A New Lincoln Bible, From a Mantel to a Presidential Library

[ReignetteC]

I posted this to the "comments" sections attached to the NYT article:

Despite arguments among historians about Lincoln's faith (or lack thereof), this is certain: The Bible was dear to him.

Shortly after Lincoln's death, a local society delivered a Bible to the Executive Mansion. (It was to be a gift for the president before his unlikely demise.) Mary Lincoln, his grief-stricken widow, accepted the Bible. In her note of thanks to the society, she wrote: "I am sure my beloved husband would have been most grateful for the gift of a Bible –a book so very dear to him, and which it was his delight to read.

Elizabeth Keckley, who was Mary Lincoln's seamstress and confidant, wrote of Lincoln's love for the Bible in "Behind the Scenes." She noted that the Bible "afforded much comfort" to the weary chief executive. "A ruler of a mighty nation going to the pages of the Bible with ... earnestness for comfort and courage, and finding both in the darkest hours of the nation's calamity."