Robert Todd Lincoln
Robert Todd Lincoln was an American lawyer and businessman. The eldest son of President Abraham Lincoln and First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln, he was the only one of their four children to survive past 18 and also the only one to outlive both his parents. Robert Lincoln became a business lawyer and company president, and served as both United States Secretary of War and the U.S. Ambassador to Great Britain.
Lincoln was born in Springfield, Illinois, and graduated from Harvard College. He then served on the staff of General Ulysses S. Grant as a captain in the Union army in the closing days of the American Civil War. After the war was over, he married Mary Eunice Harlan, and they had three children together. Following completion of his law school studies in Chicago, he built a successful law practice, and became wealthy representing corporate clients.
Lincoln was often spoken of as a possible candidate for national office, including the presidency, but never took steps to mount a campaign. He served as Secretary of War in the administration of James A. Garfield, continuing under Chester A. Arthur, and as Minister to Great Britain in the Benjamin Harrison administration.
Lincoln became general counsel of the Pullman Company, and after founder George Pullman died in 1897, Lincoln assumed the company's presidency. After retiring from this position in 1911, Lincoln served as chairman of the board until 1924. In Lincoln's later years, he resided at homes in Washington, D.C., and Manchester, Vermont; the Manchester home, Hildene, was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1977. In 1922, he took part in the dedication ceremonies for the Lincoln Memorial. Lincoln died at Hildene in July 1926, at age 82, and was buried at Arlington National Cemetery.
Early life
Robert Todd Lincoln was born in Springfield, Illinois, on August 1, 1843, to Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd Lincoln. He had three younger brothers, Edward, William, and Tad. By the time Lincoln was born, his father had become a well-known member of the Whig political party and had served as a member of the Illinois state legislature for four terms. He was named after his maternal grandfather, Robert Smith Todd.Some commentators believe that Robert Lincoln had a distant relationship with his father, in part because, during his formative years, Abraham Lincoln spent months away on the judicial circuit. Lincoln recalled, "During my childhood and early youth he was almost constantly away from home, attending court or making political speeches."
Abraham apparently realized that his being away had a potential impact on his sons as evidenced by the following quote from his April 16, 1848, letter to his wife: "don't let the blessed fellows forget Father". One such example that gives insight into Robert's childhood in general was related by Joseph Humphreys, who had taken a train to Lexington, Kentucky, in 1847: "there were two lively youngsters on board who kept the whole train in a turmoil, and their long-legged father, instead of spanking the brats, looked pleased as Punch and aided and abetted the older one in mischief".
Lincoln took the Harvard College entrance examination in 1859, but failed fifteen out of the sixteen subjects. Subsequently, Lincoln was enrolled at Phillips Exeter Academy to prepare for college; he graduated Phillips Exeter in 1860. Admitted to Harvard, he graduated in 1864, having been elected vice-president of the Hasty Pudding Club, and was a member of the Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity. Welsh author Jan Morris wrote that Robert Lincoln, "having failed fifteen out of sixteen subjects in the Harvard entrance examination, got in at last and emerged an unsympathetic bore."
Civil War years
After graduating from Harvard, Robert Lincoln enrolled at Harvard Law School, which he attended from September 1864 to January 1865, when he left in order to join the Union Army.Mary Todd Lincoln had prevented Robert from joining the Army until shortly before the war's conclusion. President Lincoln argued to her that "our son is not more dear to us than the sons of other people are to their mothers." In January 1865, the First Lady gave in and President Lincoln wrote Ulysses S. Grant, asking if Robert could be placed on his staff.
On February 11, 1865, Lincoln was commissioned as an assistant adjutant with the rank of captain. He served in the last weeks of the Civil War on Grant's staff, a status which meant, in all likelihood, he would not be involved in actual combat. According to Grant's personal secretary, Horace Porter, Lincoln was "exceedingly popular" with the rest of the staff, "was always ready to perform his share of hard work" and "never expected to be treated differently from any other officer" because he was the President's son. Her commitment and subsequent events alienated Lincoln from his mother.
Lincoln was present at Appomattox when Robert E. Lee surrendered. He resigned his commission on June 12, 1865, and returned to civilian life.
