Lincoln: The Struggles of Fatherhood

Melissa Mendes
Ogden School, Chicago

As was the custom in those proper Victorian days, Abraham Lincoln called his bride, Mary Todd, Mary, while she addressed him as Mr. Lincoln. However, this soon changed to Mother and Father. Nine months after their marriage, Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd Lincoln had their first child. On August 1, 1843, Robert Todd, named after Mary's father, was born. Soon after the arrival of their first child, the Lincolns decided to move out of their room in the little tavern where they were staying. With financial help from the Todd family, Lincoln purchased a new house in 1844. Two years later, Lincoln, his wife, and his son moved into their new, wooden-frame house, their second child, Edward Baker Lincoln, nicknamed Eddie, was born. That same year, Mary and Lincoln got along quite well. She was proud of his work in the courtroom and delighted that he was such a loving and affectionate father. If anyone criticized him in any way, she was the first to defend him. By all of his actions, anyone could tell that Lincoln loved not only his wife, but his sons dearly. When Lincoln was elected to the House of Representatives, all four Lincolns,

This tribute to Edward Lincoln appeared in the Illinois Journal in Springfield on July 2, 1850

William Wallace, the third Lincoln son, was born on December 21, 1890. He was eleven years old when he died in the White House on February 20, 1862.

himself, Mary, four-year-old Robert, and baby Eddie, moved into a boarding house in the capital. Mary, finding herself bored and tired, packed up and left with the boys, to spend the rest of her husband's term in Kentucky with her family. Lincoln wrote many letters to his wife and children. In one to his wife he wrote, "I hate to stay in this old room by myself. What did Robert and Eddie think of the little letters Father wrote them? Don't let the blessed fellows forget their father." This was one of the ways that Lincoln expressed his concern for his sons. On February 1, 1850, Abraham Lincoln faced one of the most difficult struggles of parenthood: the death of his son, Eddie. Not yet four, Eddie grew gravely ill. After lingering for two months, he died. Mary collapsed in shock. Robert, who then was six, remembered his mother's uncontrollable tears, the house draped in black, and the dark black circles

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around his father's eyes. Mary shut herself in her room and stayed there for weeks while Lincoln buried himself in his work. This was the only way to distract him from his troubles; he could not let his family fall apart.

The somber Lincoln house, however, became cheerful again when a third son, William Wallace, was born in December 1850. Three years later, the Lincolns had their fourth and last child named Thomas, nicknamed Taddie.

Both Lincoln and his wife adored their boys, denied them nothing, and seldom disciplined them. Lincoln liked to take Taddie and Willie to the office when he worked on Sundays. Their wild behavior infuriated his partner. "The boys were absolutely unrestrained in their amusement," William Herndon complained. "If they pulled down all the books from the shelves, bent the points of all the pens, overturned the spittoon, it never disturbed the serenity of their father's good nature. I have felt that many and many a time that I wanted to wring the necks off those little brats and pitch them out the windows." As far as Lincoln was concerned, his boys could do no wrong.

During 1861, Lincoln relaxed whenever he could by playing for an hour or two with Willie and Taddie. His oldest son, Robert, was away at Harvard University in Massachusetts. Later that year, in February, both the boys, Taddie and Willie, fell ill. While Taddie recovered, eleven-year-old Willie died. Lincoln had adored this solemn, quiet boy who loved to read and write poetry and was thoughtful and intelligent. Willie's death deeply sorrowed Lincoln. Through all of Lincoln's emotions, he had to find a place for Mary, who had almost become overcome with grief.

Lincoln always set aside time for his sons even if it meant taking them to work with him. He had survived and overcome many of the obstacles of fatherhood and even in times when he himself was not strong enough to keep going, Abraham Lincoln kept his family together—[From Russell Freedman, Lincoln; Rebecca Steffof, Abraham Lincoln.]

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