September 11, 2024 • 56 mins
On April 13, 1865, Abraham Lincoln was waiting for his son Robert to return with a firsthand account of Robert E. Lee surrendering the south when he received a phone call from the future…
In this episode, Lincoln shares the powerful lesson he learned while wrestling with his sister that caused him to forgive instead of punishing the South. He explains why he added ‘In God We Trust’ to our coins. And demonstrates his ingenuity by choosing to duel with swords rather than pistols.
Start the episode now to join the conversation.
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John King's episode on the Calling History Podcast was nothing short of captivating. With 25 years of experience portraying Abraham Lincoln, John seamlessly brought the 16th President to life, offering listeners an authentic glimpse into Lincoln’s journey from a humble log cabin to the White House. As a retired teacher, his engaging storytelling style makes complex historical events easy to understand while also being entertaining. His depth of knowledge and dedication to portraying Lincoln using stories to change hearts and minds is masterful.
He has brought Mr. Lincoln to life for school students, historical groups, civic groups, churches, clubs, a Law Day dinner, birthday parties, Civil War rededications, festivals, and parades. You can reach John at jwking329@yahoo.com.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:28):
Um, Tony Dean.
And today we'll be calling yesterdayto speak with Abraham Lincoln.
He'll be answering our call on April13th, 1865, two days before his
assassination at Ford's theater.
Just days prior to thisconversation, Robert E.
Lee surrendered, the south.
After four years of brotherkilling brother and hundreds
(00:49):
of thousands of deaths.
Abraham Lincoln'sinstructions were very clear.
Forgive them.
Or as he said it.
Uh, charity towards alland malice towards none.
When was the last timeyou saw a politician?
I destroy his opponent and thentreat them with that level of grace.
It's no wonder thatLincoln is often voted.
(01:10):
America's best president.
But long before he became president,
he was a young athlete and a wrestlingchampion that grew up poor in a log cabin.
He later became a shopkeeperand then a brilliant lawyer.
And then when the nation needed himmost as president, he turned those
life experiences into stories thatinspired and motivated those around
(01:34):
him to work towards his visionof a United America at all costs.
Ladies and gentlemen, fellow history,lovers, and masters of the broadsword
everywhere I give you Abraham Lincoln.
Hello, is that you, President Lincoln?
Yes, it is, sir.
(01:54):
Thank you for receiving me today.
My name is Tony Dean, and I'm talking toyou from the future in the 21st century.
The device that you're holding iscalled a smartphone, and it allows you
and I to speak as if we were standingin the same room as one another.
It also allows me to share a record ofour conversation with People around the
(02:16):
world and President Lincoln, I was hopingI could ask you some questions today.
But before I do, I understandthis is a strange introduction.
Can I answer any questionsthat you may have first?
What in the world is a smart phone?
Is it anything like a telegraph?
Well, you know, I guess there aresome similarities as a telegraph.
(02:40):
But if you think of the telegraph whereyou are very slowly transmitting these
messages one letter at a time, which iswhat I think that does, with a smartphone
you can just talk like we are rightnow and you can, Transmit documents
and you can send things very quickly.
Obviously, we're way into thefuture and so the technology
(03:02):
had advanced quite a bit.
I would probably guess that this wouldhave been something that you would have
liked very much to have during some ofyour trials during the Civil War, which I
think is just coming to an end right now.
Well, that sounds very interesting,and I was always looking for
ways to bring the war to an end.
(03:22):
So if this would have helped,it would have been nice to have.
Yeah, anything that would bringthe war to an end, , at what
stage are you in the war right now?
You're right at the tail end, aren't you?
Yes today is April the 13th.
It is just before a meeting tomorrowthat I will have with the cabinet.
(03:44):
General Grant is coming to sharehis story as to how he received the
surrender of Lee and how he handled it.
But today I had a chanceto talk to my son, Robert.
Because he was on the staff of Grant andhe came and gave me his version because he
was able to sit in the room at AppomattoxCourthouse and hear the proceedings
(04:09):
that took place, which was absolutelyincredible that I'd hear that from Robbie.
. So what did Robert say about that?
Well, he was surprisedas to how forgiving.