Incident with Edwin Booth
Lincoln was once saved from possible serious injury or death by Edwin Booth, whose brother, John Wilkes Booth, assassinated Robert's father. This event took place on a train platform in Jersey City, New Jersey. The exact date is uncertain, but it is believed to have taken place in late 1863 or early 1864, before John Wilkes Booth's assassination of President Lincoln. In a letter written in 1909 to the editor of The Century Magazine, Robert Lincoln recalled what had happened that day:Months afterwards, while serving on Grant's US Army staff, Robert Lincoln recalled the occurrence to Colonel Adam Badeau, a fellow officer who happened to be a friend of Edwin Booth's. Badeau sent a letter to Booth, complimenting the actor for his heroism. Before receiving the letter, Booth had been unaware that the man whose life he had saved on the train platform was the president's son. The knowledge of whom he had saved that day was said to have been of some comfort to Booth following his brother's assassination of the president. Grant also sent Booth a letter of gratitude for his action.
Lincoln assassination and afterwards
On the night his father was assassinated, Robert had turned down an invitation to accompany the Lincolns to Ford's Theatre due to fatigue after spending much of his recent time in a covered wagon at the battlefront. Ten days later, Robert Lincoln wrote President Andrew Johnson requesting that he and his family be allowed to stay in the Executive mansion for two and a half weeks because his mother had told him that "she can not possibly be ready to leave here". Lincoln also acknowledged that he was aware of the "great inconvenience" this would be to Johnson, since he had become president of the United States only a short time earlier.In late April, 1865, Robert moved to Chicago with his remaining family. He attended law classes at the Old University of Chicago and studied law at the Chicago firm of Scammon, McCagg & Fuller.
On January 1, 1866, Lincoln moved out of the apartment he shared with his mother and brother. He rented his own rooms in downtown Chicago to "begin to live with some degree of comfort" which he had not known when living in cramped conditions with his family. Lincoln graduated from Old University with an LL.B. in 1866 and became licensed as an attorney in Chicago on February 22, 1867. He was certified to practice law four days later on February 26, 1867.
In 1893, Harvard awarded Lincoln the honorary degree of LL.D.
Family
Marriage and children
On September 24, 1868, Lincoln married Mary Eunice Harlan, daughter of Senator James Harlan and Ann Eliza Peck of Mount Pleasant, Iowa.They had three children, two daughters and one son: Mary "Mamie" Lincoln, Abraham "Jack" Lincoln II, and Jessie Harlan Lincoln.
Robert, Mary, and the children would often leave their hot city life behind for the cooler climate of Mount Pleasant, during the 1880s the family would summer at the Harlan home there. The Harlan-Lincoln home, built in 1876, still stands today. Donated by Mary Harlan Lincoln to Iowa Wesleyan College in 1907, it now serves as a museum containing a collection of artifacts from the Lincoln family and from Abraham Lincoln's presidency.
Of Robert's children, Jessie Harlan Lincoln Beckwith had two children, namely Mary Lincoln Beckwith and Robert Todd Lincoln Beckwith, but neither of them had children of their own. The Robert Todd Lincoln of this article had another daughter, Mary Todd Lincoln, who married Charles Bradford Isham in 1891; they had one son, Lincoln Isham, who married Leahalma Correa in 1919, but died without children. The last person acknowledged and known to be of Lincoln lineage, Robert's grandson Robert Todd Lincoln Beckwith, died in 1985.
Relationship with Mary Todd Lincoln
In 1871, Lincoln's only surviving brother, Tad, died at age 18, leaving his mother devastated. Lincoln was already concerned about what he considered were his mother's compulsive and extravagant spending, hallucinations, and eccentric behaviors. Fearing that she was a danger to herself, he arranged to have her committed to a psychiatric hospital in Batavia, Illinois, in 1875. With his mother in the hospital, he was left with control of her finances, although he used his own money to pay for her care. As the head of the family, he felt that it was his duty to protect her, although he did wish that she would have "every liberty and privilege" restored to her as soon as she was better. On May 20, 1875, she arrived at Bellevue Place, a private, upscale sanitarium in the Fox River Valley.Three months after she started living there, Mary Lincoln was able to escape from Bellevue Place. She smuggled letters to her lawyer, James B. Bradwell, and his wife, Myra. Mary also wrote to the editor of the Chicago Times and shortly, the embarrassment Robert had hoped to avoid came to the forefront, with his motives and character being publicly questioned. Bellevue's director, who at Mary's commitment trial assured the jury she would benefit from treatment at his facility, now declared her well enough to go to Springfield to live with her sister. Her commitment and subsequent events alienated Lincoln from his mother.