Sons and parents

[RJNorton]

(01-07-2015 09:12 PM)LincolnToddFan Wrote:  I think I remember reading that Herndon hit his children with a strap? Was it here on this Forum?

You have an amazing memory, Toia! Kudos! It was mentioned briefly long ago on the forum, and here is the source. This information comes from p. 15-16 of David Herbert Donald's Lincoln's Herndon:

"A great teaser Billy was always playing practical jokes on his children. When he came home from town he would ask his daughter: "Who was that dirty-faced little boy I saw kissing you through the fence?" And as the child made indignant denials, he would catch her up in his arms and roar with laughter. A kind parent was Herndon, yet not an overindulgent one. The children had to know their place. He loved to have Mollie and Lizzie and Annie romping in his flower garden but if they picked a rose, remembers his daughter, "believe me he'd know it." And when Nat interrupted his father s speech at a Republican rally by shouting "Hurrah for the Democrats!" the razor strap was put into use that night."


There is a footnote for this. Donald's information came from a letter Herndon's eldest daughter wrote to William E. Barton. The letter is on p. 365 of Barton's The Paternity of Abraham Lincoln.