ; and 
when it comes to wrestling, he can throw the whole crowd," said Offut. 

The " Clary Grove boys," as they were called, heard of it. They 
were a wild and lawless set of fellows, who lived seven or eight miles 
from New Salem. Jack Armstrong was their champion wrestler and 
leader. They found pleasure in picking upon a stranger, and having fun 
with any one weaker than themselves. It was delightful sport to put a 
man into a cask and set it rolling down a hill. They rode through the 
settlements at night whooping, swearing, frightening women and chil- 
dren. They cared nothing for law or order, and were a terror to the 
country. 

" Jack Armstrong will put Offut's clerk on his back in a twinkling," 
said one of the gang. 

" I'll bet that Lincoln will use him to wipe his feet on," said Offut. 

" I'll bet $10 that Jack is the better man," responded Bill Clary. 

" I'll take that bet, and as much more as you and your gang will 
put up." 

" I do not want to wrestle," said Lincoln, when Offut asked him to 
engage in a contest with Jack Armstrong. He was no longer a boatman ; 
he was drifting away from former things. There was something in life 
better than wrestling. He looked every day into the faces of noble 
women and pure -hearted girls as they examined the goods w r hich he 
placed before them. What would they think of him if he found his 
greatest pleasure in wrestling with Jack ? 

" I want you to teach those fellows a lesson," said Offut. " They are 
a set of bullies, and I want you to take them down." 

Quite likely Abraham Lincoln was not averse to teaching them a 
lesson, and there would be some satisfaction in putting their champion 
upon the ground. The match was arranged, and the day fixed. All 
the Clary Grove fellows, and others up and down the Sangamon, heard 
of it, and laid their plans to be present, some staking their money on 
Armstrong, others on Offut's clerk. The day arrives ; !New r Salem is 
astir. The spectators tie their horses beneath the trees and take a drink 
of whiskey. The ring is formed. There is a friendly hand-shaking as 



A CITIZEN OF ILLINOIS. 67 

the contestants enter it ; then comes the grappling, turning, the strain- 
ing of muscles. If Jack Armstrong imagined it would be an easy vic- 
tory, he found himself mistaken. He tries his peculiar tricks, which 
have given him victory over other wrestlers ; but somehow this clerk of 
Offut's, who spends so much time in reading, does not go down. He 
seems to be playing with Jack, and biding his time. Jack's friends do 
not like the looks of things ; if he is vanquished they will lose their 
bets, and it will be humiliating. One of the gang attempts to interfere 
in behalf of Armstrong. 

" Fair play !" " Stand back !" " Let them alone !" were the cries 
from the excited crowd. Lincoln sees that the Clary Grove fellows in- 
tend to help Jack gain an advantage ; like another Samson he puts forth 
his strength, and the hitherto champion of Sangamon goes to the ground. 

Armstrong's friends are amazed and angry. But there is good stuff 
in Jack. He knows that he has been fairly thrown, and exhibits his 
manhood by rising and shaking hands with Lincoln. From that mo- 
ment through life he will be a steadfast friend. The Clary Grove boys 
have lost their bets, but forget their anger in their admiration for the 
man who does not crow over what he has done. ( 12 ) 

Abraham Lincoln was champion ; but instead of wrestling, he wanted 
to study grammar. Mentor Graham thought that Mr. Yaner might 
possibly have a text-book. Although it was several miles, he walked to 
Yaner's house, and returned with a copy of "Kirkham's Grammar." 
Customers who came to trade the next day found him lying on the 
counter with the book in hand, his head pillowed on a pile of cotton 
goods. He knew that his language was not grammatical. He wanted 
to express himself clearly and correctly. It was a pleasure to read the 
editorial articles in the " Louisville Journal," because they were so well 
written. He would like to be able to write so that people would under- 
stand just what he intended to say. With that object in view, he de- 
termined to know the parts of speech and the rules which govern the 
construction of language. He had no one to teach him, but went on 
as best he could. ( 13 ) 

While the clerk was waiting upon customers, keeping exact accounts, 
and getting on with his grammar, Offut was buying produce, trading 
horses, and speculating generally ; giving his notes, which were not paid 
when due. He transacted business in such a lucky-go-easy way that the 
day came when the sheriff took possession of the store. 

