Mary Todd Lincoln's faux pas (plural), worse, and much worse

[David Lockmiller]

(07-04-2014 03:19 PM)Linda Anderson Wrote:  

(07-04-2014 02:54 PM)David Lockmiller Wrote:  ]

I looked up Professor Burlingame's reference to the speech disruption on the Knox college website. There was also this reference which was not in the book: Clara Harris in Timothy S. Good, ed., We Saw Lincoln Shot: One Hundred Eyewitness Accounts (Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1995), 70.

I looked up the Timothy Good book on Google books and brought up the book preview. Unfortunately, the preview excludes page 70.

If anyone is going to make a comment on this incident favorable to Mary Todd Lincoln, it would be Clara Harris. I would like to know what Clara Harris said regarding the incident.

David, you can find Clara's account on Amazon.

http://www.amazon.com/We-Saw-Lincoln-Sho...ncoln+shot

It starts on page 69. "He spoke from the center window of the Executive Mansion. I had been invited to pass the evening there, and stood at the window adjoining room with Mrs. Lincoln, watching the crowd below as they listened and cheered. Of course Booth was there, watching his chance. I wonder he did not choose that occasion but probably he knew a better opportunity would be offered. After the speech was over, we went into Mr. Lincoln's room; he was lying on the sofa, quite exhausted but he talked of the events of the past fortnight, of his visit to Richmond, of the enthusiasm everywhere felt through the country; and Mrs. Lincoln declared the last few days to have been the happiest in her life."

I got a "please sign in" message when I tried to read page 69. I am not a "sign in" type of guy; that usually means creation of an account with passwords.

But as I said, Professor Burlingame left the Clara Harris reference out of the published book for some unknown reason. Maybe he purposely left out information in the book that differed from his own accepted thoughts. And the account of Clara Harris entering Lincoln's bedroom, after the speech as Lincoln rested on a sofa, certainly seems to me to differ from the Marquis de Chambrun's account. The Marquis mentions only Mary, Lincoln, and himself being in the room. Clara Harris does mention the Marquis being there; and, the Marquis does not mention Clara Harris being there.

As Plutarch wrote: "So very difficult a matter is it to trace and find out the truth of anything by history."