The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln

306 Pages·2007·0.8 MB·English

by  Francis Fisher Browne

The Every−day Life of Abraham Lincoln
Francis Fisher Browne
The Every−day Life of Abraham Lincoln
Table of Contents
The Every−day Life of Abraham Lincoln........................................................................................................1
Francis Fisher Browne.............................................................................................................................2
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION...............................................................................................5
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION....................................................................................................6
CHAPTER I.............................................................................................................................................7
CHAPTER II..........................................................................................................................................21
CHAPTER III........................................................................................................................................29
CHAPTER IV........................................................................................................................................36
CHAPTER V.........................................................................................................................................42
CHAPTER VI........................................................................................................................................47
CHAPTER VII.......................................................................................................................................52
CHAPTER VIII.....................................................................................................................................59
CHAPTER IX........................................................................................................................................68
CHAPTER X.........................................................................................................................................76
CHAPTER XI........................................................................................................................................81
CHAPTER XII.......................................................................................................................................94
CHAPTER XIII...................................................................................................................................103
CHAPTER XIV...................................................................................................................................112
CHAPTER XV....................................................................................................................................124
CHAPTER XVI...................................................................................................................................136
CHAPTER XVII..................................................................................................................................148
CHAPTER XVIII.................................................................................................................................157
CHAPTER XIX...................................................................................................................................163
CHAPTER XX....................................................................................................................................172
CHAPTER XXI...................................................................................................................................178
CHAPTER XXII..................................................................................................................................192
CHAPTER XXIII.................................................................................................................................198
CHAPTER XXIV................................................................................................................................204
CHAPTER XXV..................................................................................................................................211
CHAPTER XXVI................................................................................................................................219
CHAPTER XXVII...............................................................................................................................224
CHAPTER XXVIII..............................................................................................................................237
CHAPTER XXIX................................................................................................................................245
NOTES.................................................................................................................................................252
INDEX.................................................................................................................................................254
i
The Every−day Life of Abraham Lincoln
1
The Every−day Life of Abraham Lincoln
Francis Fisher Browne
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• PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION
• PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION
• CHAPTER I
• CHAPTER II
• CHAPTER III
• CHAPTER IV
• CHAPTER V
• CHAPTER VI
• CHAPTER VII
• CHAPTER VIII
• CHAPTER IX
• CHAPTER X
• CHAPTER XI
• CHAPTER XII
• CHAPTER XIII
• CHAPTER XIV
• CHAPTER XV
• CHAPTER XVI
• CHAPTER XVII
• CHAPTER XVIII
• CHAPTER XIX
• CHAPTER XX
• CHAPTER XXI
• CHAPTER XXII
• CHAPTER XXIII
• CHAPTER XXIV
• CHAPTER XXV
• CHAPTER XXVI
• CHAPTER XXVII
• CHAPTER XXVIII
• CHAPTER XXIX
• NOTES
• INDEX
The Every−day Life of Abraham Lincoln
A Narrative And Descriptive Biography With Pen−Pictures And Personal
Recollections By Those Who Knew Him
Produced by Audrey Longhurst and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team.
2
The Every−day Life of Abraham Lincoln
“How beautiful to see
Once more a shepherd of mankind indeed.
Who loved his charge, but never loved to lead;
One whose meek flock the people joyed to be,
Not lured by any cheat of birth,
But by his clear−grained human worth,
And brave old wisdom of sincerity!
They knew that outward grace is dust;
They could not choose but trust
In that sure−footed mind's unfaltering skill,
And supple−tempered will
That bent like perfect steel to spring again and thrust.
His was no lonely mountain−peak of mind,
Thrusting to thin air o'er our cloudy bars,
A sea−mark now, now lost in vapors blind;
Broad prairie rather, genial, level−lined,
Fruitful and friendly for all human kind,
Yet also nigh to heaven and loved of loftiest stars.
“Great captains, with their guns and drums,
Disturb our judgment for the hour,
But at last silence comes;
These all are gone, and, standing like a tower,
Our children shall behold his fame,
The kindly−earnest, brave, foreseeing man,
Sagacious, patient, dreading praise, not blame,
New birth of our new soil, the first American.”
JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL.
[Illustration: ABRAHAM LINCOLN FROM AN UNPUBLISHED ORIGINAL DRAWING BY JOHN
NELSON MARBLE]
THE EVERY−DAY LIFE OF
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
A NARRATIVE AND DESCRIPTIVE
BIOGRAPHY WITH PEN−PICTURES
AND PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS
BY THOSE WHO KNEW HIM
BY
FRANCIS FISHER BROWNE
Compiler of “Golden Poems,” “Bugle Echoes, Pose of
the Civil War,” “Laurel−Crowned Verse,” etc.
