Lincoln and His Father

[Gene C]

(02-19-2018 08:52 AM)RJNorton Wrote:  Gene, I found a web page that says:

"Historians believe John Jake Gordon, one of the early settlers in the area, started the cemetery in the 1830s.

After Lincoln was assassinated, Baker’s grandparents helped raise money to purchase a limestone obelisk to replace the hand-carved markers over Thomas and Sarah Bush Lincoln’s grave.

Throughout the years, souvenir hunters chipped away pieces of the first stone monument, so the local Lion’s Club collected funds to erect the headstone currently delineating the Lincolns’ graves. The limestone marker was relocated near the entrance to the cemetery."

http://jg-tc.com/news/the-dead-are-not-s...98062.html

Thanks Roger.

The first paragraph of the article appears to be a bit in error.
"Before he left Illinois to assume the presidency, Abraham Lincoln visited the graves of his father and stepmother. And it was John W. Baker, grandfather of Charleston resident Gale Baker, who showed the president-elect where Thomas and Sarah Bush Lincoln were interred in the Coles County cemetery now named after the elder Lincoln.

Abraham's step mother was still alive when he left for Washington.
An interesting article.
Perhaps if we do a fall Springfield Tour of 2018 or 2019 we can look into this further

[RJNorton]

Here's another story:

"There is a tradition that on the occasion of his visit to his father's grave, Lincoln placed at the grave a marker, on which he had cut the initials "T. L." John J. Hall told George E. Mason, in an interview which took place about 1906, the story of Lincoln's last visit as the story was preserved in the Hall family. After arriving at the Hall cabin at Goosenest Prairie, Mr. Hall recalled that:

Before noon Uncle Abe told me to hitch up; that he wanted to go over to the graveyard. Just before we started he said: "John, have you any good, solid joists around here?" I said yes, and got him some white oak timbers about three inches wide and two inches thick. He took one and got the saw and ax and made two grave markers — one for the head and the other for the foot. He then took his knife and cut in the headboard the initials "T. L."

We drove over to the graveyard and he cleared up the grave and drove the posts at the head and foot."

https://archive.org/stream/abrahamlincol...e_djvu.txt

[David Lockmiller]

The President-Elect Visits Coles County 193

Whitney, as he tells the story, secured a pass for Lincoln at the depot [Lincoln's departure from Springfield on the morning of January 30, 1861]. Lincoln waited for the train in the railroad superintendent's office. After boarding the train, Whitney recalled, "Lincoln took pains, though not with ostentation, to secure an humble old lady, whom he knew, a double seat."

The President-Elect Visits Coles County 195

A Charleston lawyer, James W. Connolly (later a major in the Civil War) told Jesse W. Weik in later years about Lincoln's arrival at Charleston. Hearing that Lincoln was coming to the city, Mr. Connolly went to the depot to witness his arrival. He recalled that:

When the train finally drew in and stopped, the locomotive was about opposite the station and the caboose, or car which carried the passengers, was some distance down the track. Presently, looking in that direction, we saw a tall man wearing a coat or shawl, descend from the steps of the car and patiently make his way through the long expanse of slush and ice beside the track as far as the station platform. I think he wore a plug hat. I remember I was surprised that a railroad company, with so distinguished a passenger aboard its train as the President elect of the United States, did not manifest interest enough in his dignity and comfort to deliver him at the station instead of dropping him off in the mud several hundred feet down the track. In addition to myself quite a crowd of natives were gathered on the platform to see him. . . . There were no formalities. Lincoln shook hands with a number of persons whom he recognized or who greeted him, and in a few minutes left for the residence of a friend, where, it was understood, he was to spend the night.

[RJNorton]

And yet another story:

"Another rumour is prevalent in the community where Thomas Lincoln died. It is supposed that when the President visited the grave ... he cut the letters "T. L." on a walnut board and drove it into the ground at the head of the grave. This the writer of these pages endeavored to find, but could not. Mr. Chapman says he did not cut the letters and place the board at the grave as represented. He was with him all the time and he says no such thing happened.

This account of Lincoln's 1861 visit also tells the story of Lincoln's

plans for a tombstone for his father's grave.

... he visited the grave of his father in company with A. H. Chapman and John Hall. . . . When Mr. Lincoln returned to Charleston he asked one of the younger members of the [Dennis] Hanks family to find out the probable cost of the tombstone for his father's grave. During the
conversation on the subject Mr. Lincoln asked Mr. Chapman what he thought the expense would be. Mr. Chapman answered not less than $40 nor more than $60 he thought. "Well," said the President, "see what it will cost and let me know at Washington, and I will send you an inscription I want put on." The war came and he could not attend to it. It has been erroneously supposed that he left money and it was not appropriately used. This, Mr. Chapman says, is untrue, and that the only arrangements made was the one already given. Further proof is given in a letter from Mrs. Lincoln after her husband's untimely death, wherein she refers to the thought often expressed by the President that as soon as his term of office expired, he would return here and see to the erection of the monument."

https://archive.org/stream/abrahamlincol...e_djvu.txt

[Mylye2222]

(09-06-2012 07:13 AM)LincolnMan Wrote:  Apparently, he helped his father build his mother's coffin. That had to be hard!

Absolutely. It certainly had a profound effect on him.

[LincolnMan]

(08-29-2012 07:05 PM)Jim Garrett Wrote:  Thomas Lincoln never amounted to anything, and never appreciated the accomplishments of his son.

I'm currently reading Michael Burlingame's 'Abraham Lincoln: A Life' 1809-1837. The book certainly agrees with your comment about Thomas Lincoln. What a wonder that this man (Thomas Lincoln) should be the father of one of the greatest in history.