Are those stories about Mary abusive to Abraham overstated???

[David Lockmiller]

(01-12-2020 01:45 PM)RJNorton Wrote:  Many thanks, David!! I just wonder if this story got "embellished" or perhaps changed to make it seem newsworthy for its "sensationalism." Despite what anyone might think of Mary Lincoln, I somehow have trouble picturing her using this kind of language toward her husband in such a public setting. I realize Professor Burlingame and many other folks can picture it (including perhaps a majority on this forum), but it's a problem for me personally.

Burlingame repeated the story in Abraham Lincoln: A Life, Vol. Two, page 784 and footnoted (#264) his source as Sandburg and Angle, Mary Lincoln: Wife and Widow (1932), 112.

Roger, you say that you "have trouble picturing her using this kind of language toward her husband in such a public setting." As I recall, the words were not spoken in the public situation of his speech, but rather to Lincoln and Oglesby while the party was awaiting the carriage. (I may be wrong on this point.)