English manorial life…monetary wealth: James Truslow Adams, America’s Tragedy (New York and London: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1934), pp. 87–88.
“enjoyable living…and their manners”: Bates, Bates, et al., of Virginia and Missouri, p. 20.
The flintlock musket…“helped to win”: Ibid., p. 22.
lured by the vast potential…Louisiana Purchase: Wiebe, The Opening of American Society, pp. 131–32.
Over the next three decades: James M. McPherson, Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988; New York: Ballantine Books, 1989), p. 42.
“too young…a buffalo!”: “Lecture by Edward Bates,” St. Louis Weekly Reveille, February 24, 1845, St. Louis History Collection, MoSHi.
“After years of family…burned brightly in him”: Cain, Lincoln’s Attorney General, p. 5.
passed his bar examination…the rest of their family there: EB to Frederick Bates, September 29, 1817; October 13, 1817; June 15, 1818; July 19, 1818; Bates Papers, MoSHi; Cain, Lincoln’s Attorney General, p. 7.
“The slaves sold…at $290!”: EB to Frederick Bates, September 21, 1817, Bates Papers, MoSHi.
expected to realize…“full-handed”: EB to Frederick Bates, September 29, 1817, Bates Papers, MoSHi.
death of his brother Tarleton…“by the delay”: Cain, Lincoln’s Attorney General, p. 6; EB to Frederick Bates, June 15, 1818, Bates Papers, MoSHi (quote).
“In those days…in the country”: Samuel T. Glover, “Addresses by the Members of the St. Louis Bar on the Death of Edward Bates,” Minutes of the St. Louis Bar Association (1869), Bates Papers, MoSHi.
“a lazy or squandering fellow”: EB to Frederick Bates, July 19, 1818, Bates Papers, MoSHi.
if accompanied only by his family: EB to Frederick Bates, September 29, 1817, Bates Papers, MoSHi.
“in a tenth part of the time…my embarrassment”: EB to Frederick Bates, June 15, 1818, Bates Papers, MoSHi.
“Mother & Sister…occasioned you”: EB to Frederick Bates, July 19, 1818, Bates Papers, MoSHi.
“friend and benefactor…wealth & influence”: EB to Frederick Bates, October 13, 1817, Bates Papers, MoSHi.
introduced him to the leading figures: Cain, Lincoln’s Attorney General, p. 4.
a partnership with Joshua Barton: Ibid., p. 7.
“more in the way…his own name”: AL, “Autobiography Written for John L. Scripps,” [c. June 1860], in CW, IV, p. 61 [hereafter “Scripps autobiography”].
Thomas had watched: A. H. Chapman statement, ante September 8, 1865, in HI, p. 95; Donald, Lincoln, p. 21.
“very narrow circumstances…without education”: AL, “Scripps autobiography,” in CW, IV, p. 61.
Nancy Hanks: Dennis F. Hanks to WHH, June 13, 1865, and John Hanks interview, May 25, 1865, in HI, pp. 5, 37; Benjamin P. Thomas, Abraham Lincoln: A Biography (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1952), p. 6. On Nancy Hanks’s ancestry, see Paul H. Verduin, “New Evidence Suggest Lincoln’s Mother Born in Richmond County, Virginia, Giving Credibility to Planter-Grandfather Legend,” Northern Neck of Virginia Historical Magazine XXXVIII (December 1988), pp. 4, 354–89.
Thomas in relentless poverty: Thomas, Abraham Lincoln, p. 5; Kenneth J. Winkle, The Young Eagle: The Rise of Abraham Lincoln (Dallas: Taylor Trade Publishing, 2001), p. 13.
“Why Scripps, it is…‘annals of the poor’”: John L. Scripps to WHH, June 24, 1865, in HI, p. 57.
“was a woman…a brilliant woman”: Nathaniel Grigsby interview, September 12, 1865, in ibid., p. 113.
“read the good…benevolence as well”: Dennis F. Hanks to WHH (interview), June 13, 1865, in ibid., p. 40.
“beyond all doubt an intellectual woman”: John Hanks interview, [1865–1866], in ibid., p. 454.