Abraham Lincoln was adrift once more. Good news came. Cap- 
tain Bogue, of Springfield, had gone to Cincinnati to obtain a steamboat 



68 LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 

which was to navigate the Sangamon. Meetings were held in Spring- 
field, New Salem, and other towns, to help on the enterprise. The 
merchants at Springfield informed their customers that their 
goods were to be brought direct from Cincinnati by the steamboat 
" Talisman," which would ascend the Illinois and the Sangamon rivers. 
It was April, and the spring floods enabled Captain Bogue to make the 
upward trip without much difficulty. Some work must be done, how- 
ever, in cutting away trees to enable the boat to reach New Salem. 
Abraham Lincoln was one of the first to volunteer his services as a 
wood-chopper. At the Springfield landing the people welcomed him 
with speeches and plenty of liquor. A young lawyer wrote a " poem :" 

" Now we are up the Sangamon, 
And here we'll have a grand hurrah ; 
So fill your glasses to the brii- 
With whiskey, brandy, wine, and gin."( 14 ) 



The " Talisman " went on to Decatur. But the water was falling, and 
the captain despaired of ever getting back, on account of the sand-bars 
and drift-wood embedded in the mud ; so he wisely employed the two 
boatmen, who had navigated the Mississippi to New Orleans, to take 
the craft down to the Illinois. They had much difficulty to get past the 
mill-dam at New Salem, but Beardstown was finally reached, and the 
boatmen received $40 each for their labor. 

The Sac and Fox Indians of Wisconsin, who had given up their lands 
to the United States and moved to Iowa, determined to return to their 
old hunting-grounds. Their chief, Black Hawk, began war by commit- 
ting outrages upon the settlers of that section. The Governor of Illi- 
nois called for soldiers. Abraham Lincoln enlisted. The young men 
along the Sangamon volunteered in sufficient numbers to form a com- 
panv. They elected him captain. He knew nothing of military tactics, 
and his soldiers were equally ignorant. With rifle, powder-horn, knap- 
sack, and canteen the march was begun to Yellow Bank, on the Missis- 
sippi River. The company is marching battalion front, and comes to a 
fence which has a narrow opening. Captain Lincoln does not know 
what order he ought to give to get them into single file, and were he 
to give it correctlv the company might not know how to execute it. 
He sees that something must be done : his soldiers will laugh at him if 
they are brought to a stand-still by a rail-fence. There is one order 
which they will comprehend. 



A CITIZEN OF ILLINOIS. 69 

" Halt !" he shouts. " This company is dismissed for two minutes ; 
it will reassemble on the other side of the fence. Break ranks !"('*) 

The dignity of Captain Lincoln was maintained, and possibly most 
of his soldiers thought it the proper order to be given. 

The steamboats which were to take the soldiers up the Mississippi 
were not at the appointed landing. The troops had nothing to do. 
They marched, countermarched, wheeled, and performed other evolu- 
tions ; but time dragged." They were impatient of military restraint and 
became quarrelsome. They had little respect for their superior offi- 
cers, and it required much tact on the part of Abraham Lincoln to 
preserve order ; but with the arrival of the steamboats and a supply of 
food harmony was restored. 

We are not to suppose that such a motley set of young men could be 
brought under strict military discipline in two or three weeks ; neither 
should we conclude that Captain Lincoln could assume military dignity 
in the same space of time. On the contrary, the captain thought it not 
undignified to take part in wrestling-matches. Possibly he won respect 
and honor by putting his soldiers one after another on their backs; 
one only was his equal in strength. Though he took part in the games, 
he did not lose his authority as their commander. An old Indian came 
into camp, bringing a letter written by General Lewis Cass, who stated 
that the bearer was entitled to protection ; that he was friendly, and 
had taken no part in the uprising. 

The soldiers discredited the letter. " It is a forgery," said one, who 
did not think of the absurdity of what he was saying. The soldiers had 
come to fight Indians ; they thought there were no friendly Indians. 

