River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1872-08-23
How President Lincoln Married the
Wrong Woman,

How President Lincoln Married the
Wrong Woman.
Mr.. Lincoln was not supremely hap.
Ply in his domestic relations the cir.
cumstances of his courtship and mar.
riage alone made that impossible. His
engagement to Miss Todd was one of
the great misfortunes of his life and of
hers. He realized the mistake too
late and when he was brought face to
face with the lie he was about TO enact.
and the wrong he was about 70 do, both
TO himself and an innocent woman, he
recoiled with horror and remorse. For
weeks together he was sick. deranged,
and on the verge of suicides heavy
care to his friends, and source of bit.
ter modification to the unfortunate
lady, whose good fame depended, in a
great part, upon his constancy. He
recovered slowly, and at length return.
ed to Springfield. He spoke out his
feelings frankly and truly to the one
person interested in them. But he had
been, from the beginning, except in the
case of Ann Rutledge, singularly incon-
sistant and unstable in his relations
with the few refined and cultivated
women who had been the object of his
attention. He loved Miss Rutledge
passionately, and the next year impor.
tuned Miss Owens to be his wife. Fail.
ing in his suit, he wrote an unfeelinc
letter about her, apparently with no
earthly object but to display his levity
and make them both ridiculous. He
courted Miss Todd, and at the moment
Of success feii in love with her relative,
and between the two went crazy, and
thought of ending all his woes with
razor or a pocket.knife. 1t is not i'm.
possible that the feelings of such man
might have undergone another and
more sudden change. Perhaps they
did. At all events, he was conscien.
tious, Honorable and just. There was
but one way of repairing the injury he
had done Miss Todd, and he adopted
it. They were married but they ul-
derstood each other, and suffered the
inevitable consequences, as other PEG.
pie do under similar consequences.
But such troubles seldom fail to find a
tongue; and it is not strange that, in
WHO teboNf anu uI-
timately the whole country, came to
know the state of things in that house.
Mr.. Lincoln scarcely attempted TO con-
ceal it, but talked of it with little or
no reserve to his wife s relatives, as well
as his own friends. Yet the gentleness
and patience with which he bore his
Affections from day to day, and from
year to year, was enough to move the
shade of Socrates. II touched his &C.
quaintances deeply, and they gave it
the widest publicity. They made no
pause to inquire, to investigate. and TO
portion the blame between the parties
according to their deserts Almost ever
since Mr.. Lincolns death, a portion
of the press has never tired of heaping
brutal reproaches upon his wife and
widow whilst a certain class of his
friends thought they were honoring
his memory by multiplying outrages
and indignities upon her. at the very
moment when she was broken by want
and sorrow, DETAINED, defenseless, in
the hand of thieves, and at the mercy
of spies. If ever woman grievously
expiated an offense not her own, this
woman did Mr.. Herndon sums up
the whole matter in single sentence,
" All that ! know ennobles both. In.
mons Life of Lincoln.