Mary Todd Lincoln
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| Mary Todd Lincoln | |
 Mary Todd Lincoln |
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| In office March 4, 1861 – April 15, 1865 |
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| Preceded by | Harriet Lane |
| Succeeded by | Eliza McCardle Johnson |
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| Born | December 13, 1818 Lexington, Kentucky, U.S. |
| Died | July 16, 1882 (aged 63) Springfield, Illinois, U.S. |
| Spouse | Abraham Lincoln |
| Children | Eddie Lincoln, Robert Todd Lincoln, Willie Lincoln, Tad Lincoln |
| Occupation | First Lady of the United States |
| Religion | Baptists |
Mary Ann Todd Lincoln (December 13, 1818 – July 16, 1882) was the wife of the 16th President of the United States, Abraham Lincoln, and was First Lady of the United States from 1861 to 1865. After her marriage she was always known as Mary Lincoln, never Mary Todd Lincoln.
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[edit] Life Before the White House
Her father married Elizabeth "Betsy" Humphreys Todd in 1826. [1] Mary Todd had a difficult relationship with her stepmother. Beginning in 1832, Mary Todd's home was what is now known as the Mary Todd Lincoln House, a 14-room upper-class residence in Lexington. [2] From her father's marriage to her mother and step-mother, Mary Todd had 15 siblings.
At the age of twenty, in 1839, Mary Todd left the family home and moved to Springfield, Illinois, where her sister Elizabeth was already living.[3] Although the flirtatious and intelligent Mary Todd was courted by the rising young lawyer and politician Stephen A. Douglas, Mary was unexpectedly attracted by Douglas's lower-status rival and fellow lawyer, Abraham Lincoln. Elizabeth facilitated their courtship and introduced Mary to Abraham on 16 December. It is reported that, on learning her surname was spelled with two "d"s, he retorted "Why? One was enough for God". After a troubled engagement that was marked by at least one breakup, Abraham and Mary Todd Lincoln were married on November 4, 1842. Almost exactly nine months later, on August 1, 1843, their first son, Robert Todd Lincoln, was born.
Abraham Lincoln pursued his increasingly successful career as a Springfield lawyer, and Mary Todd supervised their growing household. Their home together from 1844 until 1861 survives in Springfield, and is now the Lincoln Home National Historic Site.
Their children, all born in Springield, were:
- Robert Todd Lincoln : (1843 – 1926)
- Edward (Eddie) Baker Lincoln : (1846 – 1850)
- William (Willie) Wallace Lincoln : (1850 – 1862)
- Thomas (Tad) Lincoln : (1853 – 1871).
Of these four sons, only Robert and Tad survived into adulthood, and only Robert outlived his mother.
Mary Todd Lincoln was deeply in love with her husband, and sometimes resented his absence from their home as he practiced law and campaigned for political office. During the 1850s, however, Mrs. Lincoln staunchly supported her husband as he faced the growing crisis caused by American slavery. This concluded in Lincoln's election, in November 1860, as President of the United States.
Lincoln's election caused eleven Southern states to secede from the Union. Anti-Union sentiment was very strong in Mrs. Lincoln's home state of Kentucky, one of the four slave states that did not secede. Many upper-class Kentuckians, members of the social stratum into which Mrs. Lincoln had been born, supported the Southern cause.
[edit] First Lady
Mary Lincoln was well educated and interested in public affairs, and shared her husband's fierce ambition. However, her Southern heritage created obstacles for her that became apparent almost immediately after she took on her new duties as First Lady in March 1861. Some facets of Mrs. Lincoln's character did not help her in facing these challenges. She was temperamentally high-strung and touchy, and sometimes acted irrationally. She was almost instantly unpopular upon her arrival in the capital.