NEW AND THOROUGHLY REVISED EDITION, FROM NEW PLATES, WITH
AN ENTIRELY NEW PORTRAIT OF LINCOLN, FROM A
CHARCOAL STUDY BY J.K. MARBLE
CHICAGO
BROWNE &HOWELL COMPANY
3
The Every−day Life of Abraham Lincoln
1913
FRANCIS FISHER BROWNE
1843−1913
The present revision of “The Every−day Life of Abraham Lincoln” was the last literary labor of its author.
He had long wished to undertake the work, and had talked much of it for several years past. But favorable
arrangements for the book's republication were not completed until about a year ago. Then, though by no
means recovered from an attack of pneumonia late in the previous winter, he took up the task of revision and
recasting with something of his old−time energy. It was a far heavier task than he had anticipated, but he gave
it practically his undivided attention until within three or four weeks of his death. Only when the last pages of
manuscript had been despatched to the printer did he yield to the overwhelming physical suffering that had
been upon him for a long time past. His death occurred at Santa Barbara, California, on May 11.
Francis Fisher Browne was born at South Halifax, Vermont, on December 1, 1843. His parentage, on both
sides, was of the purest New England stock. Early in his childhood, the family moved to Western
Massachusetts, where the boy went to school and learned the printing trade in his father's newspaper office at
Chicopee. As a lad of eighteen, he left the high school in answer to the government's call for volunteers,
serving for a year with the 46th Massachusetts Regiment in North Carolina and with the Army of the
Potomac. When the regiment was discharged, in 1863, he decided to take up the study of law. Removing to
Rochester, N.Y., he entered a law office in that city; and a year or two later began a brief course in the law
department of the University of Michigan. He was unable to continue in college, however, and returned to
Rochester to follow his trade.
Immediately after his marriage, in 1867, he came to Chicago, with the definite intention of engaging in
literary work. Here he became associated with “The Western Monthly,” which, with the fuller establishment
of his control, he rechristened “The Lakeside Monthly.” The best writers throughout the West were gradually
enlisted as contributors; and it was not long before the magazine was generally recognized as the most
creditable and promising periodical west of the Atlantic seaboard. But along with this increasing prestige
came a series of extraneous setbacks and calamities, culminating in a complete physical breakdown of its
editor and owner, which made the magazine's suspension imperative.
[Illustration: FRANCIS F. BROWNE]
The six years immediately following, from 1874 to 1880, were largely spent in a search for health. During
part of this time, however, Mr. Browne acted as literary editor of “The Alliance,” and as special editorial
writer for some of the leading Chicago newspapers. But his mind was preoccupied with plans for a new
periodical—this time a journal of literary criticism, modeled somewhat after such English publications as
“The Athenaeum” and “The Academy.” In the furtherance of this bold conception he was able to interest the
publishing firm of Jansen, McClurg &Co.; and under their imprint, in May, 1880, appeared the first issue of
THE DIAL, “a monthly review and index of current literature.” At about the same time he became literary
adviser to the publishing department of the house, and for twelve years thereafter toiled unremittingly at his
double task−work. In 1892, negotiations were completed whereby he acquired Messrs. McClurg &Co.'s
interest in the periodical. It was enlarged in scope, and made a semi−monthly; and from that time until his
death it appeared uninterruptedly under his guidance and his control.
Besides his writings in THE DIAL and other periodicals, Mr. Browne is the author of a small volume of
poems, “Volunteer Grain” (1895). He also compiled and edited several anthologies,—“Bugle Echoes,” a
collection of Civil War poems (1886); “Golden Poems by British and American Authors” (1881); “The
Golden Treasury of Poetry and Prose" (1883); and seven volumes of “Laurel−Crowned Verse” (1891−2). He
was one of the small group of men who, in 1874, founded the Chicago Literary Club; and for a number of
years past he has been an honorary member of that organization, as well as of the Caxton Club (Chicago) and
the Twilight Club (Pasadena, Cal.). During the summer of 1893 he served as Chairman of the Committee on
the Congress of Authors of the World's Congress Auxiliary of the Columbian Exposition.