“Remarkable” perception: Dennis F. Hanks to WHH, [December 1865?], in ibid., p. 149.
“very smart…naturally Strong minded”: William Wood interview, September 15, 1865, in ibid., p. 124.
“All that I am…God bless her”: AL, comment to WHH, quoted in Michael Burlingame, The Inner World of Abraham Lincoln (Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1994), p. 42.
“milk sickness”: Philip D. Jordan, “The Death of Nancy Hanks Lincoln,” Indiana Magazine of History XL (June 1944), pp. 103–10.
Thomas and Elizabeth Sparrow: Thomas, Abraham Lincoln, pp. 10–11.
“I am going away…return”: Nancy Lincoln, quoted in Robert Bruce, “The Riddle of Death,” in Gabor Boritt, ed., The Lincoln Enigma: The Changing Faces of an American Icon (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2001), p. 132.
average life expectancy: Appleby, Inheriting the Revolution, p. 63.
“He restlessly looked…before his gaze”: Schurz, Reminiscences, Vol. II, p. 187.
had a uniquely shattering impact: Bruce, “The Riddle of Death,” in The Lincoln Enigma, p. 132.
“a wild region”: AL, “Autobiography written for Jesse W. Fell,” December 20, 1859, in CW, III, p. 511.
“the panther’s…on the swine”: “The Bear Hunt,” [September 6, 1846?], in CW, I, p. 386.
Sarah, did the cooking…Dennis Hanks: Dennis F. Hanks to WHH (interview), June 13, 1865, in HI, p. 40.
a “quick minded woman…laugh”: Nathaniel Grigsby interview, September 12, 1865, in ibid., p. 113.
“wild—ragged and dirty”: Dennis F. Hanks to WHH, June 13, 1865, in ibid., p. 41.
soaped…“more human”: Sarah Bush Lincoln interview, September 8, 1865, in ibid., p. 106.
“sat down…to his grief”: Redmond Grigsby, quoted in Burlingame, The Inner World of Abraham Lincoln, p. 95.
“From then on…you might say”: John W. Lamar, quoted in ibid.
“It is with deep grief…ever expect it”: AL to Fanny McCullough, December 23, 1862, in CW, VI, pp. 16–17.
“He was different…great potential”: Douglas L. Wilson, “Young Man Lincoln,” in The Lincoln Enigma, p. 35.
“clearly exceptional…intellectual equal”: Donald, Lincoln, p. 32.
“soared above us…guide and leader”: Nathaniel Grigsby interview, September 12, 1865, in HI, p. 114.
“a Boy of uncommon natural Talents”: A. H. Chapman statement, ante September 8, 1865, in ibid., p. 99.
“His mind & mine…if he could”: Sarah Bush Lincoln interview, September 8, 1865, in ibid., pp. 108, 107.
“He was a strong…neighborhood”: Leonard Swett, “Lincoln’s Story of His Own Life,” in Reminiscences of Abraham Lincoln by Distinguished Men of His Time, ed. Allen Thorndike Rice (1885; New York and London: Harper & Bros., 1909), p. 71.
his great gift for storytelling…fireplace at night: Sarah Bush Lincoln interview, September 8, 1865, in HI, p. 107; John Hanks interview, [1865–1866], in ibid., p. 454.
along the old Cumberland Trail: Thomas, Abraham Lincoln, p. 7.
Thomas Lincoln would swap tales: Dennis F. Hanks to WHH, June 13, 1865, in HI, p. 37.
Young Abe listened…in his memory: Sarah Bush Lincoln interview, September 8, 1865, in ibid., p. 107.
Nothing was more upsetting…that was told: Rev. J. P. Gulliver article in New York Independent, September 1, 1864, quoted in F. B. Carpenter, Six Months at the White House with Abraham Lincoln (New York: Hurd & Houghton, 1866), p. 312.