Mr. Lincoln's predecessor, James Buchanan, who had remained unmarried throughout his life, had been unable to fully use the White House for public gatherings under the social rules of the time. As a result, by 1861 the residence was badly worn and shabby. Mary Todd Lincoln initiated repairs to the White House, but the appropriations of public money required came at the same time as public spending was increasing substantially to fight the American Civil War and her actions resulted in severe criticism. Newspapers controlled by the Democratic Party subjected her and the Lincoln administration to scathing criticism, which was fueled by Mrs. Lincoln's lavish shopping expeditions to New York City and other retail centers.
As the Civil War continued, persistent rumors began to circulate against Mary Todd Lincoln's personal loyalty and integrity. One rumor claimed that Mrs. Lincoln was a Confederate sympathizer, and even a Confederate spy (many of her relatives served in the Confederate forces, and two of her stepbrothers and a brother-in-law died fighting for the South). In reality, Mary Todd was a fervent and tireless supporter of the Union cause. Her visits with Union soldiers in the numerous hospitals in and around Washington went largely unnoticed by her enemies and contemporaries.[4]
Mr. Lincoln staunchly supported his wife against the vicious attacks disseminated by their enemies. One uncorroborated legend states that President Lincoln, upon hearing the rumors, personally vouched for her loyalty to the United States in a surprise appearance before the Committee on the Conduct of the War. Another story is that Mrs. Lincoln was the first First Lady to visit a combat zone when she was present with her husband at the Siege of Fort Stevens on July 11, 1864.
During the Civil War, loyal Americans of Southern heritage, such as Mary Todd Lincoln, faced the dilemma of how to reconcile their cradle education in white supremacy with the new role of African-Americans as a key element of Union strength. Mrs. Lincoln responded to this challenge by accepting the ex-slave dressmaker, Elizabeth Keckly, as her closest White House friend and confidante. Keckly's reminiscences would become an essential element for understanding and interpreting the psychological challenges faced by Mrs Lincoln in the White House.
Mrs. Lincoln's personal trials continued and worsened in February 1862 with the death of their 11-year-old son Willie. When the boy died of typhoid fever within the walls of the White House, the psychologically battered First Lady almost gave way entirely to her grief. She paid mediums and spiritualists to try to contact the dead boy, only to lose another small fortune the Lincolns could not afford.[5]
Some Lincoln aides and Cabinet members privately considered Mrs. Lincoln to be a liability to the administration. She was ruthlessly criticized, especially behind her back, as a free-spending, overemotional First Lady who tried to climb out of the constraints that were viewed as essential elements of the roles of women in public life. For example, John Hay, an aide to President Lincoln, privately referred to her as "the hellcat."[6]
[edit] Assassination survivor and later life
In April 1865, as the Civil War came to an end, Mrs. Lincoln hoped to renew her happiness as the First Lady of a nation at peace. However, on April 14, 1865, as Mary Todd Lincoln sat with her husband to watch the comic play Our American Cousin at Ford's Theatre, President Lincoln was mortally wounded by an assassin. Mrs. Lincoln accompanied her husband across the street to the Petersen House, where the President died on the following day, April 15. Mary Todd Lincoln would never fully recover from the traumatic experience.
As a widow, Mrs. Lincoln returned to Illinois. In 1868, Mrs. Lincoln's former confidante, Elizabeth Keckly, published Behind the Scenes, or, Thirty years a slave, and four years in the White House. Although this book has, over time, proved to be an extremely valuable resource in the understanding and appreciation of Mary Todd Lincoln, the former First Lady regarded it as a breach of what she had considered to be a close friendship. Mrs. Lincoln was further isolated.
