Lincoln, 1865 - 2015.

[Eva Elisabeth]

(03-27-2015 10:05 PM)LincolnToddFan Wrote:  KatieH., I have been a slowpoke about welcoming you to the Board. Please forgive me! And thank you for this great topic because it's just the kind I enjoy most.

I am quite a bit older than you, and the problem is that I've been reading about Lincoln and his life since I was a child. I can't always remember where I read things. But there are a LOT of wonderful anecdotes and stories and I remember them:

First, all of the animal stories warm my heart because I am kind of a fanatic animal lover. The stories about AL laying on the floor of his home in Springfield cuddling and playing with his pet cats until they purred...the poignant and famous story of the orphan kittens at City Point that he was so concerned for.. the incident shortly before his death when he was on the train with Tad and ordered it stopped because he and his son saw a turtle on the tracks and they wanted to play with it...the story that Eva mentioned where he got off his horse to find the nest of some baby birds that had been misplaced, and finally the one where he helped a stuck pig out of some mud because it gave him a sad look as he was riding by. That one makes me tear up, because I understood exactly what made him stop and help that poor creature.

I also love reading about the delight he took in his pet goats at the WH, and how he used to sometimes take them around in his carriage.

I LOVE Roger's story.

But there are two anecdotes in particular that, for me, demonstrate the true essence of what he was like in his dealings with people close to him...affectionate and patient almost beyond belief. Shortly after he became President he was in his office at the WH, in an extremely intense meeting with some of his generals. As we know the war was not going well for the North in those early days. There was thumping and noise outside the door and then the sound of a child wailing. It was little Halsey "Holly" Taft, the buddy of his son Tad. Holly had gotten his finger caught in a door. Everyone would have understood if the exasperated, stressed out president had called for a servant or someone else to deal with the child but AL stopped the meeting and went into the hall to console the little boy until he stopped crying...then he returned to his meeting with the generals. I think this story comes from Julia Taft Bayne, older sister of Halsey, but I can't be certain.

And the last one concerns Mary, and how he dealt with his high strung wife....."One day, Mary came home from shopping to discover that their children, Robert and Eddie, had made a mess in the parlor. She was scolding them when Abraham came in and intervened on the boys' behalf. Mary angrily turned on him "but he only laughed", recalled a neighbor, "picked her up in his arms, and kissed the [i]daylights out of her. And she clung to him like a girl[/i]".
("The Lincolns: A Scrapbook Look at Abraham and Mary"...source Katherine Helm.."Mary, Wife of Lincoln" pg#106

I think there is no better illustration of his emotional intelligence or his skill in handling Mary!

Toia, I love your last example and agree on your last sentence!!!