“no small part…to comprehend”: AL, quoted in ibid., pp. 312–13.
having translated the stories…young listeners: Dennis F. Hanks to WHH, June 13, 1865, and Dennis F. Hanks interview, September 8, 1865, in HI, pp. 42, 104; Sarah Bush Lincoln interview, September 8, 1865, in ibid., p. 107.
subscription schools: Donald, Lincoln, p. 29.
“No qualification…wizzard”: AL, “Autobiography written for Jesse W. Fell,” December 20, 1859, in CW, III, p. 511.
“by littles”…pick up on his own: AL, “Scripps autobiography,” in CW, IV, p. 62.
“he could lay his hands on”: Dennis F. Hanks to WHH, June 13, 1865, in HI, p. 41; Sarah Bush Lincoln interview, September 8, 1865, in ibid., p. 107;
John S. Houghland interview, September 17, 1865, in ibid., p. 130.
“a luxury…the middle class”: Fidler, “Young Limbs of the Law,” p. 249.
obtained copies of: Thomas, Abraham Lincoln, p. 15; Nathaniel Grigsby interview, September 12, 1865, in HI, p. 112; Charles B. Strozier, Lincoln’s Quest for Union: Public and Private Meanings (New York: Basic Books, 1982), p. 231.
“his eyes sparkled…could not sleep”: David Herbert Donald, Lincoln Reconsidered: Essays on the Civil War Era, 3rd edn. (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1956; New York: Vintage Books, 2001), pp. 67–68.
“the great mass…to perform”: AL, “Second Lecture on Discoveries and Inventions,” [February 11, 1859], in CW, III, pp. 362–63.
“as unpoetical…of the earth”: AL to Andrew Johnston, April 18, 1846, in CW, I, p. 378.
“There is no Frigate…Lands away”: Emily Dickinson, “There is no Frigate like a Book,” The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson, ed. Thomas H. Johnson (Boston: Little, Brown, 1960), p. 553.
the Revised Statutes…and political thought: Helen Nicolay, Personal Traits of Abraham Lincoln (New York: Century Co., 1912), pp. 66–68.
Everywhere he went: Nathaniel Grigsby interview, September 12, 1865, in HI, p. 113.
“When he came across”…memorized: Sarah Bush Lincoln interview, September 8, 1865, in ibid., p. 107.
The story is often recounted…“on a stalk”: Oliver C. Terry to JWW, July 1888, in ibid., p. 662.
Lincoln wrote poems…Crawford’s large nose: Dennis F. Hanks to WHH, June 13, 1865, in ibid., p. 41; A. H. Chapman statement, ante September 8, 1865, in ibid., p. 101.
“Josiah blowing his bugle”: AL, “Chronicles of Reuben,” as paraphrased in Herndon and Weik, Herndon’s Life of Lincoln, p. 47.
Seward had only to pick: Seward, An Autobiography, pp. 19–22, 31–35.
regarded as odd and indolent: Herndon and Weik, Herndon’s Life of Lincoln, p. 38; Dennis Hanks interview, September 8, 1865, in HI, p. 104.
“particular Care…of his own accord”: Sarah Bush Lincoln interview, September 8, 1865, in ibid., p. 108.
When he found…could continue: Matilda Johnston Moore interview, September 8, 1865, in ibid., p. 110.
destroyed his books…abused him: Burlingame, The Inner World of Abraham Lincoln, pp. 38–39.
father’s decision to hire him out: Swett, “Lincoln’s Story of His Own Life,” in Reminiscences of Abraham Lincoln, ed. Rice, p. 70.
the “self-made” men in Lincoln’s generation: Appleby, Inheriting the Revolution, p. 231; Wiebe, The Opening of American Society, p. 271.
The same “longing to rise”: de Tocqueville, Democracy in America, p. 627.
departed…bundled on his shoulder: Swett, “Lincoln’s Story of His Own Life,” in Reminiscences of Abraham Lincoln, ed. Rice, pp. 71–72.
New Salem was a budding town: Benjamin P. Thomas, Lincoln’s New Salem (Springfield, Ill.: Abraham Lincoln Association, 1934; 1947), p. 15.
to “keep body and soul together”: AL, “Scripps autobiography,” in CW, IV, p. 65.