Grant was of Lee, and that when he tookhis sword, instead of breaking it as you
would normally do if you were defeated,, but then he gave unconditional surrender,
(04:35):
which was his tradition, and when hewas through, he gave the sword back,
treated him with respect, asked himwhat he needed, What is men needed?
And he said, they need food becausethey haven't eaten for two weeks.
And he says, tell themto draw the rations.
And that was incredible.
They did that.
(04:56):
, and he also told them that ifthey had made the pledge that they
would not take up arms against theUnion, then they could go home.
If they had their own guns, theycould take them with them, take
their horses if they had them.
And they would be able to goback and plant their crops
because it's growing season.
(05:16):
And because of that my son wasamazed with what he had seen.
Then when they went out on the porchLawrence Chamberlain from Gettysburg
had his men come to attention andsalute Lee as he left in respect of
the great man in general that he was.
And I was just amazedof what really happened.
(05:39):
, I actually didn't know that it wasnormal procedure for when someone
surrendered that the winninggeneral would break their sword.
And, did you instruct Grant totreat these people like Americans
rather than as enemy combatants?
Well, it's interesting.
(05:59):
A while back, Grant asked mewhen I went to City Point to
visit with him, and he says, Mr.
Lincoln, . What do you want me to do?
With Jefferson Davis.
And I said, that reminds me of a story.
I at one time had a case witha two elderly couples that just
bickered their entire life and.
(06:22):
The wife, one day, was upset withher husband, grabbed a log from the
side of the fireplace, hitting theside of the head, and killed him.
And I was asked to defend her.
And it looked as though they were goingto put an 86 year old lady in prison.
Which made no sense to me.
So I asked for a recess and I went to abuilding nearby and shortly after when
(06:47):
I came out, I came by myself and personasked me, well, why did you do that?
, well, because she asked me whereI could get a cold drink of water.
And I pointed to the open windowand I said, I believe Tennessee.
And Grant looked over at me and henodded his head and I nodded my head
back and I believe he understood Iwas saying, what purpose would it
(07:12):
serve to punish Jefferson Davis?
And he interpret that also with Robert E.
Lee.
, interesting.
, in our time.
You are known for telling thesekinds of stories and them
having great meaning to others.
(07:32):
, where does this come from, thisability to relate to people and tell
stories that, , either give peopleinstructions or calm them down when,
things are getting a little too heated.
Where does this come from?
Well, when I was younger, wedid not have , any books in the
house, other than the Bible.
And that was from a very poor family.
(07:54):
And as I learned to read and write, andthe books that I finally were able to, I
have in my presence with my stepmother,which was Aesop's Fables, and when I
read it, it was animals were talking,and they told stories that had morals
(08:15):
to them, and I learned from that.
And other stories that I heard Robinson,Crusoe, I believe it was, where they had
lived on an island, and were surviving,and they found a person that lived
there, and was walking along on thebeach, and his, we named him Friday.
(08:36):
And the unique thing about it was, byhim being on Friday, that if he did all
the work, then everything was done byFriday, he went to have her weekends free.
This is where all ofyour stories came from.
They just came from books?
From books.
And what I would do is take those as wellas biblical things that I read and would
(08:57):
relate them to particular situations.
Now sometimes they were to get a pointacross one particular case I had early
on riding the circuit is that I hada man that was walking wrong and mind
his own business and the other personjust kept pestering and pestering.
He finally got upset with him.
(09:19):
So he just clobbered him,beat the tar out of him.
And the person that had been , pastoringhim took him to court, and I was asked
to defend him, and when we gave allthe stories and all the things with
it, I was asked , what I would sayabout it, and I said it reminds me of a
story of a man that's walking down theroad with a pitchfork on his shoulder.
(09:42):
Mining his own business, and thisferocious dog comes out at him, and
he puts a pitchfork down in frontof him, and the dog comes at him,
he jumps into it, and kills the dog.
The owner comes out, and he says,my dog, why did you kill my dog?
And he says, well, whydid your dog attack me?
And he says, well, why didn't you go afterhim with the other end of the pitchfork?
(10:07):
I turn around and put my rear endand wave it at the jury and I said,
well, why didn't he come after me withhis other end the jury laughed and we
won the case because they understoodexactly what I was saying by the
illustration that if you pick on someone.
