Lincoln (127 page)

Collection of Jack Smith, South Bend, Indiana

The basic source for any biography of Abraham Lincoln is his own writings.
The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln,
edited by Roy P. Basler and others, is authoritative; eight volumes were published in 1953 by the Rutgers University Press, an Index volume followed in 1955, and two small supplements were issued in 1974 and 1990. I evaluated the technical merits of this edition in the
American Historical Review
59 (October 1953): 142–149. Almost equally important are the largely unpublished Abraham Lincoln Papers in the Library of Congress, which contain Lincoln’s incoming correspondence together with drafts and copies of many of his own letters and messages. Fortunately these are available on microfilm in ninety-seven reels. A rich sampling of these papers up to July 1861 appears in David C. Mearns, ed.,
The Lincoln Papers
(2 vols.; Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday & Co., 1948). Harold Holzer, ed.,
Dear Mr. Lincoln: Letters to the President
(Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley Publishing Co., 1993), includes many other letters, mostly from the same collection. Rivaling the Lincoln Papers in importance is the Herndon-Weik Collection, also in the Library of Congress, which contains thousands of pages of legal documents, interviews, and letters collected by Herndon for his Lincoln biography. These papers are also available on microfilm, in fifteen reels. Selections from these papers, sometimes inaccurately edited, appeared in Emanuel Hertz, ed.,
The Hidden Lincoln: From the Letters and Papers of William H. Herndon
(New York: Viking Press, 1938).

An enormous amount has been published about Lincoln. Jay Monaghan’s
Lincoln Bibliography, 1839–1939
(2 vols.; Springfield: Illinois State Historical Library, 1943), lists 3,958 books and pamphlets, and thousands more have appeared since. Paul M. Angle,
A Shelf of Lincoln Books: A Critical Selective Bibliography of Lincolniana
(New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1946), is a judicious evaluation of this literature. Monaghan’s bibliography does not include articles in magazines, some of which can be located through Richard Booker,
Abraham Lincoln in Periodical Literature, 1860–1940
(Chicago: Fawley-Brost Co., 1941).

The Lincoln Kinsman
(54 numbers, 1938–1942) was devoted to Lincoln’s genealogy and relatives. Beginning with April 15,1929,
Lincoln Lore,
a publication of the Lincoln National Life Insurance Co., Fort Wayne, Indiana, has offered thousands of valuable short articles. The
Lincoln Herald,
published quarterly by Lincoln Memorial University, Harrogate, Tennessee, carries more extensive essays. The
Abraham Lincoln Quarterly,
published by the Abraham Lincoln Association in Springfield between 1940 and 1952, included some of the best scholarship, and since 1979 its tradition has been upheld in
Papers of the Abraham Lincoln Association
(after 1988 called
Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association
).

Lincoln Day by Day: A Chronology, 1809–1865,
edited by Earl S. Miers and others (3 vols.; Washington, D.C.: Lincoln Sesquicentennial Commission, 1960), is an indispensable guide. So is
The Abraham Lincoln Encyclopedia,
by Mark E. Neely, Jr. (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1982). Archer H. Shaw, ed.,
The Lincoln Encyclopedia
(New York: Macmillan Co., 1950), is also useful.

Of the many biographies
Abraham Lincoln: A History
(10 vols.; New York: Century Co., 1890), by John G. Nicolay and John Hay, is the most complete.
Herndon’s Lincoln: The True Story of a Great Life
(3 vols.; Chicago: Belford, Clarke & Co., 1889), by William H. Herndon and Jesse W. Weik, is revealing on Lincoln’s early years. Albert J. Beveridge’s
Abraham Lincoln, 1809–1858
(2 vols.; Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1928), offers the fullest account of Lincoln’s career in Illinois politics. Carl Sandburg’s
Abraham Lincoln: The Prairie Years
(2 vols.; New York: Harcourt, Brace & Co., 1926) and
Abraham Lincoln: The War Years
(4 vols.; New York: Harcourt, Brace & Co., 1939) together form the most imaginative and humanly flavorful of all the biographies. The most scholarly large-scale biography remains J. G. Randall,
Lincoln the President
(4 vols.; New York: Dodd, Mead & Co., 1945–1955), the last volume of which was ably completed by Richard N. Current.

Two important recent studies which—correctly, in my opinion—emphasize the war years are Mark E. Neely, Jr.,
The Last Best Hope of Earth: Abraham Lincoln and the Promise of America
(Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1993), and Phillip S. Paludan,
The Presidency of Abraham Lincoln
(Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1994).

Of the many one-volume lives the best are Benjamin P. Thomas,
Abraham Lincoln: A Biography
(New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1952); Reinhard H. Luthin,
The Real Abraham Lincoln
(Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1960); and Stephen B. Oates,
With Malice Toward None: The Life of Abraham Lincoln
(New York: Harper & Row, 1977). Because I wanted, so far as possible, to write a biography from the original sources, I have not read or consulted these distinguished works in the preparation of the present volume. I cannot say, however, that I have not been influenced by them, for I used these books in my classes for many years and there are doubtless unconscious echoes of them in this biography.