Lincoln in New Salem: Thomas, Lincoln’s New Salem, pp. 41–77; Mentor Graham to WHH, May 29, 1865, in HI, pp. 9–10; Wilson, Honor’s Voice, pp. 59–67.
“studied with nobody”: AL, “Scripps autobiography,” in CW, IV, p. 65.
He buried himself…Equity Jurisprudence: Donald, Lincoln, p. 55; Thomas, Abraham Lincoln, p. 43.
able to read and reread his books…“any other one thing”: AL to Isham Reavis, November 5, 1855, in CW, II, p. 327.
“I am Anne Rutledge…: Edgar Lee Masters, “Anne Rutledge,” in Spoon River Anthology (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1914; 1916), p. 220.
Lincoln would take…“wooded knoll” to read: W. D. Howells, “Life of Abraham Lincoln,” in Lives and Speeches of Abraham Lincoln and Hannibal Hamlin (New York: W. A. Townsend & Co., and Columbus, Ohio: Follett, Foster & Co., 1860), p. 31.
“it is true…of her now”: Isaac Cogdal interview, 1865–1866, in HI, p. 440.
“Eyes blue large, & Expressive,” auburn hair: Mentor Graham interview, April 2, 1866, in ibid., p. 242.
“She was beloved by Every body”: Ibid., p. 243.
“quick…worthy of Lincoln’s love”: William G. Greene to WHH (interview), May 30, 1865, in ibid., p. 21.
that they would marry…at Jacksonville: Thomas, Lincoln’s New Salem, p. 82; Tarbell, The Life of Abraham Lincoln, Vol. I, p. 119.
details of Ann’s death: Rankin, Personal Recollections of Abraham Lincoln, pp. 73–74.
“indifferent… woods by him self”: Henry McHenry to WHH, January 8, 1866, in HI, p. 155.
“never seen a man…he did”: Elizabeth Abell to WHH, February 15, 1867, in ibid., p. 557.
“be reconcile[d]…temporarily deranged”: William G. Greene interview, May 30, 1865, in ibid., p. 21.
“reason would desert her throne”: Robert B. Rutledge to WHH, ca. November 1, 1866, in ibid., p. 383.
he ran “off the track”: Isaac Cogdal interview, [1865–1866], in ibid., p. 440.
“I hear the loved survivors tell…”: AL to Andrew Johnston, April 18, 1846, in CW, I, p. 379.
“was not crazy”: Elizabeth Abell to WHH, February 15, 1867, in HI, p. 557.
“Only people…and heal them”: Leo Tolstoy, Childhood, Boyhood, Youth, quoted in George E. Vaillant, The Wisdom of the Ego (Cambridge, Mass., and London: Harvard University Press, 1993), p. 358.
“I’m afraid…last of us”: AL to Mrs. Samuel Hill, quoted in Wilson, Honor’s Voice, p. 83.56 of any “faith in life after death”: Bruce, “The Riddle of Death,” in The Lincoln Enigma, pp. 137–39. Lincoln wrote to his stepbrother that were his father to die soon, Thomas Lincoln would have a “joyous [meeting] with many loved ones gone before; and where [the rest] of us, through the help of God, hope ere-long [to join] them.” AL to John D. Johnston, January 12, 1851, in CW, II, p. 97.
his “heart was broken”…eternal companionship: SPC to Charles D. Cleveland, October 1, 1845, reel 6, Chase Papers.
“to a higher world…with her mother”: Bates diary, November 15, 1846.
“I ought to be able…in these reflections”: WHS to Charlotte S. Cushman, January 7, 1867, Vol. 13, The Papers of Charlotte S. Cushman, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress.
his “experiment…never saw a sadder face”: Speed, Reminiscences of Abraham Lincoln, p. 21.
Speed had heard Lincoln speak: Ibid., pp. 17–18; Joshua F. Speed statement, 1865–1866, in HI, p. 477.
