Evening star. [volume], April 12, 1931, Page 8, Image 82

About Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972

Image provided by: Library of Congress, Washington, DC

                
8
Mrs. Lincoln as the Nation’s First Ladv
J
BY JOHN CLAGETT PROCTOR.
£ L TT ~W~ T" HILE her sister- women
M M / scraped lint, sewed bandages
M/m/ and put on nurses - caps and
m' B' gave their all to country and
to death, the wife of its
President spent her time in rolling to and
fro between WashinjLcn and New York, in
tent on extravagant purchases for herself and
the White House Mrs. Lincoln seemed to
have nothing to do but to ‘shop,’ and the
reports of her lavish bargains in the news
papers were vulgar and sensational in the
extreme. The wives and daughters of other
Presidents had managed to dress as elegant
women without the process of so doing becom
ing prominent or public. But not a new dress
or jewel was bought by Mrs. Lincoln that did
not find its way into the newspapers.”
How unjust Were these remarks, made 57
years ago, and at a time, too, when Mrs.
Lincoln was mentally unable to reply had she
wished to have done so. "Man's inhumanity
to man!” —and that also means, of course,
woman's inhumanity to woman!
It does seem that when a fellow is down
someone is always eager to push him just a
little bit farther. Perhaps, if his heart is rent
with anguish, to open just a little wider the
gaping wound of an already dying soul.
How can we account for such words, and
spoken, too, of the wife of the greatest Amer
ican this counry has had since the passing of
George Washington. Even were it true—and
those who were personally acquainted with
the facts say it was not —would it not have
been more charitable to have left them unsaid?
How much regard could the wielder of this
poison pen have had for even Mrs. Lincoln's
Christian name—one of the most inspiring and
sacred in biblical history!
Mrs. Lincoln had her enemies. Mrs. Lincoln
had her friends. But the former, for all the
mean and uncharitable things they cared to
say, unfortunately gained the larger amount
of publicity; just as the stripping of character
is seized upon today by some publications.
man ever went into the White House
x under such trying and adverse conditions
as did Abraham Lincoln —actually stealing his
way into the Capital of the Nation for the
inaugural ceremonies. No woman ever accom
panied her husband into the highest office
within the gift of the people and suffered more
in so doing than did Mrs. Lincoln. If almost
continuous anguish from 1861 to 1865, result
ing in- a broken, bleeding heart for her loved
ones who died from disease and in battle,
climaxed with the murder of her husband, can
be said to be some of the frivolities and diver
sions she enjoyed during the Civil War. then
we will admit that her stay in the White House
was careless and free. But with a knowledge
of what Mrs. Lincoln endured during those
little over four years, it is safe to say that there
is not today a sane woman in the United States
who would change places with her even for
the honor of being the First Lady of the Land,
were such a change at this time possible.
Mrs. Lincoln was a Southern woman, and,
like her great husband, was born in Kentucky.
She loved her Southland, where there were so
many ties of blood; but she loved above all else
the Union and the cause lor which her husband
stood. She was true, loyal, patriotic. She was
to Lincoln what Josephine was to Napoleon—
his life, his blood, his very being, but Lincoln
appreciated her worth more than the Corsican
did Josephine’s. During the darkest days of
the war, when to so many all seemed lost, she
did not leave her husband, as Maria Louisa
would have done, and go to her relations, many
of whom were fighting on the other side, but
remained steadfast as the great French empress,
cared for her children and comforted and con
soled the President as she had always done in
his adversities. And yet we are told Mrs.
Lincoln had nothing else to do but shop and
roll to and fro between Washington and New
York. How easy It Is for people sometimes to
Viisjudge the other fellow’s job.
RS. Lincoln had not the confidence of the
North or the South. By the former she
was looked upon as a rebel and by the latter
as a Yankee. Many of the people of the Union,
without justification, doubted her sincerity,
while those of the Confederate States treated
her with contempt, principally because she was
the wife of Lincoln. No woman in the White
House ever had a harder lot.
She was high-strung and sensitive, and, like
those so constituted, took to heart all the slights,
discourtesies and insults heaped upon the Presi
dent and herself while they occupied the Presi
dent's mansion. Her love for her family was
Intense. She almost idolized her husband and
her children.
At the breaking out of the war Robert Todd,
the eldest of her sons, was a young man nearly
18 years old. The other children then with her
in Washington were William Wallace, born De
cember 21, 1850, and Thomas (or “Tad," as
he was affectionately called) born April 4,
1853. Edward Baker, the second child (born
March 10, 1846) had died February 20, 1850.
The Lincolns had not been in the White
House quite a year when their third son. Wil
liam Wallace, died on February 20, 1862. He
was a bright and promising boy, and of a lov
able disposition. Os him Nathaniel Parker
Willis, in the Home Journal, has said;
“This little fellow had his acquaintances
among his father’s friends and I chanced to be
one of them. He never failed to seek me out
in the crowd, shake hands and make some
pleasant remark; and this, in a boy of about
10 years of age, was, to say the least, endearing
to a stranger. But he had more than mere
affectionsteness. His self-possession—aplomb,
as the French call it—was extraordinary. I
was one day passing the White House, when he
was outside with a playfellow on the side
walk. Mr. Seward drove in, with Prince
Napoleon and two of his suite in the carriage;
and in a mock heroic way—terms of amusing
intimacy evidently existing between the boy
THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, T>. C., APRIL 12, 7*TT.
Her Life in 11kite House Was Accompanied
by Sorrozvs, Though Misunderstood by Many
Who Wrote About Her—Deaths of
Relatives Added to Burdens of War.
Sympathetic Qualities Recalled.
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Mary Todd Lincoln. Reproduced from a White House portrait painted by
Katherine Helm.
and the Secretary—the official gentleman took
