ABRAHAM LINCOLN
WILBUR F. GORDY
Published by Left of Brain Books
Copyright 2021 Left of Brain Books
ISBN 978-1-396-31995-2
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Table of Contents
Abraham Lincoln in 1861
From a photograph by Hesler, in possession of F. A. Brown
PREFACE.
IT is an old and true maxim which says that we learn from experience; meaning, of course, our own personal experience. But much is to be learned also from the experience of others, especially of the great and the good who have lived before us. Herein lies the value of biography. By coming to know, through books, men of great and strong character, we learn from their lives much that is helpful in living our own. For if in imagination we enter into their purposes and plans, their sorrows and joys, their defeats and victories, we learn through their experiences, and they become in a real sense our teachers, guides, and friends.
Perhaps to Abraham Lincoln, more than to any other man in the history of our country, has been given the power of influence over the lives of those unknown to him. To thousands who never saw him, but who know him through his letters and speeches, and through the record of his private and public life, he is an inspiration. The story of his overcoming the difficulties of his early life has put courage into many a young heart; his resolute stand by what he thought to be right has helped countless souls to be true to their duty; and the kindliness and good-will which flowed from his great heart toward alleven his foesmade the cherishing of malice and bitterness seem unworthy and shameful.
To know such a man, as we may know him by the study or even the reading of his life, cannot fail to inspire us to nobler living and more patriotic service in that little community we call our neighborhood and that larger community, our country.
Such a hero and leader, who continues to live in the ideals and institutions of his native land, is one of its richest possessions; and it is especially fitting, in days when the nation is again called to take a stand in a great cause, that we should learn to understand and appreciate something of the high purpose and immortal achievements of his life.
With that thought in mind, this book has been prepared. It is the first of a series called Heroes and Leaders in American History, a series which will include many of the men, in various fields of service in our national life, who have had much to do with making our country what it is to-day.
In writing this volume my aim has been to make real to my young readers Abraham Lincoln; first as a youth who worked and struggled in the backwoods to prepare himself for greater usefulness; then as a man raised by his own merits to positions of responsibility; and, finally, as a leader of a great nation, who through four of the most troubled years of that nations history carried its burdens amid peril and crisis; but always and under all circumstances as one who was simple, honest, and friendly, living true to high and unselfish motives of service to his fellow men.
In conclusion, I wish to acknowledge my deep obligation to Mr. Forrest Morgan, of the Watkinson Library, Hartford, and to Miss Elizabeth P. Peck, of the Hartford Public High School, both of whom have read the manuscript and offered most helpful criticism; and also to my wife, whose invaluable co-operation and assistance has in large measure given to this biography whatever of merit it may possess.
WILBUR F. GORDY.
HARTFORD, CONN.,
May 1, 1917.
CHAPTER I .
BOYHOOD DAYS
IN the pioneer country of Kentucky, not so very long before that wild, wooded region became a State, began the life of one of our nations great men. There, in a remote settlement on Nolin Creek, about fifty miles south of where Louisville now stands, Abraham Lincoln was born. Nothing in his surroundings or his early living conditions foreshadowed the greatness of the man or of his career. Possibly the natural simplicity of his life favored the growth of a great soul. Certainly none of the hampering conditions of luxury, or even of too comfortable living, held it back.
The immediate family into which the hero of our story was born was small, there being only his father, Thomas Lincoln, his mother, Nancy Hanks Lincoln, and a little sister, Sarah, two years old. But there were many bearing the names of Lincoln and of Hanks in the country. Their ancestry ran back to the early beginnings of New England, and the names themselves were ancient English.
With the prosperous and successful branches of the family we have little to do. Abraham Lincoln himself in his later years knew little of them, not even of his grandfather. He said: I am more concerned to know what his grandson will be. Knowing, therefore, that among Lincolns ancestors there were able and distinguished men, we may pass over their achievements, and begin the story of Abraham Lincolns life with a brief account of his father.
Thomas Lincoln was the youngest of a family of five children who were made fatherless by the shot of a stealthy Indian when little Thomas was only ten years old. From that time he was set adrift, a wandering, laboring boy, to make his own way in the world. Yet at twenty-five he had bought a farm in Hardin County, Kentucky, and had learned a trade, being called a good carpenter for those days. So he could not have been altogether idle and shiftless, though history has usually pictured him so. Besides, he was honest and sober, with strong common sense, and was considered by his neighbors good-natured and obliging; and his love of fun and good stories, traits he handed on, made him unusually good company.
These qualities, even though he lacked thrift and ambition, won him the affection of the devoted woman who became Abrahams mother. She is described as sweet-tempered and beautiful the centre of all the country merrymaking, and a famous spinner and housewife. She was the niece of Joseph Hanks, in whose shop Thomas Lincoln had learned the carpenters trade. She was twenty-three years old at the time of her marriage, five years younger than her husband, but superior to him in appearance and in intellect, and in her ability to read and write; for until his wife taught him after their marriage Thomas Lincoln had never learnedpossibly because he had been thrown upon the world so young, or perhaps because he had no liking for books. Indeed, few of their friends could boast this accomplishment.
Cabin at Nolin Creek Where Abraham Lincoln Was Born
It was on June 12, 1806, that Thomas Lincoln and Nancy Hanks were married in Elizabethtown, Kentucky. The young couple began their housekeeping in a one-room cabin, fourteen feet square, like many others in Elizabethtown; and there in the following year their first child, Sarah, was born.