THE PUBLISHERS
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The Every−day Life of Abraham Lincoln
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION
The original edition of this book was published about twenty years after Lincoln's death at the close of the
Civil War. At that time many of the men who had taken a prominent part in the affairs, military and civil, of
that heroic period, many who had known Lincoln and had come in personal contact with him during the war
or in his earlier years, were still living. It was a vivid conception of the value of the personal recollections of
these men, gathered and recorded before it was too late, that led to the preparation of this book. It was
intended to be, and in effect it was, largely an anecdotal Life of Lincoln built of material gathered from men
still living who had known him personally. The task was begun none too soon. Of the hundreds who
responded to the requests for contributions of their memories of Lincoln there were few whose lives extended
very far into the second quarter−century after his death, and few indeed survive after the lapse of nearly fifty
years,—though in several instances the author has been so fortunate as to get valuable material directly from
persons still living (1913). Of the more than five hundred friends and contemporaries of Lincoln to whom
credit for material is given in the original edition, scarcely a dozen are living at the date of this second edition.
Therefore, the value of these reminiscences increases with time. They were gathered largely at first hand.
They can never be replaced, nor can they ever be very much extended.
This book brings Lincoln the man, not Lincoln the tradition, very near to us. Browning asked, “And did
you once see Shelley plain? And did he stop and speak to you?” The men whose narratives make up a large
part of this book all saw Lincoln plain, and here tell us what he spoke to them, and how he looked and seemed
while saying it. The great events of Lincoln's life, and impressions of his character, are given in the actual
words of those who knew him—his friends, neighbors, and daily associates—rather than condensed and
remolded into other form. While these utterances are in some cases rude and unstudied, they have often a
power of delineation and a graphic force that more than compensate for any lack of literary quality.
In a work prepared on such a plan as this, some repetitions are unavoidable; nor are they undesirable. An
event or incident narrated by different observers is thereby brought out with greater fulness of detail; and
phases of Lincoln's many−sided character are revealed more clearly by the varied impressions of numerous
witnesses whose accounts thus correct or verify each other. Some inconsistencies and contradictions are
inevitable,—but these relate usually to minor matters, seldom or never to the great essentials of Lincoln's life
and personality. The author's desire is to present material from which the reader may form an opinion of
Lincoln, rather than to present opinions and judgments of his own.
Lincoln literature has increased amazingly in the past twenty−five years. Mention of the principal
biographies in existence at the time of the original edition was included in the Preface. Since then there have
appeared, among the more formal biographies, the comprehensive and authoritative work by Nicolay and
Hay, the subsequent work by Miss Ida Tarbell, and that by Herndon and Weik, besides many more or less
fragmentary publications. Some additions, but not many, have been made to the present edition from these
sources. The recently−published Diary of Gideon Welles, one of the most valuable commentaries on the Civil
War period now available, has provided some material of exceptional interest concerning Lincoln's relations
with the members of his Cabinet.
In re−writing the present work, it has been compressed into about two−thirds of its former compass, to
render it more popular both in form and in price, and to give it in some places a greater measure of coherency
and continuity as an outline narrative of the Civil War. But its chief appeal to the interest of its readers will
remain substantially what it was in the beginning, as set forth in its title, “The Every−day Life of Abraham
Lincoln, by Those Who Knew Him.”
F.F.B. SANTA BARBARA, CAL., April, 1913.
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The Every−day Life of Abraham Lincoln
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION
This book aims to give a view, clearer and more complete than has been given before, of the personality of
Abraham Lincoln. A life so full of incident and a character so many−sided as his can be understood only with
the lapse of time. A sense of the exhaustless interest of that life and character, and the inadequacy of the
ordinarily constructed biography to portray his many−sidedness, suggested the preparation of a work upon the
novel plan here represented. Begun several years ago, the undertaking proved of such magnitude that its
completion has been delayed beyond the anticipated time. The extensive correspondence, the exploration of
available sources of information in the books, pamphlets, magazines, and newspapers of a quarter of a
century, and in the scraps and papers of historical collections, became an almost interminable task. The
examination and sifting of this mass of material, its verification amidst often conflicting testimony, and its
final molding into shape, involved time and labor that can be estimated only by those who have had similar
experience.
To the many who have kindly furnished original contributions, to others who have aided the work by
valuable suggestions and information, to earlier biographies of Lincoln—those of Raymond, Holland, Barrett,
Lamon, Carpenter, and (the best and latest of all) that of Hon. I.N. Arnold—hearty acknowledgment is made.
Much that was offered could not be used. In the choice of material, from whatever source, the purpose has
been to avoid mere opinions and eulogies of Lincoln and to give abundantly those actual experiences,
incidents, anecdotes, and reminiscences which reveal the phases of his unique and striking personality.