" Shoot him !" they shouted. 

" No, you will not shoot him I shall protect him ! I'll shoot the 
first man who lays hands on him !" was the calm but resolute reply of 
their captain. 

The company was part of a regiment commanded by Colonel Samuel 
Thompson, which marched northward to Dixon. The troops halted to 
await the arrival of United States soldiers. Two battalions of horse- 
men, under Majors Stillman and Bailey, were eager to encounter the 
Indians perhaps thinking it would be fun to chase them across the 
prairies. The horsemen advanced and reached Old Man's Creek, where 
they suddenly found themselves confronted by Black Hawk and a large 
number of Indians. The soldiers became panic-stricken and fled to 
Dixon, the Indians pursuing and killing several. In the morning not 
an Indian was to be seen. 



70 LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 

The time expired for which the soldiers from Sangamon had en- 
listed. They had not fought a battle, but were weary of military life. 
All the company, with the exception of Captain Lincoln and one pri- 
vate, returned to Sangamon. The captain was without a command, 
but he could become a private, and accordingly enlisted in a company 
of cavalry commanded by Captain Elijah lies. It was known as the 
" Independent Spy Battalion." It was a holiday service, lasting three 
weeks. The Indians were defeated in a battle at Bad Axe, and Black 
Hawk taken prisoner. The " Independent Spy Battalion " was not pres- 
ent to take part in the engagement. Private Lincoln saw no fighting, 
and was mustered out of service June 16th by young Lieutenant Kobert 
Anderson. 

From Fox Eiver Lincoln and his fellow-soldier, Harrison, made their 
way to the Illinois Kiver at Peoria, where they obtained a canoe and 
paddled to Havana, and from that town walked to New Salem. 



NOTES TO CHAPTER IV. 

(') Nicolay and Hay, "Abraham Lincoln: A History," vol. i., p. 45. 

( 2 ) William H. Herndon, "Lincoln," p. 68 (edition 1889). 

( 3 ) Herndon speaks of the plank as being sawed at Kirkpatrick's mill. J.G.Hol- 
land, visiting Illinois immediately after the death of President Lincoln, 1865, says: 
" Every plank of it was sawed by hand with a whip-saw." "Life of Abraham Lincoln," 
p. 42. 

(*) William H. Herndon, "Lincoln," p. 73 (edition 1889). 
().Ibid., p. 75. 

( 6 ) J. G. Holland, "Life of Abraham Lincoln," p. 42. 
(') William H. Herndon, "Lincoln," p. 76 (edition 1889). 
( B ) Ibid. 

( 9 ) Mrs. Lizzie H. Bell's letter quoted in Nicolay and Hay's "Abraham Lincoln: 
A History," vol. i., p. 78, note. 

( 10 ) J. G. Holland, "Life of Abraham Lincoln," p. 43. 
( ) Ibid., p. 44. 

( 12 ) William H. Herndou, "Lincoln," p. 43 (edition 1880). 

( 13 ) Ibid., p. 84. 

(") Ibid., p. 88. 

( 16 ) Ibid,, p. 93, note. 



LIFE AT NEW SALEM. 71 



CHAPTER Y. 

LIFE AT NEW SALEM. 

IN a community where every man casts a vote there will ever be a 
large number of people who will desire to hold office or represent 
their fellow-citizens in making laws. In Illinois those who desired po- 
litical distinction might aspire to be candidates for any position 
Ausust ' and enter the list independent of nomination by a convention 
of electors. Before volunteering as a soldier, Abraham Lincoln 
had announced that he would be a candidate for the Legislature. It 
was only ten days before the election when he reached New Salem. His 
friends welcomed his return. Those who had served under him as sol- 
diers were ready to persuade their friends to cast their ballots for him. 
He had shown his patriotism by being one of the first to enlist, and had 
re-enlisted when others, wearied of the restraints of camp-life, returned 
to their homes. He was brave, resolute, kind-hearted, and had a mind 
of his own ; in wrestling he had put the best men of the regiment on 
their backs all save one. Though most of them were Democrats and 
he a Whig, they were ready to vote for him. A majority of the people 
in Illinois accepted the political principles held by President Andrew 
Jackson. Abraham Lincoln supported the principles held by Henry 
Clay, who believed the nation ought to improve the rivers, make them 
navigable, and pass laws which would protect the industries of the coun- 
try by imposing a tariff on goods made in other countries. He thought 
a national bank would be a good thing for the country. Candidates bet- 
ter known to the people than he were making speeches in the villages 
throughout the county. 

