Born inLexington,
Kentucky, the daughter of Robert Smith Todd, a banker, and Elizabeth
Parker-Todd, Mary was raised in comfort and refinement.[1]When
Mary was seven, her mother died; her father married Elizabeth "Betsy"
Humphreys-Todd in 1826.[2]Mary
had a difficult relationship with her stepmother. Beginning in 1832, Mary's
childhood home was what is now known as theMary
Todd Lincoln House, a 14-room upper-class residence in Lexington.[3]From
her father's marriages to her mother and stepmother, she had 15 siblings. Mary
Lincoln's paternal great-grandfather, David Levi Todd, was born inLongford
County,Irelandand
immigrated through Pennsylvania toKentucky.
Through her mother's family, her great-great grandfather Samuel McDowell was
born inScotlandthen
immigrated to and died in Pennsylvania. Other Todd ancestors came fromEngland.[4]
Mary Todd left home at an early age to attend a fine school as part of an
effort to avoid her step-mother. She learned to speak French fluently, studied
dance, drama, music and social graces. By the age of 20, in October of 1839,
she had a ready wit and sparking personality attuned to politics that made her
quite popular among Springfield's gentry when she began living with her sister
Elizabeth Edwards. Elizabeth (wife of Ninian W. Edwards, son of aformer
governor) served as Mary's guardian while Mary lived in Springfield.[5]Although
Mary was courted by the rising young lawyer and politicianStephen
A. Douglasand others, her
courtship withAbraham
Lincolnresulted in an engagement that was broken and eventually
reaffirmed. Abraham Lincoln, age 33, married Mary Todd, age 23, on November 4,
1842, at the home of Mrs. Edwards inSpringfield,
Illinois.
Lincoln and Douglas would eventually become political rivals in the great
Lincoln-Douglas debates for a seat representing Illinois to the United States
Senate in 1858. Although Douglas successfully secured the seat by election in
the Illinois legislature, Lincoln became famous for his position on slavery
which generated national support for him.
Lincoln pursued his increasingly successful career as a Springfield lawyer,
and Mary supervised their growing household. Their home together from 1844
until 1861 still stands in Springfield, and is now theLincoln
Home National Historic Site.
By all accounts, both Mr. and Mrs. Lincoln were indulgent, careful, kind, and
loving parents. Of these four sons, only Robert and Tad survived to adulthood,
and only Robert outlived his mother.
During Lincoln's prairie years as an Illinois circuit lawyer, Mary Lincoln was
left on her own to raise their children and run their household. Mary Lincoln
was a close political partner to her husband and socially supported him and
served as an advisor to him in his political dealings.
White
House years
During her White House years, Mary Lincoln faced many difficulties generated
by severe divisions within the country. Her family was from a border state
where slavery was permitted. Kentucky was known for families where siblings
fought each other in the Civil War and Mary's family was no exception. Some of
her step brothers served in the Confederate Army and were killed in action.
Mary, however, was staunchly behind her husband in his quest to save the Union
and maintained a strict political loyalty to him. It was difficult for Mary to
serve as her husband's First Lady in a Washington, D.C, because it was
dominated by Eastern and Southern culture. Mary and Lincoln were from the
West, Lincoln being the first Western President. Social rivalries, spoil
seeking solicitors, and bating newspapers in a climate of high national
intrigue were difficult to maneuver in the White House's social
responsibilities during Civil War Washington.
Mary Lincoln suffered from severe headaches throughout her adult life, and
coupled with the deaths of three of her four children, the deaths of siblings
killed in the Civil War, and her husband's assassination, Mary sometimes faced
difficult bouts of depression and mourning. She also suffered a severe head
injury in a carriage accident during her White House years, which was believed
to have been an assassination attempt focused on the president, who was not
present at the time.
During her tenure at the White House, she often visited hospitals around
Washington where she gave flowers and fruit to wounded soldiers. In some cases
she helped with their correspondence. From time to time, she accompanied
Lincoln on military visits to the field. Her White House duties included many
social functions at the White House. To her, presentation of the White House
was as important for the stability of the Union in much the same reasons that
completion of the Capitol was addressed during the Civil War. She has often
been blamed for spending too much on the White House, but she felt, in spite
of overspending her budget on the House, that it was important to the
maintenance of prestige of the Presidency.
In April 1865, as the Civil War came to an end, Mrs. Lincoln hoped to renew
her happiness as the First Lady of a nation at peace. However, on April 14,
1865, as Mary Lincoln sat with her husband to watch the comic playOur
American CousinatFord's
Theatre,President
Lincoln was mortally wounded by an assassin. Mrs. Lincoln accompanied her
husband across the street to thePetersen
House, where Lincoln's Cabinet was summoned. Mary was with her husband in
the Peterson House through the night along with her son Robert. The President
died on the following day, April 15. Mary Lincoln suffered the loss of two
sons and the death of her husband drove her to mourn and wear black for the
rest of her life.