It scarcely need be pointed out that this work does not attempt to give a connected history of the Civil
War, but only to sketch briefly those episodes with which Lincoln is personally identified and of which some
knowledge is essential to an understanding of his acts and character. Others are brought into prominence only
as they are associated with the chief actor in the great drama. Many of them are disappearing,—fading into the
smoky and lurid background. But that colossal central figure, playing one of the grandest roles ever set upon
the stage of human life, becomes more impressive as the scenes recede.
F.F.B. CHICAGO, October, 1886.
[Illustration: A. Lincoln]
THE EVERY−DAY LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN
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The Every−day Life of Abraham Lincoln
CHAPTER I
Ancestry—The Lincolns in Kentucky—Death of Lincoln's
Grandfather—Thomas Lincoln and Nancy Hanks—Mordecai
Lincoln—Birth of Abraham Lincoln—Removal to Indiana—Early
Years—Dennis Hanks—Lincoln's Boyhood—Death of Nancy Hanks—Early
School Days—Lincoln's First Dollar—Presentiments of Future
Greatness—Down the Mississippi—Removal to Illinois—Lincoln's
Father—Lincoln the Storekeeper—First Official Act—Lincoln's
Short Sketch of His Own Life.
The year 1809—that year which gave William E. Gladstone to England—was in our country the
birth−year of him who wears the most distinguished name that has yet been written on the pages of American
history—ABRAHAM LINCOLN. In a rude cabin in a clearing, in the wilds of that section which was once
the hunting−ground and later the battle−field of the Cherokees and other war−like tribes, and which the
Indians themselves had named Kentucky because it was “dark and bloody ground,” the great War President of
the United States, after whose name History has written the word “Emancipator,” first saw the light. Born and
nurtured in penury, inured to hardship, coarse food, and scanty clothing,—the story of his youth is full of
pathos. Small wonder that when asked in his later years to tell something of his early life, he replied by
quoting a line from Gray's Elegy:
“The short and simple annals of the poor.”
Lincoln's ancestry has been traced with tolerable certainty through five generations to Samuel Lincoln of
Norfolk County, England. Not many years after the landing of the “Mayflower” at Plymouth—perhaps in the
year 1638—Samuel Lincoln's son Mordecai had emigrated to Hingham, Massachusetts. Perhaps because he
was a Quaker, a then persecuted sect, he did not remain long at Hingham, but came westward as far as Berks
County, Pennsylvania. His son, John Lincoln, went southward from Pennsylvania and settled in Rockingham
County, Virginia. Later, in 1782, while the last events of the American Revolution were in progress, Abraham
Lincoln, son of John and grandfather of President Lincoln, moved into Kentucky and took up a tract of
government land in Mercer County. In the Field Book of Daniel Boone, the Kentucky pioneer, (now in
possession of the Wisconsin Historical Society), appears the following note of purchase:
“Abraham Lincoln enters five hundred acres of land on a Treasury
warrant on the south side of Licking Creek or River, in Kentucky.”
At this time Kentucky was included within the limits and jurisdiction of Virginia. In 1775 Daniel Boone
had built a fort at Boonesborough, on the Kentucky river, and it was not far from this site that Abraham
Lincoln, President Lincoln's grandfather, located his claim and put up a rude log hut for the shelter of his
family. The pioneers of Kentucky cleared small spaces and erected their humble dwellings. They had to
contend not only with the wild forces of nature, and to defend themselves from the beasts of the forest,—more
to be feared than either were the hostile Indians. The settlers were filled with terror of these stealthy foes. At
home and abroad they kept their guns ready for instant use both night and day. Many a hard battle was fought
between the Indian and the pioneer. Many an unguarded woodsman was shot down without warning while
busy about his necessary work. Among these was Abraham Lincoln. The story of his death is related by Mr.
I.N. Arnold. “Thomas Lincoln was with his father in the field when the savages suddenly fell upon them.
Mordecai and Josiah, his elder brothers, were near by in the forest. Mordecai, startled by a shot, saw his father
fall, and running to the cabin seized the loaded rifle, rushed to one of the loop−holes cut through the logs of
the cabin, and saw the Indian who had fired. He had just caught the boy, Thomas, and was running toward the
forest. Pointing the rifle through the logs and aiming at a medal on the breast of the Indian, Mordecai fired.
The Indian fell, and springing to his feet the boy ran to the open arms of his mother at the cabin door.