There was to be an auction of horses, cattle, and pigs at Pappsville, 
twelve miles from Springfield, where all the candidates would speak. 
The people for miles around would be there to hear them, and help 
themselves to free whiskey. The day arrives, and Pappsville is alive. 
A stand for the speakers had been erected. Those who gather around 
it see a very tall young man, wearing a blue jean clawhammer, bobtail 



72 LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 

coat, tow-and-wool trousers, cowhide boots, and a straw hat, laughing 
and telling stories to those around him. It is Captain Lincoln, and 
those who served under him in the war with the Indians are grasping 
his brawny hand. His face is bronzed from exposure to the sun and 
winds upon the prairies. The other candidates speak. He is a young 
man of twenty-three years, and respectfully waits his turn. Whiskey has 
flowed so freely that some ruffians in the crowd are quarrelsome. Cap- 
tain Lincoln sees one of his friends sorely beset by a bully. He jumps 
from the platform, gives the fellow a threshing, tosses him aside as if he 
were but a boy, returns to the platform, and listens to the other candidates 
just as if nothing had happened. It is a brief speech which he makes : 

" Fellow-citizens, I presume you would like to know who I am. I am 
humble Abraham Lincoln. I have been solicited by my friends to be- 
come a candidate for the Legislature. My politics are short and sweet, 
like the old woman's dance. I am in favor of a national bank ; I am in 
favor of the internal improvement system and a high protective tariff. 
These are my sentiments and principles. If elected I shall be thankful ; 
if not, it will be all the same/'C) 

Another meeting was held at Springfield, where he made a longer 
speech. One who was present has described his appearance on that 
occasion : 

"He was tall, gawky, and a rough - looking fellow. His panta- 
loons didn't meet his shoes by six inches ; but after he began speak- 
ing I became much interested in him. He made a very sensible 
speech." (") 

Four representatives were to be elected. There were twelve candi- 
dates. Abraham Lincoln was not chosen. He could not go to Vandalia, 
the capital of the State, as a representative. What should he do ? He 
did not want to be a boatman or wood -chopper. Would it not be well 
for him to become a blacksmith? He turned the matter over,( 8 ) but 
suddenly found himself again keeping store in an unexpected way. 
Rowan and James Herndon, after the failure of Offut, opened a store at 
New Salem. James sold his interest to Mr. Berry, who induced Lin- 
coln to purchase the interest held by Rowan Herndon. Lincoln had 
no money, but Herndon was ready to take his note. Another store was 
opened by Reuben Radford about the same time. 

"You had better get on good terms with the Clary Grove boys," 
said Radford's father, " or they will trouble you." 

Radford stayed at the store several evenings, expecting a visit from 
the gang ; but as they did not come, and wishing to spend a night a few 



LIFE IN NEW SALEM. 73 

miles distant, he left the store in charge of a younger brother Jack, 
sixteen years old. 

" You may give the boys, if they come, two drinks all round, but no 
more," he said. 

It was the evening chosen by the fellows for a lark in New Salem. 

" Well, boy, aren't you going to give us a treat ?" they asked. 

" Oh yes," and they were each given a generous drink. 

" It is about time for another snifter, isn't it, sonny ?" they said, after 
a while. 

" Yes ;" and Jack served them once more. 

They lounged about the store, sang songs, danced, and made them- 
selves at home. 

" Well, Jack, we reckon that it is time for another nipper," they said. 

" You can't have any more. Rube said I might give you two drinks, 
but no more." 

" Oh ho ! he said so, did he ? We will see 1" And each one of the 
crew went to the whiskey-barrel, took a big drink, and filled his bottle. 
The whiskey was doing its work they danced and whooped like 
Indians. 

