The Pocket Watch that Mary Never Received

[RJNorton]

Susan, there was a second watch which was fraudulent.

Here is what is said about that one on the Rail Splitter website. The watch Susan cited is mentioned in the last paragraph.

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"Dan Morphy offered an intriguing Lincoln item in his June 9th sale. It was represented as the pocket watch that Abraham Lincoln gave to Mary Todd as the time of their on-again off-again courtship, engagement and marriage. The catalog description read:

“This is a historical 18K Gold pocket watch that was presented to Miss Mary Todd while courting between 1839 and 1842. The inscription reads, ‘To Miss Mary Todd-A Token of my Everlasting Devotion and Affection – Abe Lincoln’. The watch was mentioned in Abe Lincoln’s archives. It was owned by the Todd family for a number of years, and then sold privately to Mr. Ready where it has been for the last several decades. The watch itself has a very elaborate gold design with three colors of gold to create flowers. The watch is not in working order, as it needs a new chain. The watch comes with a letter of authenticity from the North Missouri Historical Society, and a report from the EMTEC providing proof of the age of the inscription.”

There are a lot of “loose ends” associated with this watch, besides the fact that no provenance from the time of its presentation or shortly thereafter came with the lot. The biggest “blip” is that Lincoln never referred to himself as “Abe”. That nickname lacked dignity and propriety. He never signed any of his letters or documents in that manner.

What exactly are “Abe Lincoln’s archives?” A specific notation would help. The letter from Fred Schwartz, the “senior metallurgical engineer” at EMTEC of Denver asserts that the “engraving is not of recent origin.” Fine.. all that means is that the engraving wasn’t done in the last twenty years. It tells you when it “wasn’t” done, not when it “was” done.

The letter of authenticity from Jerry L. Davis on the letterhead of the “North Missouri Historical Society” of Kahoka, Missouri is a joke. A search on google for “North Missouri Historical Society” comes back with no results. There are historical societies in Kahoka, but not this one. Mr. Davis makes all sorts of wild claims, including that he owns the only COMPLETE copy in Lincoln’s hand of the Emancipation Proclamation, that he owns a pen that Lincoln carried and used from 1858 until his death and which was used exclusively for all the documents he composed, that he owns a marble desk set given to Lincoln in 1864 by the City of New York, and that he owns a Lincoln watch “that was part of the O. H. Oldroid [sic] collection.” He says that since his watch and Larry Ready’s watch (the one being sold here) are the same size, with the same case, housed in similar boxes, that both are therefore authentic Lincoln watches.

The offering also fails to take into account another Lincoln presentation watch… the one in the Henry Luhrs Collection sold by Heritage Auctions in 2007 for $71,700. That watch had extensive documentation and the presentation engraving was signed “A.L.”, not “Abe Lincoln”. With an estimate of $30,000-$60,000, this ticking time bomb was passed."