And you get yourself introuble, you're gonna run into
(10:28):
someone where you won't win.
Wow.
And I would tell cases likethat to get a point across.
When I was in Washington, I had peopleconstantly coming in and just absolutely.
Terribly upset and I would tell thema story and I'd say, this reminds me
of a story and I'd start telling themto them and the story had nothing
(10:52):
to do with what they were in thereand what they were upset about.
And the more I told of the story, theywould listen and try and say, well, how
does this relate to what's happening?
And then when I would get to the punchline and they would laugh and then I would
say, now, what was it you came in for?
And what did I do?
I disarmed them.
And therefore.
(11:13):
We could talk reasonably about what washappening rather than me listening to the
tyrants of what they were upset about.
It just calm them down, just breaktheir pattern, give them a moment to
take a couple deep breaths and thenbe rational again, it sounds like.
That's exactly what would happen.
It worked for me quite often.
(11:34):
Now, I would do itoccasionally with the cabinet.
I would say, well, thisreminds me of a story.
And they'd say, oh no,don't tell me another story.
And one time they said Stanton, I believeit was, said, I believe you would tell a
story if you were within a mile of hell.
And I said, well, that's just about thedistance it is from here to the Congress.
(11:56):
That's Oh, geez, that is fantastic.
That really is.
You know, and it seems like when youwere working as a lawyer, but I certainly
in politics too, what am I saying?
But , this is a perfect fit for this.
Because as a lawyer, , you're certainlyalways trying to change somebody's mind
or persuade somebody, which I guesswould be no different than politics.
(12:18):
But do you have a, I'm curious,do you have a preference?
Yes.
Between politics and law, do youlike one better than the other?
Well, law is where youtry and help someone out.
And when someone has wronged themor they believe that they have been
wronged now I've always told my clientsand would work my best to resolve the
(12:40):
situation instead of going to court.
Because you never know what willhappen when you're in court.
And if you can avoid doingthat, I would always do that.
But the real problem is with politicsis that you never know what the other
person Is going to do and it's beingable to persuade them and work with them.
(13:02):
But I always liked politics.
Henry Clay was my idol.
I thought he would be a president someday.
And I kind of patterned my life afterhim, but I was interested in treating
people fairly and that they weretreated fairly and taken care of.
, but I enjoyed.
Being an attorney, because I rode thecircuit in the spring and the fall for
(13:23):
three months and would leave home andleave poor Mary to watch after the boys,
because we did have four boys, and shewould take care of them while I was gone.
And then I would what I call practicelaw and I really enjoyed that time
with the other attorneys and thejudge, and just that time together
(13:44):
and growing relationships that Iwould cherish for the rest of my life.
I'm wondering if this feeling of thisneed to be fair with people sometimes
affected you negatively in the courtroom.
Because in our time, when peopleend up in a courtroom, It doesn't
(14:05):
appear, and I don't know if thisis true, but it doesn't appear that
people are looking for fairness.
They're looking to win.
When you go to court,aren't you looking to win?
Well, actually, if I had a case and I knewI was wrong, my client was guilty matter
of fact, one time I did, I asked for arecess and I left and I never went back.
(14:26):
I just could not defendsomeone that was guilty.
But I would try and find a way toprove that someone was, and sometimes
I was successful at doing it.
An example of that was when JackArmstrong had a son named Duff,
and after he had passed away, DuffArmstrong was accused of murder.
(14:48):
And at 11 o'clock at night, by thelight of the moon, They said that
he, with a slingshot, killed a man.
And I knew his mother, which was a widowat that time, and I went and defended
Duff for her at no cost because of thekindness that they had shown to me.
(15:08):
And during the case, I had the personthat saw what happened in the middle
of the night repeat it several times.
So there was absolutely noquestion what they were saying.
And then I pulled out the almanac.
And the almanac said, at 11 o'clockat night, there was not a full moon.
(15:30):
And the whole case went the other way.
And it's just a matter of looking andsearching and trying to find a way of
proving that the person that you believewas being unfairly convicted or tried,
that you find a way of making it right.
(15:50):
And that's what I workvery hard to be able to do.
So what about making things rightwith somebody like Jefferson Davis?
Because I understand with Grantand , the direction that you had
given him about showing Robert E.
