Lincoln and Ann Rutledge

[LincolnToddFan]

It is typical and unsurprising that while Michael Burlingame reports in great detail about Mary Lincoln's infamous City Point freak out and how it distressed and embarrassed AL according to Adam Badeau(Grant's secretary) he ignores other commentary on the incident. According to Lieutenant Commander Barnes, who was also at City Point as a member of Grant's staff:

[Barnes asked after Mrs. Lincoln, "hoping that she had recovered from the fatigue of the previous day". The president's answer reveals a depth of understanding and compassion for the frail woman that other witnesses to her tirades did not share. He knew it was not jealousy alone that had disturbed his wife. Lincoln explained "that she was not at all well, and expressed fear that the excitements of the surroundings were too great for her, or for any woman." He did not apologize for his wife or try to defend her behavior. He put his finger on the crux of her problem so that Barnes, at least, could be begin to comprehend it.

Barnes and Mrs. Grant stayed aboard while AL and MTL left the ship to wander alone together "arm in arm in the woods". AL was hopeful that in that quiet place he could "cheer up his wife".

[Among several witnesses to Mrs. Lincoln's trouble, Barnes is most trustworthy because he harbors no bitterness toward the afflicted woman(EMPHASIS MINE) and actually appears to have absorbed some of Lincoln's compassion. "She was at no time well; the mental strain upon her was great....Mr. Lincoln I am sure felt deep anxiety for her. Lieutenant Barnes would always remember Lincoln's kindness toward his wife, "the most affectionate solitude, so marked, so gentle and unaffected that no one could see them together without being impressed by it."] //quoted from Daniel Mark Epstein's The Lincolns: Portrait of a Marriage

Burlingame also quotes Elizabeth Keckley's famous story of the incident where AL showed Mary the mental asylum and suggests that she might be taken there if she didn't get a grip, but predictably ignores her other observation about the couple...that "Lincoln loved the mother of his children tenderly...and craved only affection from her."

I just read another poster wondering whether AL would have gotten cold feet at the altar with Ann Rutledge. We will never know of course, but I am more than a little convinced that much of what attracted AL to Rutledge was the fact that she was basically UNAVAILABLE. She was engaged to another man, and her ability to marry AL depended on whether or not she could be released from her engagement to John McNamar.

Incidentally David[Lockmiller] there is no real proof that AL and AR were ever officially engaged, let alone that there was any "well planned" wedding in the offing. John McNamar later said that as far as he knew, he and Ann were still going to marry. He bought furniture for their new home. He and Lincoln remained friends after Ann's death. There are several extent letters from Lincoln to McNamar, who he calls "Mack". Is that likely to have been the case if AL had bird-dogged the guy's fiancée?

We read that Mary might have been unfaithful to AL with William Wood. Burlingame seems to relish that possibility, but dismisses any and all conjecture about his hero's possible affair with Officer David Derickson in the summer and fall of 1862. There is at least as much evidence for Lincoln's affair with Derickson as there is for Mary's with Wood, so what gives?

A couple of weeks ago I was reading through some of William Herndon's published letters. I am now convinced this guy was probably not rowing with both oars. Here is what he writes about the deaths of the Lincoln children......"I should like to know what caused the death of those children? I have an opinion which I shall never state to anyone. I know a good deal of the Lincoln family and too much of Mrs. Lincoln.":huh:// quoted from Herndon's letter to Jesse Weik in "Legends That Libel Lincoln" by Montgomery Lewis.

Alrighty then...let's recap!

1)Conniving, lustful Mary Todd seduced an older but clueless bumpkin Abraham Lincoln, who had too much "honor" to resist. The morning after, he got nervous about having sex out of wedlock and the possibility that she might be pregnant. So he proposed. Then, meekly following Mary's instructions, he had her wedding band inscribed LOVE IS ETERNAL. But he was dreaming of Annie.

2)Mary was intent on punishing him for ditching her the first time. He really hated her and was miserable. He tried to stay away as much as possible. But when he did come home, she threw things at him and forced him to have sex. That explains why there were four children in the first ten years. He never wanted to do anything except practice law and read and live on the Illinois prairie in peace. But Mary wanted to be the wife of a president so much she nagged the hell out of him. He acquiesced, brooded, and dreamed of Annie.

3) Mary was so depraved she probably had a hand in the deaths of toddler Eddie and golden child Willie. Lincoln wept, grieved, and dreamed of Annie.

4)After they got to the WH, Mary spied on behalf of the South and was at the same time a vile traitoress to her Southern forebears. She also stole money, bribed officials, threw tantrums, and committed adultery. Lincoln "bore it all as Christ might have" and dreamed of Annie.

5) Mary took part in the plot to have her husband murdered at Ford's Theater. She offended the Grants so much they refused to attend, and weren't there to protect him.So John Wilkes Booth shot Abraham Lincoln and he went to be eternally reunited with Ann Rutledge(this last according to poet Edgar Lee Masters, who incidentally later turned savagely against the Lincoln legend and regretted ever saying anything good about him)

I might be resorting to sarcasm, but every last one of the charges above has at one time or another been laid at the feet of Mary Todd Lincoln. If her critics are to be believed she was the reincarnation of the Roman Messalina, not a basically kind, intelligent, cultured but emotionally unstable woman.