I would rather be defeated with the soldier vote behind me than to be...

[Rob Wick]

I haven't visited the forum for a while, so I never saw this thread until I received a private message from David asking my opinion of A Reporter for Lincoln. I asked David to give me a few days to go through my papers. I decided to answer his question here so all can see it.

First, some background.

Henry E. Wing was a Methodist minister and served from Connecticut during the Civil War where he was wounded in the leg during the battle of Fredericksburg, specifically the Union attack on Marye's Heights. He told Tarbell that he didn't support Lincoln during his first run for the presidency, instead supporting Stephen A. Douglas. Wing's father was an ardent abolitionist, and his mother had spent time in the South, where she accepted the role that slavery played there. Wing's father was such a strong opponent of slavery that he publicly castigated his son during a speech before the war. His father told the crowd that he couldn't believe that someone bearing his own name would be as evil as his son. Later that day, at the urging of his mother, Henry left town rather than confront his father.

After his wounding, Wing became a cub reporter for the New York Tribune newspaper. His main claim to fame rested on the fact that during the Battle of the Wilderness, Wing received information from Ulysses S. Grant that no matter what he planned to persevere in his fight against Robert E. Lee. Wing made his way to Washington, where he was given an audience with Lincoln. Having had no news from Grant for days, Lincoln asked to see Wing, who told him of Grant's statement, immediately (in Wing's story) lightening Lincoln's mood and endearing Wing to Lincoln. What made it even more interesting is that Edwin M. Stanton had ordered Wing be shot as a Confederate spy, which Lincoln immediately suspended.

Wing published much of his reminisces in the early years of the 20th century, mainly in the Christian Advocate. Tarbell was first approached about Wing on April 28, 1924 when a woman named Mrs. John Sherman Hoyt wrote her a letter telling her about Wing and his exploits and urging Tarbell to come to South Norwalk, Connecticut to meet with Wing, who was in his 80s and not long for the world. Although Tarbell's reply to Hoyt isn't in her papers, she did go to meet Wing in May of 1924. In a memo to herself, Tarbell wrote of Wing "I am agreeably disappointed in the man. He is past 80 and deaf, but still youthful in spirit--quite simple and friendly. He launches at once into talk of Lincoln. I find that most of the stories in the MS (that had been given to Tarbell by Hoyt to study before meeting Wing) have been printed in one form or another in the Christian Advocate, that under the title of "When Lincoln Kissed Me" they have a little book which still sells."

Tarbell only mentions the story of Lincoln telling Wing about the soldier's vote once in all the memos in her papers. "Light on Lincoln's feeling for the common soldier, his desire that they back him up in '64, his fear that they might not."

Tarbell wasn't convinced that the material she had along with her interviews of Wing would make much a story, especially given that much of the information had already been printed. Tarbell wanted to focus a piece on Wing's horse, named Jess. "I am inclined to think that the real hero of this story is Jess, the horse, that is, from the writer's point of view, and that if Wing can tell me enough of Jess that the Lincoln and Grant material would give the thing a freshness and a value which would be quite unique." According to Tarbell's notes, Jess was left in a thicket and Lincoln ordered that an expedition be fitted out to enable Wing to return to the thicket and retrieve his horse. "The expedition had to run through a Confederate camp at one point and had the glory of having Mr. Lincoln himself ride her. To give more of the horse, its end, etc., would make, it seems to me, a capital tale."

Tarbell, who grew immensely fond of Wing and his wife, admitted that she was "Puzzled to know how I can handle this material to Wing's advantage." Tarbell was able to sell articles to the Ladies Home Journal and Collier's. Macmillan agreed to publish the book, giving Tarbell an advance of $150 (almost $2,300 in today's dollars). She insisted that Wing's widow be given the royalties for the work as well as her pay from the magazine articles given that Wing never made much money off of his Lincoln stories when he was alive.

So now, as to the veracity of Wing's work. Tarbell, from what I saw in her papers, never questioned any of Wing's stories. However, Tarbell rarely questioned any thing, which is why she accepted Joseph Medill's article on Lincoln's Lost Speech as well as the reminisces of Henry B. Rankin.

As for the reviews, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle wrote "She has not romanced to the distortion of historical fact, yet romance is the breath of the story." William E. Barton, exhibiting the snark for which he was well-known, wrote in the Journal of American History in 1927 that "The sentimentality which pervades the narrative will probably win for it a considerable body of readers. For the critical reader it contains nothing of interest or value. It is history of the type that is frequently portrayed on the silver screen. Save for the prestige which the sponsorship of its distinguished editor provides, the narrative would call for no mention here."

I honestly don't have an opinion either way as to how trustworthy Wing's recollections are. I've not done enough research to show what other historians think of Wing. Given that many approach history with an exceedingly skeptical eye, it wouldn't surprise me that some might take his stories as unproven anecdote. That Tarbell accepted them uncritically and that the only negative review I found came from Barton doesn't surprise me. I honestly believe that Wing was such an obscure figure that very little study has ever been given to him, and its likely that very little ever will.

Best
Rob