" I'll bet the drinks I can beat you in hitting those jars," said one, 
seizing a weight and smashing a glass jar. Each in turn brought the 
jars and crockery crashing to the floor; then frying-pans, skillets, 
Dutch-ovens, coffee-pots, tin basins, milk-pans, saucers, plates and plat- 
ters, molasses-jugs, went flying through the air. The glass in the win- 
dows rattled to the ground, and the door was torn from its hinges. 
A little past midnight they rode whooping homeward, with cow-bells 
tied to their saddles. 

The sun was just rising when Reuben Radford was awakened by 
the cow -bells and whooping, as the gang rode past the house where 
he was spending the night. Suspecting there might be trouble, he 
mounted his horse and galloped towards New Salem, passing on the 
way a boy of sixteen, William G. Green, who had started early in the 
morning with a bag of corn to be ground at Mr. Rutledge's mill. Rad- 
ford reached the store, beheld the wreck and ruin, and heard Jack's 
story. He had no particular desire to be a merchant any longer, and 
was ready to sell out. 

" I'll sell this store to the first person who makes me an offer," said 
he, as Green rode up ; and added, " What will you give for it ?" 

The boy looked through the window and surveyed the interior 
the shattered glass and crockery, the helter-skelter of frying-pans and 



74 



LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 



broken jugs. He noticed many of the most valuable articles had not 
been disturbed, and without much thought, and in fun rather than in 
earnest, said, " I'll give you $400." 

" It is a bargain." 

" But I haven't any money," 

" No matter ; I'll take your note." 

Green dismounted, entered the store, and signed a note promising 
to pay $400 after a specified number of days. A little later Abraham 




RUTLEDGE S MILL. 

[From a photograph by C. S. McCullough, Petersburg, 111. Lincoln & Berry's store stood 
near the trees at the right of the view.] 

Lincoln came, beheld the broken crockery and general confusion, and 
laughed as he listened to Jack Radford's account of how the Clary 
Grove boys danced, yelled, and smashed things. Green told the story 
of the purchase. 

" Billy," said Lincoln, " I shouldn't be surprised if you had made a 
good bargain. I'll help you take an inventory." ( 4 ) 

Young Green, whose education had been limited, did not know just 



LIFE IN NEW SALEM. 75 

what an inventory might be. If it was a further smashing, he said he 
did not care for it. Lincoln explained it was an estimate of the value 
of each article. " You will need it, to be able to fix prices." 

The man who said this was part owner in a rival store ; but he was 
ready to help the boy who thoughtlessly had begun as a trader. They 
hung the door on its hinges and nailed boards over the window. Green 
took his corn to the mill and Lincoln left for his breakfast. Through 
the day he went over the inventory with Green. The broken glass and 
crockery were swept out and things put in place. 

" Billy, it figures up more than $1200 at St. Louis prices," said Lin- 
coln, when the inventory was completed. Customers came, listened to 
the story, laughed over it, and purchased articles. During the day 
Green sold goods to the amount of $15. 

Mr. Lincoln's partner, Berry, thought it would be a good business 
operation to buy out Green. 

" What will you take for your bargain ?" he asked. 

Berry owned a good horse, which Green thought he would like to 
obtain. Although he was only sixteen years old, he had an eye to busi- 
ness, and was ready to quit being a store-keeper. Besides, he was not 
quite sure how his father would look upon what he was doing. 

" I'll tell you what I'll do. If you will let me have your horse, 
saddle, and bridle, $200 cash, and you and Lincoln will give your joint 
notes for $200, I'll call it a bargain." 

Lincoln had made the inventory, and found the property was worth 
$1200. Berry having $200 in silver on hand, the offer was accepted, 
the notes signed, and the transfer completed. "With the goods of both 
stores put into one building, Berry and Lincoln began business on a 
larger scale, having a monopoly of trade in New Salem. 

It was nearly midnight when Green, riding the horse obtained from 
Berry, and leading the other with the bag of meal on its back, reached 
home. Having put the horses in the stable, he lifted the latch and en- 
tered the house. His father and mother were in bed. They had heard 
what had been going on at New Salem : the wreck done by the Clary 
Grove boys, and the purchase by their son. 

