Madness of Mary Lincoln

[RJNorton]

(11-16-2017 10:40 AM)Gene C Wrote:  Do you have a reliable source for item 4, 5 & 6?

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No - just pure guesswork on my part. It is known that papers fell from Lincoln's pocket, and they were picked up by Bedee. Bedee turned them over to Stanton. No mention of a pistol. Bedee would have to have been told to keep quiet about the pistol for this scenario to work out. All this is just speculation - I do not have any idea if the pistol Mary was apparently carrying in the 1870s was the same pistol that Tad was given during the war.

[kerry]

Mary was begging people to shoot her that night, so giving her a pistol seems unlikely. That whole pistol story is weird. I don't think the Edwardses would make up that they heard that from someone (it sounded like it was not firsthand knowledge), but that person could have been mistaken or had some reason to claim that. Then Elizabeth said Ninian may have overreacted, instead of saying the report was wrong, which is hard to make sense of - was it a false report or did they find out she had a good reason for having it? Then there was the mention of the hitmen, which also quickly faded away. Whether or not that was true would clearly make a big difference as to her mental state and ability to live in society. Elizabeth said it was in her purse, didn't she? So it doesn't seem like a relic tucked away. I assume Catherine Clinton was trying to make sense of that story. I found an article that said Mary gave Major Jose Ramon Pico, a pallbearer for the Washington funeral, a pocket pistol that Lincoln carried during the war.

At the institution, they did give medications, but it's unclear if Mary was. Most of them were ones no longer used, because they are highly addictive, but they calmed the person down. I think it is very likely the structure of the place helped Mary stabilize and focus, but as a long-term strategy, the mental harm caused by the loss of freedom would have outweighed those benefits. The bottom line is that Mary was never going to accept it, and was smart and bold enough to fight it. Some other eccentric or troubled people may have accepted it as their fate, right or wong, and done better there, but she wasn't going to. That's what made it a bad choice , even if she met criteria for institutionalization. It similar to what Davis said about a financial conservatorship working for a person of another temperament. With her personality, the only thing that could justify a long time stay was obvious danger to others or self-harm. Her desire for freedom and her personality were just too strong, and she liked to move around and see new things and read the papers. Whenever she was stuck some place for a while, she seemed to deteriorate, because she couldn't settle down or do anything but brood. While her wandering or campaigning (for freedom or money) may have been unusual and obsessive, her mental state seemed to be better during those periods to me.

Her friend Prof. Swing said she had a few days or weeks a year when she needed someone watching her, but the rest of the time she should be free. It's unfortunate that she did not have someone capable of caring for her during those periods, especially given her traveling. It was probably something only Lincoln could have done, or perhaps if her sons had lived they might have shared the responsibility of looking out for her.

[L Verge]

Don't you think that Tad would have been a caring and protective care giver?

[Gene C]

Caring and protective, yes I think so, but Tad probably lacked the maturity and life experience that would be needed to deal with Mary in her most challenging situations.
I think it would probably take more than the love of a teenage son for his mother to deal with Mary's illness.

[L Verge]

Good point, but I also wonder if Tad's death helped to push his mother over the precipice. Also, wasn't there an marked improvement in Tad once he got proper education and discipline? Perhaps not enough to deal with his mother's problems as they became severe, but certainly not as bull-headed as I see Robert to be at times.

[kerry]

I think it got worse after Tad's death, as she seemed to center around him and he didn't seem to mind. Mary seemed to need someone optimistic and steady, who would not fight her if she was nervous or angry, but would try to redirect her. It seems like Tad had that personality, and probably Willie. I think Robert was less that way, which I just see as a personality type issue, not as a good or bad thing. But once Tad had a family or job, I think it would have been hard for him to always be around the way a husband would. However, I think it is possible he wouldn't have minded her living with him, even if she was domineering, so she would have been more tied down and less likely to wander and obsess. A letter that was more recently posted on an auction site included this:

"Just as I had in a measure returned to my natural cheerfulness - with a worshipped son, by my side, who could not bear me out of his sight when I was feeling that once more, I had something to live for, who was my pride, my fond delight, to have this precious one, snatched from my arms."

