The Terre Haute Madstone

[Anita]

This is from an article found here. https://stephenjessetaylor.wordpress.com...history-2/

I hadn't heard this story of Lincoln taking Robert to be cured by a madstone. Is there any truth to it?


"A “widow lady” whom McCormick thinks was Mary Taylor “cured three cases” of hydrophobia in early 1848, according to the Wabash Express.

During the decades when John McCoy and Mrs. Taylor were folk medical practitioners in the Hoosier State, Abraham Lincoln, according to an old claim, brought his son Robert to Terre Haute to be cured of an ominous dog-bite.

Poet and Lincoln biographer Edgar Lee Masters reported this claim in his 1931 Lincoln the Man. (Like the president, Masters was obsessed with melancholy and death. He grew up near Lincoln’s New Salem in Illinois and later set his paranormal masterpiece, Spoon River Anthology, in the old Petersburg cemetery where Lincoln’s first lover, Ann Rutledge, a typhus victim, lies.)

“He believed in the madstone,” Masters wrote, in a section on Lincoln’s superstition, “and one of his sisters-in-law related that Lincoln took one of his boys to Terre Haute, Indiana, to have the stone applied to a wound inflicted by a dog on the boy.”

Max Ehrmann, a once-renowned poet and philosopher who lived in Terre Haute, investigated Masters’ claim in 1936. At the famous hotel called the Terre Haute House, Ehrmann had once heard a similar story from three of Lincoln’s political acquaintances. They told Ehrmann that sometime in the 1850s, Lincoln, then still a lawyer in Springfield, brought Robert to Indiana for a madstone cure. Father and son stayed at The Prairie House at 7th and Wabash, an earlier incarnation of the famous hotel. A sister of Mary Todd Lincoln, Frances Todd Wallace, backed up the story.

“I have never been able to discover who owned the mad-stone,” Ehrmann wrote. “It was a woman, so the story runs.” If true, Robert (the only child of Abraham and Mary Lincoln to survive to adulthood) would have been a young child or teenager. He lived to be 82."

[RJNorton]

Anita, in his Robert Lincoln biography Jason Emerson writes, "Robert was also bitten by a rabid dog as a boy, and Abraham took his son to Terre Haute, Indiana, to be healed with a mad-stone, a common folk remedy for rabies. 'Great apprehension was felt for the young hopeful's escape from hydrophobia,' wrote Ward H. Lamon. 'Mr. Lincoln, more than anyone else feared for the life of his first born.' The aftermath of the incident is unknown, so either the dog was not rabid or Robert's immune system was able to fight off the infection."

In an interview with William Herndon, Frances Todd Wallace said, "Don't think Mr. L. was much attached to Cats and dogs - one reason was that Bob once had a little dog - he bit Bob - Lincoln took him off to the Mad Stone in Terrehaute or other place in Indiana I think."

Herndon also briefly mentions the visit to Terre Haute in his "Life of Lincoln."

I have a few other books that mention this visit, but some treat the story more as "tradition" rather than "fact." Ruth Painter Randall includes the story in "Lincoln's Sons," but author Ralph Gary writes, "There is another tradition that he (Lincoln) brought his son Robert here (Terre Haute) for a dog bite, possibly in September 1859, by a lady with a curative 'mad stone.' "

I think Frances Todd Wallace is the sole source for this story, but I am not 100% certain of that.

[Houmes]

(12-07-2016 05:00 PM)RJNorton Wrote:  Anita, in his Robert Lincoln biography Jason Emerson writes, "Robert was also bitten by a rabid dog as a boy, and Abraham took his son to Terre Haute, Indiana, to be healed with a mad-stone, a common folk remedy for rabies. 'Great apprehension was felt for the young hopeful's escape from hydrophobia,' wrote Ward H. Lamon. 'Mr. Lincoln, more than anyone else feared for the life of his first born.' The aftermath of the incident is unknown, so either the dog was not rabid or Robert's immune system was able to fight off the infection."

In an interview with William Herndon, Frances Todd Wallace said, "Don't think Mr. L. was much attached to Cats and dogs - one reason was that Bob once had a little dog - he bit Bob - Lincoln took him off to the Mad Stone in Terrehaute or other place in Indiana I think."

Herndon also briefly mentions the visit to Terre Haute in his "Life of Lincoln."

I have a few other books that mention this visit, but some treat the story more as "tradition" rather than "fact." Ruth Painter Randall includes the story in "Lincoln's Sons," but author Ralph Gary writes, "There is another tradition that he (Lincoln) brought his son Robert here (Terre Haute) for a dog bite, possibly in September 1859, by a lady with a curative 'mad stone.' "

I think Frances Todd Wallace is the sole source for this story, but I am not 100% certain of that.

If Robert Todd Lincoln truly had a rabid dog bite, he wouldn't have survived. In U.S. history there have been only three known survivors from rabid animals, where rabies vaccine and rabies immunoglobulin were either not available or given too late. Most bites in the U.S. are from bats, and fewer than 5% of cases involve dogs. Unfortunately, most victims are not diagnosed until they are symptomatic, and the first signs are a flu-like illness. The really bad stuff (paralysis, agitation, terror, coma, death) appears later. Hydrophobia (not always seen) is caused by involvement of the throat muscles and airway compromise. Incubation periods of the rabies virus varies between four days and six years, depending upon wound contamination and the virus load in the wound.

[Gene C]

There are several articles about mad stones on the internet, they are similar in content with minor variations, so take your pick.
I chose these two,

http://www.grandviewoutdoors.com/big-gam...madstones/

https://thelibrary.org/lochist/periodica.../su83k.htm

[Anita]

I am surprised Lincoln believed in this cure. I thought him to be skeptical of quackery.

[Wild Bill]

We are all susceptible to the myths of our times

[Gene C]

(12-07-2016 05:00 PM)RJNorton Wrote:  In an interview with William Herndon, Frances Todd Wallace said, "Don't think Mr. L. was much attached to Cats and dogs - one reason was that Bob once had a little dog - he bit Bob - Lincoln took him off to the Mad Stone in Terrehaute or other place in Indiana I think."

I think Frances Todd Wallace is the sole source for this story, but I am not 100% certain of that.

Well we know that Lincoln DID like cats and dogs, so consider that when thinking about the story of the Mad Stone.

[Eva Elisabeth]

I agree with Bill. Gene - "Don't think Mr. L..." could be read as "I don't think...". I think a lot of people loved and love to draw their personal "conclusions" from what they watch others doing although there's no factual nor logical/necessary connection. Most pet owners do not hate their pet because of an accident that needed treatment. E.g. many horse riders experience a serious injury over time but wouldn't give up on horses. Rather the conclusion IMO lacks any basis than the trip.

Nevertheless I think it was Robert who didn't like animals - manybe due to that event. I don't recall him ever owning any pets later nor riding horses.

[RJNorton]

(12-10-2016 12:19 AM)Eva Elisabeth Wrote:  Nevertheless I think it was Robert who didn't like animals - manybe due to that event. I don't recall him ever owning any pets later nor riding horses.

I agree. In general, I think the other boys, Willie and Tad (and even little Eddie) were more into animals than Robert.