Lee respect because Robert E.
Lee was being a soldier.
(16:11):
He was doing what he was told to do.
But , Jefferson Davis, I feel like hissituation is a little bit different
because he's the one telling people.
And he's a little bit more responsible.
As far as the decisions in the South,the buck kind of stops with him, I think.
Does somebody like thatdeserve forgiveness?
I'm wondering what yourfeelings are on him.
(16:33):
Well, it was as I said in the otherstory, and that a person's 85 years
old and they're going to go to theprison, what purpose does it serve?
If we put Jefferson Davis in prison andshoot him or whatever, what purpose would
that serve for him and for the country?
And my feeling was that as I said inthe second inaugural address, malice
(16:55):
toward none and charity toward all.
What I'm looking for is thatwhen the war is over, I want Mrs.
Helms, which is Mary's my wife's sisterto be able to come to the White House and
visit with us and not feel bad about it.
And that we can together moveforward, move where we're going to go.
(17:19):
We have family memberson each side of the war.
They're good people.
And when the war is over, we needto bring the country back together.
Because we're not tryingto destroy another country.
We're trying to rebuild or bring back ourcountry together so that our two brothers
(17:42):
that fought on each side can embrace eachother and say, what can I do to help you?
How do you heal that divide whenyou've got brothers killing brothers
and neighbors killing neighbors?
You think back, and you go way back inhistory, that even stories of like, Romeo
and Juliet, and you talk about thesefamilies where, , somebody accidentally
(18:04):
kills somebody else's pig, and nextthing you know, , over the next hundred
years, , they're killing each other.
, these kinds of stories have goneon throughout history these feuds
that have lasted for generations.
How do you heal, , this dividewith so many hundreds of thousands
of people, , killing each other?
Well, it says that youshould forgive your brother.
(18:28):
And if we follow that and believewhat is in the Bible and what, how it
tells us to live with our neighbor.
If you look at the story of the prostituteand they wanted the stoner because that's
what the law was and what did Jesus do?
He leaned down, he wrote in thesand and he says, the first one
(18:48):
of you is that is without sin.
So the first stone and they graduallyas he traced something on the
ground, they all left because weall are guilty of doing something
that we should not be doing.
And how can we or do to other peoplewhen we're not perfect either?
(19:12):
That's pretty tough to argue with.
You've mentioned the Bible several times.
As we've been talking and whatis your relationship with the
Bible and with religion and God?
Well when I was born in a log cabin thatwas 16 by 18 With a dirt floor and we
only had one book because that's allwe could afford it would be the Bible.
(19:35):
So When, on the Sunday, we alwayswould take the Bible out, and
my mother would read to me, eventhough she was illiterate, and you
say, well, how did she do that?
Well, she at least knew the wordDavid, and Noah, and other biblical
characters, and then she would tellthe story, . But when my sister and
(19:56):
I had enough education we could read,we read, basically, to my mother.
To my mother because we were able to dothat and I had great curiosity in wanting
and desire to read anything I could.
. I read it through many times.
(20:17):
I memorized many parts ofit, and therefore this.
The stories in the Bible tell us how totreat our neighbor and how we want to be
treated and how we should treat others.
in the same fashion.
And because of that it was ingrained inmy mind as to what God wanted us to do.
(20:41):
Now, there were times in my lifethat I questioned the Bible,
as I think most people do.
But when Particularly when I wentto the war, as I left Springfield on
February the 11th, I said the challengebefore me is greater than that of
(21:01):
Washington, and I know not when orif I will ever return to Springfield.
So I knew that the task before mewas a big one and whether or not
I would survive it, I wasn't sure.
And I indicated that in my speech, soyou never know where you're going to be.
(21:25):
And also, the Bible is whatwill help you get through it.
I asked my fellow citizens inSpringfield to pray for me.
Because without that prayer, and thedivine help of God, I don't know how
I will get through the next period oftime, not knowing that it would take
(21:47):
four years rather than just a fewmonths or hopefully not fighting at all.
And because of that, there weretimes the world was not going well.
So I called for prayerand fasting nine times.
I asked people to go to theirplace choice of worship and sit
(22:08):
down and quietly ask your God.
What do you want us to do?