off his hat, and the Napoleon party did the
same, all making the young prince President a
ceremonious salute. Not a bit staggered with
the homage, Willie drew himself up to his full
height, took off his little cap with grateful
self-possession and bowed down formallj* to
the ground, like a little ambasador. They
drove past, and he went on unconcerned with
his play; the impromptu readiness and good
Judgment being clearly a part of his nature.
His genial and open expression of countenance
was none the less ingenuous and fearless for
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7Am Edwards residence, Springfield, 111-, where Abraham Lincoln and Mary
Todd were married. Mrs. Lincoln died in the same house.
a certain tincture of fun; and it was in this
mingling of qualities that he so faithfully re
sembled his father.”
IUST passed 12 years of age when he died,
Willie had been of a serious and studious
nature. Indeed, it has been said that so
“systematic was he that he was accustomed of
his own accord, of a morning, to arrange a
program of his duties for the day, giving each
its appropriate time, and manifesting much
thoughtfulness and originality in their assign
ment.”
He was interested in the war and after the
killing of Gen. Edward D. Baker at Balls,
October 21, 1861, wrote and asked the National
Republican to print a poem which he had writ
ten, and which that paper did print on Novem
ber 4, saying:
"Little Willie Lincoln, son of President Lin
coln, has sent us the following verses, which
are quite creditable, as a first effort for one so
young. We insert them with pleasure and hope
that Willie's desire, as expressed in the last
verse, will meet with a ready response by the
whole country.”
And then follow the verses:
“Lines On the Death of Col. Edward Baker.
"There was no patriot like Baker,
So noble and so true:
He fell as a soldier on the field.
His face to the sky of blue.
"His voice is sil:nt in the hall
Which oft his presence grac’d:
No more he’ll hear the loud acclaim
Which rang from place to place.
"No squeamish notions filled his breast,
The Union was his theme.
’No surrender and no compromise.’
His day thought and night’s dream.
"His country has her part to play,
To’rds those he left behind;
His widow and his children all
She must always keep in mind.”
LINCOLN was human, and she wept
as any other affectionate mother would
have done under like conditions when her son
Willie died. Her grief knew no bounds. Mrs.
Lincoln never entered again the guest's room
In which he died, nor the green room, where
his body lay while awaiting burial.
This was not ail of Mrs. Lincoln's sorrows by
any means. But let us go back and look at
her early life that we might better pass judg
ment on the Mrs. Lincoln as she was known in
Washington during wartime.
Robert Smith Todd, her father, was for many
years clerk of the Kentucky State House of
Representatives; was a State Senator and pres
ident of the Lexington Branch of the Bank of
Kentucky from its establishment, in 1836, until
his death, in 1849, and it was in that city he
married Eliza Ann Parker at her parents' home,
in Short street. Prom this union there were
seven children: Levi, Elizabeth, Prances. Mary
(born December 13. 1818, and who became Mrs.
Lincoln), Ann, Robert Parker and George.
Mrs. Todd died when her son George was
born, and in due course of time her husband
took unto himself another wife, Elizabeth Hum.
phreys, who bore him nine additional children;
so Mary Todd was not lonesome for brothers
and sisters during her childhood, though this
fact contributed largely to her sorrow during
the great strife between the States, for which,
however, her people were not to blame—at least
not primarily. These brothers and sisters of
the half blood included Robert Smith, Samuel,
David, Alexander, Margaret, Martha, Emilie,
Elodie and Katherine.
From early childhood Mrs. Lincoln was am
bitious, and this, Indeed, is one of the few
truthful statements made by her defamers.
• Where can we find a man or a woman in the
United States today interested in the affairs
of his country and wishing for its success who
is not so constituted?
Tk/tRS. LINCOLN early acquired a liking for
politics. Like her distinguiAed husband,
she was originally a Whig and was especially
fond of Henry Clay. She hoped some day to
see her father President, and when she mar
ried Lincoln, she did all she could to inspiro
him in reaching the goal that it should be
every American’s ambition to reach, or to be
of some higher service at least.
How dismal would be our lives if we did not
have a desire to better our conditions, to make
something more of ourselves, to elevate our
minds and our morals, to better equip ourselves
for our own and the public's good. Indeed, am
bition has for centuries been the guiding star
of the Anglo-Saxon race; it made Great Britain
what it is, and it made the greatest republic
on earth today, and as long as there are enough
ambitious people in this country it will be
sustained.
And yet ambition is one of the "crimes’*
charged against the woman who shared Lin
coln's trials in the White House; who in her
early married life did all of her own housework;
made all of her own clothes and the better part
of Mr. Lincoln’s, and besides made her chil
dren's wearing apparel; and this, for an edu
cated woman, reared in luxury and refinement,
surely stamps her as having been of the high
est American ideals. Had it not been for Mary
Todd the chances are that Abraham Lincoln
would never have been President and the world
would have accordingly been the loser.
Indeed, when she and Lincoln were married
on Friday, the fourth of November, 1842, h«
did not have money enough to go to house
keeping with, but boarded for a while at the
Globe Tavern, in Springfield, for the modest
sum of $4 a week before going to their own
little cottage at the corner of Eighth and
Jackson streets, to which they subsequently
added another story.
T> EGARDING this period of their married life,
Miss Katherine Helm, a niece of Mrs.
Lincoln, tells us:
"Although such surroundings could not fail
to be anything but distasteful to Mary, reared
as she had been, she never murmured; nor did
she utter a single complaint, even to any
member of her own family. Indeed, they assert
she seemed very happy. Mr. Lincoln also
seemed satisfied and had lost some of the deep
gloom which had affected him all his life, and
for which historians have tried in vain to
account.
"Mary knew of this deep and settled melan-