Meanwhile Josiah, who had run to the fort for aid, returned with a party of settlers. The bodies of Abraham
Lincoln and the Indian who had been killed were brought in. From this time forth Mordecai Lincoln was the
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The Every−day Life of Abraham Lincoln
mortal enemy of the Indian, and it is said that he sacrificed many in revenge for the murder of his father.”
In the presence of such dangers Thomas Lincoln spent his boyhood. He was born in 1778, and could not
have been much more than four years old on that fatal day when in one swift moment his father lay dead
beside him and vengeance had been exacted by his resolute boy brother. It was such experiences as these that
made of the pioneers the sturdy men they were. They acquired habits of heroism. Their sinews became wiry;
their nerves turned to steel. Their senses became sharpened. They grew alert, steady, prompt and deft in every
emergency.
Of Mordecai Lincoln, the boy who had exhibited such coolness and daring on the day of his father's death,
many stories are told after he reached manhood. “He was naturally a man of considerable genius,” says one
who knew him. “He was a man of great drollery. It would almost make you laugh to look at him. I never saw
but one other man who excited in me the same disposition to laugh, and that was Artemus Ward. Abe Lincoln
had a very high opinion of his uncle, and on one occasion remarked that Uncle Mord had run off with all the
talents of the family.”
Thomas Lincoln was twenty−eight years old before he sought a wife. His choice fell upon a young woman
of twenty−three whose name was Nancy Hanks. Like her husband, she was of English descent. Like his, her
parents had followed in the path of emigration from Virginia to Kentucky. The couple were married by the
Rev. Jesse Head, a Methodist minister located at Springfield, Washington County, Kentucky. They lived for a
time in Elizabethtown, but after the birth of their first child, Sarah, they removed to Rock Spring farm, on
Nolin Creek, in Hardin (afterward LaRue) County. In this desolate spot, a strange and unlikely place for the
birth of one destined to play so memorable a part in the history of the world, on the twelfth day of February,
1809, Abraham Lincoln the President was born.
Of all the gross injustice ever done to the memory of woman, that which has been accorded to Nancy
Hanks is the greatest. The story which cast a shadow upon her parentage, and on that of her illustrious son as
well, should be sternly relegated to the oblivion whence it came. Mr. Henry Watterson, in his brilliant address
on Lincoln, refers to him as “that strange, incomparable man, of whose parentage we neither know nor care.”
In some localities, particularly in Kentucky and South Carolina, the rumor is definite and persistent that the
President was not the son of Thomas Lincoln, the illiterate and thriftless, but of one Colonel Hardin for whom
Hardin County was named; that Nancy Hanks was herself the victim of unlegalized motherhood, the natural
daughter of an aristocratic, wealthy, and well−educated Virginia planter, and that this accounted for many of
her son's characteristics. The story has long since been disproved. Efforts to verify it brought forth the fact
that it sprang into being in the early days of the Civil War and was evidently a fabrication born of the bitter
spirit of the hour.
It was not from his father, however, that Lincoln inherited any of his remarkable traits. The dark coarse
hair, the gray eyes, sallow complexion, and brawny strength, which were his, constituted his sole inheritance
on the paternal side. But Nancy Hanks was gentle and refined, and would have adorned any station in life. She
was beautiful in youth, with dark hair, regular features, and soft sparkling hazel eyes. She was unusually
intelligent, and read all the books she could obtain. Says Mr. Arnold: “She was a woman of deep religious
feeling, of the most exemplary character, and most tenderly and affectionately devoted to her family. Her
home indicated a love of beauty exceptional in the wild settlement in which she lived, and judging from her
early death it is probable that she was of a physique less hardy than that of those among whom she lived. Hers
was a strong, self−reliant spirit, which commanded the love and respect of the rugged people among whom
she dwelt.”
The tender and reverent spirit of Abraham Lincoln, and the pensive melancholy of his disposition, he no
doubt inherited from his mother. Amid the toil and struggle of her busy life she found time not only to teach
him to read and write but to impress upon him ineffaceably that love of truth and justice, that perfect integrity
and reverence for God, for which he was noted all his life. Lincoln always looked upon his mother with
unspeakable affection, and never ceased to cherish the memory of her life and teaching.
A spirit of restlessness, a love of adventure, a longing for new scenes, and possibly the hope of improving
his condition, led Thomas Lincoln to abandon the Rock Spring farm, in the fall of 1816, and begin life over
again in the wilds of southern Indiana. The way thither lay through unbroken country and was beset with
difficulties. Often the travellers were obliged to cut their road as they went. With the resolution of pioneers,
8