Charles Hamilton and Lloyd Ostendorf,
Lincoln in Photographs: An Album of Every Known Pose
(Dayton, Ohio: Morningside, 1985), is authoritative. James Mellon,
The Face of Lincoln
(New York: Viking Press, 1979), offers superb reproductions of the best of these photographs.
Lincoln: An Illustrated Biography
(New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1992), by Philip B. Kunhardt, Jr., et al., is a fascinating photographic history.

On Lincoln historiography readers should consult Benjamin P. Thomas,
Portrait for Posterity: Lincoln and His Biographers
(New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1947), and Merrill D. Peterson,
Lincoln in American Memory
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1994), which is especially valuable.

It has been difficult to know how to annotate this book. Almost every aspect of Lincoln’s life has been the object of much study; most subjects are treated not merely in the biographies and the general histories of the period but in specialized monographs. If I were to cite all the books and articles consulted in the preparation of this biography, I would have a book at least twice as long as the present one. My solution of the problem has been to offer for each chapter a brief discussion of the principal sources I found most useful. I hope these paragraphs may serve as guides to further reading.

The actual notes are largely confined to giving sources for quotations and facts included in the text. I have not thought it my task to use these notes to correct errors that I think previous biographers have made or, except in a few absolutely necessary cases, to enter into historiographical discussions. This is a book about Lincoln—not a book about the literature about Lincoln.

I have tried to quote my sources as accurately as I could. In particular, I have given Lincoln’s words exactly as he wrote them and have not thought it necessary to interject [
sic
] in order to point out his infrequent errors in spelling or grammar. In the interest of readability I have throughout transcribed “&” as “and.” I have also taken the liberty of omitting initial and final ellipses. Thus, had I decided to use a phrase from Lincoln’s July 20, 1860, letter to Cassius M. Clay, I would not give it as “... at Rockport you will be in the county within which I was brought up ...,” but as “At Rockport you will be in the county within which I was brought up.” I believe that this usage does not distort the meaning but makes it easier for a reader to follow the story. (Ellipses have been scrupulously employed to signify that words within a passage have been omitted.)

AL—Abraham Lincoln

ALQ
—
Abraham Lincoln Quarterly

Baker,
Mary Todd Lincoln
—Jean Harvey Baker,
Mary Todd Lincoln: A Biography
(New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 1987)

Bates,
Diary
—Howard K. Beale, ed.,
Diary of Edward Bates, 1859–1866
(Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1933)

Beveridge—Albert J. Beveridge,
Abraham Lincoln, 1809–1858
(2 vols.; Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1928)

Browning,
Diary
—Theodore C. Pease and James G. Randall, eds.,
The Diary of Orville Hickman Browning
(2 vols.; Springfield: Illinois State Historical Library, 1925–1933)

Carpenter,
Six Months
—Francis B. Carpenter,
Six Months at the White House with Abraham Lincoln
(New York: Hurd & Houghton, 1866)

Chase,
Diary
—David Herbert Donald, ed.,
Inside Lincoln’s Cabinet: The Civil War Diaries of Salmon P. Chase
(New York: Longmans, Green & Co., 1954)

Chase MSS—All citations are to the microfilm edition issued by the Library of Congress, which includes Chase letters from the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, the Library of Congress, and other sources.

CW
—
Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln,
ed. Roy P. Basler

Day by Day
—Earl Schenk Miers, ed.,
Lincoln Day by Day
(3 vols.; Washington, D.C.: Lincoln Sesquicentennial Commission, 1960)

Donald,
Lincoln’s Herndon
—David Herbert Donald,
Lincoln’s Herndon
(New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1948)

Donald,
Sumner
—David Herbert Donald,
Charles Sumner and the Rights of Man
(New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1970)

Duff, A
Lincoln
—John J. Duff,
A. Lincoln: Prairie Lawyer
(New York: Rinehart & Co., Inc., 1960)

Hay,
Diary
—Tyler Dennett, ed.,
Lincoln and the Civil War in the Diaries and Letters of John Hay
(New York: Dodd, Mead & Co., 1939)

HEH—Huntington Library, San Marino, California

Herndon’s Lincoln
—William H. Herndon and Jesse W. Weik,
Herndon’s Lincoln: The True Story of a Great Life
(3 vols.; Chicago: Belford-Clarke, 1890). Throughout I have cited this edition, which appears to be identical to the first edition, published in 1889.

Hidden Lincoln
—Emanuel Hertz, ed.,
The Hidden Lincoln: From the Letters and Papers of William H. Herndon
(New York: Viking Press, 1928)