I felt maybe the South was outpraying us.
Maybe that was the reasonthe war didn't go well.
And then toward the end of the war, Isigned a document that would allow the
phrase of four words be put on our coins.
(22:30):
And in 1864, on a two cent piece, therewas put the phrase, In God We Trust.
I went to my knees many times duringthe war., I was so distraught.
And the only comfort that I could findis when I would take and read the Bible
for a little bit, and then pray, andthen let God handle whether we'd win at
(22:56):
Gettysburg or not, or whether we'd winat Chancellorsville or not, and then be
able to go from there and live with it.
, are you telling me That, prior to thatmoment, , because at this time in history,
all the coins say in God we trust on them.
(23:16):
All of them do.
Are you telling me that prior to thatmoment in 1964, where you're looking
for any way to add more prayer, sothat we can pray more, , that the coins
did not say in God we trust on them?
They did not.
That was the first coin, ourcoin, that has a God We Trust
on it, was 1864, two cent piece.
(23:39):
, that was the first time that it occurred.
You had mentioned Washington a fewminutes ago, President Washington.
Yeah.
And, is he a hero of yours?
Oh.
Yes, he was.
we would not be a country withoutWashington and the challenge that he
had in saving us from Great Britainand fighting an impossible battle.
(24:05):
In war of dividing ourselves froma way of life that we did not
want, and being successful at it.
Of course I really wish he had whenhe wrote the Constitution, they had
solved the problem of slavery, butunfortunately he didn't left that for me.
He apparently thoughtyou were more capable.
I guess he thought someonein the future would be.
(24:28):
If you could go back in time, andyou could ask him a couple questions
or you could make some comments.
Is there anything else that comesto mind that you'd want to ask him?
Well, what I've read is Battle of Trentonand in the gamble that he took in the dead
of night of attacking on Christmas Day.
, in just the different things thathe did that were unconventional, but
(24:52):
yet without that courage and, I guessdetermination we wouldn't be a country.
the talk with him for a few minutes wouldbe something that would be remarkable.
Well, now, you know how Ifeel . So let me ask you about
you had said that you went to war.
(25:13):
Now, when I was preparing to speakwith you, you actually did go to war.
I think except for Washington, andI may be wrong on this, but I think
you were one of the few presidentsto actually go onto a battlefield.
In fact, I read something about whereyou, there were bullets flying everywhere
and you were standing up on top of ahill and somebody grabbed you and pulled
(25:36):
you down and said, , you crazy person.
Get down here, you're gonna getkilled, or something like that.
Can you tell me about this story?
I don't know the details.
You're probably referring to Fort Stevens.
Fort Stevens is a mile from the summercottage where we stayed, but probably
over four miles from downtown Washington.
And Marion and I and some otherswere visiting Fort Stevens.
(26:02):
And when we were there, Thebattlefield was laying in front
of us, and we were just looking,and then some firing took place.
People started firing at people, and wesent Mary and the ladies about a mile
away in the carriage to get away from it.
I'm standing on the battlefieldlooking out over it.
(26:25):
And they start firing, and some bulletsare coming our way, and a gentleman by
the name of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
stands up and says, Getdown, you dang fool!
Or words to that effect.
And a bullet, from a sharpshooter,shot a private that was within
(26:46):
a couple arms length of me,indicating that I was under fire.
And at that point, Idecided to listen to Mr.
Holmes, and I found a little saferplace to be than standing up with
my hat sticking up as a target.
Now, a little later, when I wentback to the carriage to find Mrs.
(27:07):
Lincoln, my hat blew off.
And the problem was, when the soldiersPicked it up for me and showed it to me.
There was a bullet hole throughit, which means it wasn't
totally the way it should be.
Now, I asked him to take the hat and notshow it to Mary in particular and acquire
(27:28):
a new one for me so that Mary would notbe aware of how close things really were.
Is this a pattern of yours?
Taking incredible riskswith your life like this?
guess I don't understand this.
Is there not somebody on yourcabinet or somebody in your security
detail that says, Why are you here?
(27:51):
This is not where you belong.
You're the decision maker,not the guy holding the gun.
Well, Wade Lamont was a fellow attorneywhen I was on the circuit and he came
to me when I realized I was going toWashington as a bodyguard, basically.