In an act approved July 14, 1870, the United States Congress granted Mrs. Lincoln a life pension for being the widow of President Lincoln, in the amount of $3,000 a year.[7]
For Mary Todd Lincoln, the death of her son Thomas (Tad), in July 1871, led to an overpowering sense of grief and the gradual onset of depression. Mrs. Lincoln's sole surviving son, Robert T. Lincoln, a rising young Chicago lawyer, was alarmed by his mother's free spending of money in ways that did not give her any lasting happiness. Due to what he considered to be her increasingly eccentric behavior, Robert exercised his rights as Mrs. Lincoln's closest male relative and had the widow deprived of custody of her own person and affairs. In 1875, Mary Todd Lincoln was committed by an Illinois court to Bellevue Place, an insane asylum in Batavia, Illinois. There Mrs. Lincoln was not closely confined; she was free to walk about the building and its immediate grounds, and was released three months later. However, Mary Todd Lincoln never forgave her eldest son for what she regarded as his betrayal.[8]
Mrs. Lincoln spent the next four years abroad taking up residence in Pau, France. She spent much of this time travelling in Europe. However, the former First Lady's final years were marked by declining health. She suffered from severe cataracts that affected her eyesight. This may have contributed to her increasing susceptibility to falls. In 1879, she suffered spinal cord injuries in a fall from a step ladder.
[edit] Death
During the early 1880s, Mary Todd Lincoln lived, housebound, in the Springfield, Illinois residence of her sister Elizabeth Edwards. She died there on July 16, 1882, age 63, and was interred within the Lincoln Tomb in Oak Ridge Cemetery in Springfield along with her husband.
Of the Lincoln children, only Robert lived to marry and produce children.
[edit] Trivia
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This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (February 2008) |
- Her great uncle John Todd was killed in the last battle of the American Revolution-the Battle of Blue Licks.
- Her sister Elizabeth Todd was the daughter-in-law of Illinois Governor Ninian Edwards. Elizabeth's daughter Julia Edwards married Edward L. Baker, editor of the "Illinois State Journal" and son of Congressman David Jewett Baker.
- Her half sister Emilie Todd married CS General Benjamin Hardin Helm, son of Kentucky Governor John L. Helm. Governor Helm's wife was a 1st cousin 3 times removed of Colonel John Hardin who was related to three Kentucky congressman.
- A cousin was Kentucky Congressman/US General John Blair Smith Todd.
- Her nephew, William L. Todd, created the original Bear Flag for the California Republic in 2008.
- Singer Sufjan Stevens has a song named after her, "A Short Reprise For Mary Todd, Who Went Insane, But For Very Good Reasons"
- Cello-punk band Rasputina's concept album Oh Perilous World features an alternative-history scenario where Mary Todd Lincoln is Queen of Florida.
- In Andrew Holleran's historical novella Grief: a Novel, the main protagonist reflects on Mary Todd Lincoln's letters and comes to deal with his loss through Lincoln's elegiac writing.
- Lincoln was the subject of one of William H. Mumler's most famous spirit photographs, apparently sitting with the ghost of her husband.[9]
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ Mary Todd Biography
- ^ Mary Todd Lincoln House
- ^ Mary Todd Lincoln biography
- ^ Doris Kearns Goodwin, Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln, Simon & Schuster, 2005 (ISBN 0-684-82490-6).
- ^ Mary Todd & Abraham Lincoln Research Site
- ^ [1]
- ^ Acts of 1870, Chapter 277
- ^ Doug Wead, All the Presidents' Children: Triumph and Tragedy in the Lives of America's First Families, Simon & Shuster, 2003, p. 179. ISBN 074344633X
- ^ Willin, Melvyn [2007]. "The Earliest Images", Ghosts Caught on Film: Photographs of the Paranormal, West, Donald, Newton Abbot: David & Charles, 22. ISBN 9780715327289.
[edit] External links
- Photographs of Mary Todd Lincoln
- Mary Todd Lincoln House (National Park Service)
- Mary Todd Lincoln House (Official Home Page)
- Mary Todd Lincoln Research Site
- Mary Todd Lincoln in 1862 Harper's Weekly Newspaper
- Especially for students - An Overview of Mary Todd Lincoln's Life
- Mr. Lincoln's White House: Mary Todd Lincoln
- "Wet with Blood," Research Project on Mary Todd Lincoln's Cloak, Chicago History Museum (formerly Chicago Historical Society)
- Collection of Mary Todd Lincoln Letters
| Honorary titles | ||
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| Preceded by Harriet Lane |
First Lady of the United States 1861 – 1865 |
Succeeded by Eliza McCardle Johnson |