" "Well, boy," said his father, " you think you can be a store-keeper, 
do you ? I'll teach you a lesson not to buy a store when I send you 
to mill. Go to bed, you rascal, and be prepared for a threshing in the 
morning !" 

"Hold on, father!" said the son, raking open the coals in the fire- 
place and throwing on a stick of wood. He seated himself on the floor 



76 LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 

and began to toss shillings, quarters, and half dollars on the hearth, 
which rang as they fell. The father heard the jingling, and sat up in 
bed, gazing with astonishment at the growing pile. 

" Wife, give me a chaw of tobacco," he said. He took the quid, sat 
more erect, spat at the fire, and gazed at the shining pieces of silver. 

" There is $215.12|. Besides this, I have got Berry's horse, saddle, 
and bridle in the stable, and his and Lincoln's notes for $200," said the 
son. 

" Wife, get up ! Billy must have some supper the best you can get. 
Billy, I won't thresh you in the morning. You are a good bov good 
boy!"(') 

It was a dull winter for trade. Although Berry and Lincoln were 
the only store-keepers in New Salem, they were not making much head- 
way in business. The farmers had little produce to sell, conse- 
quently could not purchase many goods. Berry, the while, was 
drinking whiskey, and Lincoln was thinking of what was going on in 
South Carolina and in Congress rather than how to increase trade. 
South Carolina was proposing to pass a law to nullify the acts of Con- 
gress, because a tariff was to be collected on goods brought from other 
countries. In Congress Daniel Webster, of Massachusetts, made a speech 
on the Constitution and the Union which electrified the country ; Pres- 
ident Jackson uttered a solemn oath that the Union should be pre- 
served. All of which was interesting reading to Lincoln. 

The partners thought they might make money by keeping a tavern, 
and took out a license, which prescribed the prices they might charge 
per pint for liquors: French brandy, 25 cents; peach brandy, 18| 
cents; apple brandy, 12 cents; Holland gin, 18| cents; wine, 25 cents; 
rum, 18| cents; whiskey, 12-^ cents. Meals, 25 cents each; lodging, 
12 cents. Horse for the night, 25 cents. Breakfast, dinner, or supper 
for passengers in the stage, 37-3- cents. 

The project of keeping a tavern was not carried out. The store 
was sold to Trent Brothers. They had no money, but gave their notes. 
Lincoln and Berry had given their own notes first to the Herndons, 
then to Green. From the beginning the transactions were pretty much 
in notes. No one seemed to look forward to the time when they would 
become due, or made any preparation for such an event. The Trents 
probably had no thought of ever paying. They would get what they 
could for the goods and leave town. Berry became a loathsome sot 
and died. Abraham Lincoln found himself held on the joint notes 
which had been given to the Herndons and to Green. He could not 



LIFE IN NEW SALEM. 



pay them, but did not repudiate them. He had put in no capital. If 

the creditors would not harass him he would do his best to pay them. 

Years went by, the debts hanging like a millstone about his neck, 

but were paid finally, principal and interest, to the last cent. He would 

not have been true to him- 

,* t f 

self, would not have been 
Abraham Lincoln, had he 
not done so. 

The little money he 
had when the Trents took 
the store was soon gone. 
His board bill at Rut- 
ledge's tavern was due. 
lie would like to spend 
his time in reading; but 
there was no chafing of 
spirit as he shouldered his 
axe and went down the 
hill -side to the woods 
along the river, chopping 
down trees in order to 
obtain splints, which ho 
carried to a shanty, where 
his evenings were spent 

OAK-TREES STANDING NEAR THE SITE OF BERRY & LIN- 
m COLN'S STOKE. 