Clearly she wanted to be the center of someone's world and fuss over them. http://images.goldbergauctions.com/php/c...r=3&page=1

I believe she had probably been having those days/weeks of deterioration for a while, but people around her stepped in. She probably had fewer close relationships in 1871, having been abroad and much less social, and fewer people keeping an eye on her for image reasons. I also think her spiritualistic associations and practices made her say and do unusual things that considerably affected how people viewed her mental state.

[Eva Elisabeth]

Did you read this?
https://www.amazon.com/Mary-Todd-Lincoln...0880640731
My copy is far away, I cannot check her letters after Batavia, but I think not everyone though her "mad".
Especially her grand-nephew Lewis didn't.

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I, too, think Tad's death was just too much (her husband's had been already), and if anything Batavia brought her back to reason because getting out needed this (Batavia worked like cold water in the face. Despite I think it wasn't good for anything - well, getting to know her son's mindset).

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Didn't her sister Elizabeth, Robert's aunt, have one mentality ill daughter? Was she institutionalized? No. IMO Robert just wanted to get rid of a problem the most convenient way for him.

[kerry]

(11-16-2017 08:36 PM)Eva Elisabeth Wrote:  Did you read this?
https://www.amazon.com/Mary-Todd-Lincoln...0880640731
My copy is far away, I cannot check her letters after Batavia, but I think not everyone though her "mad".
Especially her grand-nephew Lewis didn't.

---

I, too, think Tad's death was just too much (her husband's had been already), and if anything Batavia brought her back to reason because getting out needed this (Batavia worked like cold water in the face. Despite I think it wasn't good for anything - well, getting to know her son's mindset).

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Didn't her sister Elizabeth, Robert's aunt, have one mentality ill daughter? Was she institutionalized? No. IMO Robert just wanted to get rid of a problem the most convenient way for him.

Yes, I have that book and have read it through. It was recently made available at archive.org to be "borrowed" if you want to access it, along with a ton of other Lincoln books. With it being only Mary's side of the correspondence, Lewis doesn't say anything, but they clearly had a good relationship. "Cold water to the face" is a good way of putting it. Elizabeth's daughter's husband was given a job in another country to hide her, supposedly. It's amazing to me that they kept it as quiet as they did, given how much is spoken about the Lincolns. It seems like Elizabeth was opposed to any family member being institutionalized because of the embarrassment, but I do think she thought Mary should be free. It's clear a lot of people thought she was eccentric but not in need of institutionalization, and that others lacked the imagination to see any distinction between the two, especially with women. Mary was able to appreciate people who were different and accept that they were so without dismissing them, as she does in her letters about several people, particularly to her daughter-in-law. Then you have the letters that indicate her doctor told her she needed quiet and couldn't see Myra Bradwell or Jane Swisshelm. She clearly connected well with people who had an independent streak.

[Susan Higginbotham]

Interestingly, Julia Edwards was one "different" person whom Mary didn't like at all, judging from her references to her in her letters.

The source for Julia's husband being sent abroad for causes related to his wife is a 1912 letter by Ada Bailhache, who writes that "Mrs. Baker was a wayward girl and very attractive woman to the sorrow of her family and friends. There was a scandal connected with her about 1872, and Mr. Baker was sent as Consul to the Argentine Republic . . . " It sounds that if Julia was indeed the cause of her husband's being given a diplomatic appointment, it was because of a sexual scandal and not because of her mental health.

Michael Burlingame, who quotes the Bailhache letter, also writes that a trustee was appointed for Julia because she could not handle her affairs, but it seems more probable that Julia, who owned some real property in Springfield, had put it into a trust before going abroad. She and her daughter were visiting Julia's brother in Chicago when her husband was fatally injured in a railroad accident in Argentina in 1897, and Julia apparently spent the rest of her life in Chicago.

[kerry]

It seems like Julia had mental abnormalities and sexual scandal, which may or may not have been related. No one mentions her being eccentric, so maybe that was confined to the home. Elizabeth said was especially bad after each child was born, so it was probably postpartum psychosis and may not have been noticeable at other times. But then Elizabeth said she was at no time natural in her behavior. Surely they wouldn't have sent her to Washington if she was "at no time natural." Mary seems to have been upset by the sexual behavior, as I doubt she had especially liberal views on that subject, and Julia was married.