The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1886-04-21
LINcoLN's TWO MOTHERS.
Brief sketch of two Unknown Noble
Women.

The expression of sadness which was so
noticeable in Lincoln's face is said TO have
been a direct inheritance from his mother.
Previous to his birth she had fallen into
hopeless state of mind, induced by Loneliness
of heart and long suffering. She was the
wife of man who, If all accounts of him do
not lie, was destitute Of energy and any
sense Of responsibility.
1t is said that any mention of his mother
brought over Lincoln's face an expression OF
sadness almost approximating anguish. The
cause lay deeper than any knowledge he ever
gained. 1t was an anti-natal impress. She
was strangely sad woman During the lat
ter years of her life she became reserved and
shrinking, in decided contrast to the joyous
sociability of her girlhoOd. Her maiden
name was Nancy Hanks. DR.. Holland said
of her: "She had much in her nature that
was truly heroic, and much that shrank from
the rude life around her"
From his father Lincoln inherited his con-
versationai habit and love OF anecdote
Thomas Lincoln was brilliant stOre-box
whittier and leader of grocery store dia-
logues. His chief earthly pleasure was TO
crack jokes and tell stories in group Of
chums who paid homage to his wit by CIV
ing him the closest attention and lOudest ap-
plause. ellis son possessed this accom-
plishment" says Laura G. Holloway, in her
book entitled "Mothers of Great Men and
Women" but in his case i, was INDUCED in
more to mask deep feeling and to avoid I'M
pleasant subjects than for the pleasure the
telling of stories gave him. All his life he
put barriers between the world and himself
through the medium OF humOr.
Thomas Lincoln was rolling stone. He
changed his residence whenever the mood
seized him, a feasible undertaking any times
since his worldly goods were never bulky:
He was a carpenter 'ostensibly, but worked
only at hunting. He could scarcely have
L. m hIQ when The
bedsteads in his cabin were made of saplings
with the bark on. Nancy Hanks married
him on the 23d of September, 1906, and
probably regretted it ever after.
In comparison with the people about her
Mrs. Lincoln was a learned woman. She
could read and write, though her husband
could not. She taught her little son TO read
and write in their scanty cabin, and the few
books she possessed were comfort to her
otherwise dismal existence. She died OF
what was then called the milk sickness"
after a long Illness when Lincoln was ten
years old. How pathetic were those last
days when she saw herself fading out of life,
leaving her children in pincbing poverty to
the care of careless father. Lincoln had a
sister named Sally, two years older than
himself. who married in her eighteenth year
and died less than year later. How earnestly
she tried to make her son understand that he
must set him self some particular task in life
and do il WELL He could write fairly when
she died. A year later he wrote to the min
lister who had married bis parents, requesting
him to come aud preach his mothers funeral
sermon, since there had been no service at
the time of her death. Three months later
the minister came, and the funeral sermon
was preached over her grave in the Western
wilderness, in the presence Of the children,
their father and about twenty of the neigh
bors. To this day no stone marks her rest
ing place.
No words can describe the loneliness and
misery of LincoIn's life in the year that fol-
lowed. In the brightest days of his manhood
he could not look back upon that time with
out agony and humiliation. few months
more than year after the death Of his moth
er fate blessed him with stepm0ther, who
was to him mother, friend and companion.
She was widow when Thomas Lincoln mar