Is this Abraham Lincoln?

[STS Lincolnite]

This photograph is obviously of an individual wearing a top hat and a particular style of beard. These are often characteristics associated with Abraham Lincoln.

I will summarize my thoughts (they are much the same as others have previously posted - but much more wordy ). They are in no particular order.:

1) The shape of the ear (particularly at the attachment of the lobe) does not match with the verified photos of Lincoln. I have posted previously on the usage of this marker in photo identification. It is very important as it is not something that changes over time.

2) Lincoln’s familiar mole is absent in the image in question. This is something very unique to Lincoln and obviously should be present were this Lincoln.

3) The individual in this photo does not exhibit a malpositioning of the left eye that is present in other verified images of Lincoln. 8 November 1863 image (Roger posted in post #7 of this thread) is an example where this malpositioning can be clearly seen.

4) Lincoln also has a slight malpositioning of his jaw (it deviates to the right) that can be seen in Lincoln images taken from the front. Again, in the 8 November 1863 image in post #7, this deviation can be seen in spite of Lincoln’s facial hair. There is no evidence of a like deviation in the image in question.

5) The shape of the eyes and the fullness of Lincoln’s eyebrows in known images clearly differ from the individual in the image in question.

6) From the image posted, there looks to be a case. That is typically indicative of a daguerreotype or ambrotype. Those forms largely fell out of favor (at least for indoor images, which image in question looks to be) by 1860. As Steve mentioned, Lincoln did not start to grow whiskers until late 1860. Lincoln was photographed in late November (25th?) 1860 in Chicago by Samuel Alschuler – his whiskers had just started and in that image were not nearly full. He was photographed again in early 1861 (January and February) by Christopher German, who made albumen prints not ambrotype/daguerreotype. The very small window for Lincoln to be photographed with full beard using the ambrotype/daguerreotype technology makes this being an image of Lincoln unlikely.

This is my initial pass. I’m sure a more robust evaluation would reveal more. And though I have done some photo evaluation in the past, even more would certainly be revealed by a professional photo evaluator or artifact appraiser. To me, this image does not bear any more than a very limited, passing resemblance to Lincoln (and that is only because of the general characteristics of hat and beard). Other than those general characteristics, there is nothing here to suggest this is in fact Abraham Lincoln. For me, any ONE of the above may enough to disqualify this image as Lincoln. But all of them taken together? The answer is pretty clear to me.

The verdict: NOT Abraham Lincoln