Lucien Hanks

[kerry]

(05-30-2018 03:12 PM)RJNorton Wrote:  Apparently C.A. Tripp didn't know about this...

That was my first thought.

But given he was prone to night terrors, I'll take it as a funny story.

Because I'm so into eyewitness testimony inconsistencies, I can't help but notice how the story changed, though most was consistent. Lincoln overheard it going up to bed and his uncle nodded at him? Lincoln overheard it before dinner and approached his aunt? They went to bed together? Lincoln came home at midnight and got into the bed?

Not to derail the thread totally, but it made me think of a few things I found in my research:

On July 18, 1863, it was reported in the Plain Dealer that “The latest bit of scandal is that Halleck sleeps with Father Abraham at the White House.” Mary would have been absent, recovering from her carriage accident injuries at the Soldiers' Home.

On May 27, The Sydney Morning Herald reported that “The telegraph says that Lieutenant-General Grant slept with Mr. Lincoln last night, Mrs. Presidentess sleeping in another apartment overlooking the Potomac.”[1]


[1] This may have been republished from March 9.

Maybe the entire military worked a bit different than we've thought!

In fairness, it seems they were very casual about this:

On July 10, 1864, Hay wrote in his diary “A little after midnight R. T. L. Came into my room & got into bed: Saying Stanton had sent out for them all to come in.”

I would almost always rather sleep on the floor than in a bed with someone I don't know well.