From all over the world, Mary Lincoln received messages of condolence. In time
she would attempt to answer many of them personally. Even in her misery over
the death of her husband, her sense of duty and politeness remained.[6]ToQueen
Victoriashe wrote: "I have
received the letter which Your Majesty has had the kindness to write. I am
deeply grateful for this expression of tender sympathy, coming as they do,
from a heart which from its own sorrow, can appreciate theintense
griefI now endure." Victoria
herself had suffered the loss ofPrince
Albert.[7]
As a widow, Mrs. Lincoln returned to Illinois. In 1868, Mrs. Lincoln's former
confidante,Elizabeth
Keckly, publishedBehind the
Scenes, or, Thirty years a slave, and four years in the White House.
Although this book has, over time, proven to be an extremely valuable resource
in the understanding and appreciation of Mary Todd Lincoln, the former First
Lady regarded it as a breach of what she had considered to be a close
friendship.
In an act approved July 14, 1870, the United States Congress granted Mrs.
Lincoln a life pension for being the widow of President Lincoln, in the amount
of $3,000 a year.[8]
For Mary Lincoln, the death of her son Thomas (Tad), in July 1871, added on
top of the death of two of her other sons and her husband, led to an
overpowering sense of grief augmented by her previous history of mental
instability. Mrs. Lincoln's sole surviving son, Robert Lincoln, a rising young
Chicago lawyer, was alarmed as his mother's behavior became increasingly
erratic. In March 1875, during a visit to Jacksonville, Florida, Mary Lincoln
became unshakably convinced that Robert was deathly ill. She traveled to
Chicago to find him in fine health. On her arrival, she told her son that
someone had tried to poison her on the train and that a “wandering Jew” had
taken her pocketbook but would return it later. During her stay in Chicago
with her son, Mary spent money lavishly on useless items, such as draperies
which she never hung and elaborate dresses which she never wore, due to the
fact that she only wore black after her husband's assassination. She would
also walk around the city with her $56,000 in government bonds sewn into her
petticoats. Despite this large amount of money, the $3,000 a year stipend from
Congress, and her extravagant spending, Mrs. Lincoln had persistent and
irrational fears of poverty. After Mrs. Lincoln went into an 'episode' during
which it was feared she would jump out of the window to escape a non-existent
fire, it was determined that Mrs. Lincoln should be institutionalized.[9]
Fearing that his mother was a danger to herself, Robert Lincoln was left with
no choice but to have Mrs. Lincoln committed to a psychiatric hospital inBatavia,
Illinoisin 1875. After the
court proceedings Mary Lincoln was so enraged that she attempted suicide. She
went to the hotel pharmacist and ordered enoughlaudanumto
kill herself. However, the pharmacist caught on to her plans and gave her a
placebo.[9]
On May 20, 1875, she arrived atBellevue
Place, a private, upscale sanitarium in the Fox River Valley.[10]With
his mother in the hospital, Robert Lincoln was left with control of Mary
Lincoln's finances. Three months after being installed in Bellevue Place, Mary
Lincoln engineered her escape. She smuggled letters to her lawyer,James
B. Bradwell, and his wife,Myra
Bradwell, who was not only her friend but also a feminist lawyer and
fellow spiritualist. She also wrote to the editor of theChicago
Times, known for its sensational journalism. Soon, the public
embarrassments Robert had hoped to avoid were looming, and his character and
motives were in question. The director of Bellevue, who at Mary’s trial had
assured the jury she would benefit from treatment at his facility, now in the
face of potentially damaging publicity declared her well enough to go to
Springfield to live with her sister as she desired.[11]She
was released into the custody of her sister, Mrs. Elizabeth Edwards in
Springfield and in 1876 was once again declared competent to manage her own
affairs. The committal proceedings led to a profound estrangement between
Lincoln and his mother, and they never fully reconciled.
Mrs. Lincoln spent the next four years abroad taking up residence inPau,
France. She spent much of this time travelling in Europe. However, the
former First Lady's final years were marked by declining health. She suffered
from severecataractsthat
affected her eyesight. This may have contributed to her increasing
susceptibility to falls. In 1879, she suffered spinal cord injuries in a fall
from a step ladder.
During the early 1880s, Mary Todd Lincoln lived, housebound, in the
Springfield, Illinois residence of her sister Elizabeth Edwards. She died
there on July 16, 1882, age 63, and was interred within the
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