Portrait For Posterity

[Gene C]

by Benjamin Thomas, copyright 1947. I had some misgivings about this book. I didn't think it would be that interesting. It is, because Thomas is a good writer. Since it came highly recommended by friends here that had read it, and I had read three other books by the author, I purchased it. I think it's a good book even when I didn't know anything about many of the Lincoln biographers he discusses. Very informative.

This book looks at the writings of Josiah Holland, William Herndon, Ward Hill Lamon, Hay and Nicolay, Jesse Weik, Henry Whitney, Ida Tarbell, William Barton, Albert Beveridge, James Randall, and Carl Sandburg.

"This is the story behind Lincoln books, based on the correspondence of Lincoln biographers. These letters are personal, sometimes bitter, sometimes funny, sometimes gossipy, sometimes keen and penetrating. They were not written for us to read, but there is a reason why we should examine them.

None of us knows Lincoln first hand. Some of these people did: and the remainder knew him through long study. Our Lincoln comes to us through them.

For this reason it is important that we know what kind of people they were, what methods they used, what personal bias influenced their thought, whether they chose to tell us all they knew, whether they aspired to truth or camouflaged their subject with protective coloration.

Why were both Holland and Herndon, who took widely different views, incapable of giving us an accurate idea of Lincoln's religion? Why did Chauncey Black, Lamon's ghostwriter, make Lincoln's background so unattractive? Why did he wish to prolong the controversy over Lincoln's religion, and what did the men who knew Lincoln personally think about the merits of this controversy? Did Herndon ever give up the idea that Lincoln was illegitimate? What did Lincoln's friends think of the Ann Rutledge story; and of his revealing it?

How did the public react to the work of the various biographers? To what extent did they write to please the public? What did they say privately about each other?
Were they willing to admit mistakes, or did they have closed minds?

These are only a few of examples of the sort of questions their letters answer. In them they express their real feelings. And since most of them were colorful figures, their letters are colorful too. Behind the scenes they speculated, confided, argued ans sometimes schemed.

From these letters the theme of the book emerges as a struggle between two conflicting schools of thought regarding the way to write about Lincoln. One school would depict him as a national hero with all the attributes a national hero was supposed to have. The other school thought he should be represented as he was. At first, public opinion was solidly behind the first view. Gradually, it shifted. Now people want the facts. Yet even those who honestly tried to show Lincoln as he was, had a feeling of failure. There was something about the man the most probing technique could not always penetrate." (condensed from the book preface)

What I found interesting is Thomas will use much of what he learned in writing this book into his own biography of Lincoln, 5 years later. Several of us on the forum believe it is one of, if not the best, single volume biography of Lincoln.

Copies aren't that easy to find, but with patience and good luck, you can find one.
I purchased my copy from Books On the Square, in very good condition , for $18.
Copies are available on Amazon and ABE Books.
https://www.amazon.com/Portrait-Posterit...282&sr=8-2