“You seem to be…‘I am moved!’”: Speed, Reminiscences of Abraham Lincoln, pp. 21–22.
description of Joshua Speed: See ibid., pp. 3–14; Robert L. Kincaid, Joshua Fry Speed: Lincoln’s Most Intimate Friend, reprinted from The Filson Club History Quarterly 17 (Louisville, Ky.: Filson Club, 1943; Harrogate, Tenn.: Department of Lincolniana, Lincoln Memorial University, 1943), pp. 10–11.
Lincoln and Speed shared: For the relationship between Lincoln and Speed, see Speed, Reminiscences of Abraham Lincoln; Kincaid, Joshua Fry Speed, pp. 13–14.
as his “most intimate friend”: Kincaid, Joshua Fry Speed, pp. 10, 33 n2.
“You know my desire…to do any thing”: AL to Joshua F. Speed, February 13, 1842, in CW, I, p. 269.
Some have suggested: C. A. Tripp, The Intimate World of Abraham Lincoln, ed. Lewis Gannett (New York: Free Press, 2005), pp. 126–29.
sharing a bed: Rotundo, American Manhood, pp. 84–85; Strozier, Lincoln’s Quest for Union, p. 43.
The room above Speed’s store: Michael Burlingame, “A Respectful Dissent,” Afterword I, in Tripp, The Intimate World of Abraham Lincoln, p. 228.
attorneys of the Eighth Circuit…for a companion: Whitney, Life on the Circuit with Lincoln, pp. 63, 72.
the “preoccupation…the nineteenth”: Donald Yacovone, “Abolitionists and the ‘Language of Fraternal Love,’” in Meanings for Manhood: Constructions of Masculinity in Victorian America, ed. Mark C. Carnes and Clyde Griffen (Chicago: University of Chicago
Press, 1990), p. 94.
CHAPTER 3: THE LURE OF POLITICS
“Scarcely have you…as to an assembly”: Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America, ed. and trans. Harvey C. Mansfield and Delba Winthrop (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 2000), p. 232.
Noah Webster’s Elementary Spelling Book: Fidler, “Young Limbs of the Law,” pp. 175–76.
“Who can wonder…hush before his”: Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Eloquence,” in The Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson: Society and Solitude, Vol. VI, Fireside Edition (Boston and New York: n.p., 1870; 1898), p. 65.
Bates was the first…“form of government”: Cain, Lincoln’s Attorney General, pp. 8–9, 11 (quotes pp. 9, 11); Appleby, Inheriting the Revolution, p. 247.
“This momentous question…of the Union”: Thomas Jefferson to John Holmes, April 22, 1820, The Works of Thomas Jefferson, Vol. XII, Federal Edition, ed. Paul Leicester Ford (New York and London: G. P. Putnam’s Sons/The Knickerbocker Press, 1905), p. 158.
Missouri Compromise: “Missouri Compromise,” in The Reader’s Companion to American History, ed. Foner and Garraty, p. 737.
“Great Pacificator”: Stephen Douglas, quoted by AL, “Speech at Peoria, Illinois,” October 16, 1854, in CW, Il, p. 251.
“emerged as one”…candidates for state offices: Cain, Lincoln’s Attorney General, pp. 14–15 (quote p. 14).
tensions developed between Senators Barton and Benton: Cain, Lincoln’s Attorney General, pp. 19–22.
The Whigs favored public support: See Michael F. Holt, The Rise and Fall of the American Whig Party: Jacksonian Politics and the Onset of the Civil War (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), pp. 27, 64, 66–70.
“a most beautiful woman”: John F. Darby, “Mrs. Julia Bates, Widow of the Late Ed. Bates, Esq. For the Republican,” reprinted in Bates, Bates, et al., of Virginia and Missouri, p. 31.
Julia’s South Carolina family: Ibid., pp. 31–32.
Her surviving letters: Julia Davenport Bates to Caroline Hatcher Bates, April 10, 1850; Julia Davenport Bates to Onward Bates, July 24, 1855, February 14, 1861, Bates Papers, MoSHi.
“was calculated…domestic circle”: Darby, “Mrs. Julia Bates,” reprinted in Bates, Bates, et al., of Virginia and Missouri, p. 31.