He WaS twenty - lOUr [From a photograph by C. S. McCullough, Petersburg, 111.] 

years old, without an oc- 
cupation, and did not know for what he was fitted. He would like to 
be a lawyer. He had not forgotten the plea of lawyer Breckenridge 
in Indiana. He had come in contact with the prominent lawyers of 
Springfield : Stephen T. Logan and Major John T. Stuart. The last 
named served with him in the war with the Indians. His old comrade 
was very kind, and loaned him a law-book. The people of New Salem 
sometimes saw him stretched upon the ground beneath an oak-tree 
studying it. Eussell Godby wanted a hand to help harvest his corn 
and gave him work. He was astonished to see his new hand, when 
resting, seated on a stump reading a book. Never before had he be- 
held a fellow with a book in the field. 

" What are you reading, Abe ?" 

" I am not reading ; I am studying." 




78 



LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 



1838. 



" Studying ! What, I should like to know ?" 
" Law, sir." 

" Great God Almighty !" exclaimed Godby. It was not a profane 
expression, but one of astonishment. 

When the book was finished, the farm hand walked to Springfield 
and obtained another from his friend. He earned money enough to 
pay his board by assisting Mr. Ellis, who had opened a store. When a 
customer came he put his book aside, but took it up again the moment 
he was at leisure. 

Just how it happened is not known, but he was appointed post- 
master. President Jackson was a Democrat, and did not appoint 
many Whigs to office ; for he had given utterance to the expression, 
" To the victors belong the spoils." Lincoln was in a Dem- 
ocratic community, but was popular with Whigs and Democrats 
alike. So few letters came to New Salem that the revenue would hardly 
pay him for the trouble of receiving and sending the weekly mail. His 
hat was the post-office. He thrust the letters into it, and kindly carried 
them to the people in the village to whom they were addressed. 

The young postmaster at 
New Salem greatly admired 
Henry Clay, of Kentucky, who 
had been Senator, and also 
member of President John 
Quincy Adams's Cabinet. In 
1829 a young man, George D. 
Prentice, who was born in Con- 
necticut, established a news- 
paper, the "New England Ee- 
view," at Hartford, in that 
State. He had graduated at 
Brown University, and was a 
very able and witty writer. 
His poems were appearing in 
the newspapers. Mr. Clay was* 
| a candidate for the Presidency, 
[ and Mr. Prentice was einploy- 
; ed to write his life. So it came 
about that John G. Whittier, 
whom the world has since 
WTLLTAM G. GREEN OCTOBER, 1890. heard of, became editor of 




LIFE IN NEW SALEM. 



79 




GEOKGE D. PRENTICE. 



the " Keview," and Mr. Prentice went to Kentucky and prepared a life 
of Mr. Clay, a copy of which fell into the hands of the young postmas- 
ter at New Salem, who read it with great care, and who accepted the 
political principles of the Kentucky statesman. Mr. Clay needed a news- 
paper to set forth his principles, and Mr. Prentice accordingly estab- 



80 LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 

lished the "Louisville Journal," for which the postmaster at New 
Salem had subscribed. He found great pleasure in reading its witty 
and pungent paragraphs to the loungers in Mr. Hill's store, such as 
the folloAving : 

"An editor in Indiana threatens to handle us without gloves. We certainly would 
never think of handling him without three pair, and thick ones at that." 

"What would you do, madam, if you were a gentleman ?" 
" Sir, what would you do if you were one ?" 

" Strange that a dinner to which a man has not been invited is generally the one that 
sits hardest on the stomach." 

It is certain that he must have laughed heartily over Mr. Prentice's 
account of what happened in Louisville : 

"Mr. Trotter, without provocation, attempted to shoot Mr. Clark in the street. Mr. 
O'Hara, friend of Trotter, made an attack upon Mr. Bryant, associate of Clark. Bryant 
gave O'Hara an effectual cudgelling, and then laid his cane over the head and shoulders of 
Mr. Trotter till the latter cried for quarter. There the matter ended. Mr. Clark retired to 
reload his pistols, Mr. Bryant to purchase a new cane, and Mr. Trotter and Mr. O'Hara to 
get their heads mended." 

Mr. Trotter was editor of the " Louisville Gazette," and said in his 
paper : " The infamy of George D. Prentice is notorious. He is shunned 
by all honorable men. The mark of Cain is on his brow." 

" Mr. George T