And he was kind of in charge of securityfor me and he many times would just
(28:15):
throw his hands up and he says, Lincoln,if you aren't going to help me any by
going to the telegraph office in themiddle of the night with no one with you.
How in the world can I keep you alive?
And if you keep doing that, I'm justgoing to give up on you and leave.
And so he got prettyupset at times with me.
(28:36):
But there were times that I justneeded to either be by myself
or I didn't want to bother.
The soldiers at 11 or 12 o'clockat night when I needed to go to the
telegraph office and find out what hadhappened in the battle during the day.
And sometimes I would take my son,Tad, with me and we would go over.
(29:00):
But it just, I didn'twant any inconvenience.
Now, one time, I was always lookingfor ways to bring the war to an end.
And looking for something that wouldbe more efficient to what we had.
And I went out behind the White Houseone time, test firing a Remington.
And when I was back there and fireda couple times, my bodyguards that
(29:22):
were around the front of the WhiteHouse came running as fast as they
could with their guns, all ready tofind me in a precarious situation.
And they realized all they weredoing was test firing guns.
And they got a little upset with meand I had to apologize and make sure in
(29:44):
the future that when I was test firingout back, which I did a few times,
that I let them know beforehand so theywouldn't get so upset or disturbed.
I wonder if, cause I don't thinkthat standing on the front lines
it almost looks irresponsiblelike Like you have a death wish.
, but I know that isn't true.
I think that you were probably tryingto inspire people and show courage.
(30:07):
But I wonder if maybe there was even , abelief that you had some divine protection
or maybe even luck on your side.
Because I think during your life, weren'tthere several times where you almost died?
Yes, there were.
And when I was a youngster, I had afriend named Austin, and after a big
(30:32):
rain, we went down to the river that wehad been a day or two before, and there
was a log across the stream, but we hadalways been warned that , after a big
storm, that you should stay away fromthe water, because it's very dangerous.
And I told Austin that I thinkI can get across that log the
(30:52):
same as I had the day before.
The previous day and when I tried it,I was wrong and I fell in and Austin
grabbed a stick and poke me with it andby poking me with it, I grabbed for it
and fortunately grabbed a hold of itand he pulled me in and saved my life.
(31:15):
And, had he not been there, and I liketo share that we should learn that
whenever we do anything, we should havesomeone with us, particularly if there's
any possibility, particularly aroundwater, possibility of danger, and so he
did save me and otherwise we wouldn'thave been telling you this story today.
(31:37):
Another time was, I was older, and we, would take our grain to the local granary.
Now when the water is down,you would take your mule.
So I took my mule with mecarrying the grain that we had.
And I waited quite a while.
And I was getting frustrated,.
(31:57):
You wait in line long enough youjust want to get it over with.
And so it was finally our turn.
And I hooked our mule up.
I put the grain in and was working as Ishould, and I had a little switch that I
would encourage him to go a little faster,because I wanted to get done before dark.
And I would go, giddy up, andthen a mule hit me in the head
(32:21):
and I was saying giddy up.
And that was the end of it andknocked me out cold and I lay there
and the story they tell me is thatthe owner of the mill came out and
wondering what in the world happenedand he thought I was , a real goner.
And then.
A few minutes later, I woke up andI said, giddy up and finish what I
(32:44):
was trying to get the mule to do.
And I realized, oh, I'm notbehind the mule anymore.
So, yes, I believe I'm on this earth.
For a reason.
I don't know for sure what itis, but I feel that I'm here to
do something that will make mestand out among my fellow men.
(33:05):
And whether that's divineor not, I'm not sure.
I just feel I'm here for a reason.
Well, I'd have to ask you aboutone more situation like this.
I don't know if you brought this onyourself, or if, you outsmarted somebody.
But is there truth to a story that youwere nearly in a duel and you chose to
(33:27):
duel with swords rather than pistols?
Yes, funny you should ask that.
Well, President Lincoln, I'mspotting a trend here, so go ahead.
Well, early as a lawyer.
We were trying a case with a widowthat had lost her property and a
man came along and said that someoneelse had bought it from her husband
(33:51):
before he died and I was defending her
.And the person I was against the other attorney was , a
man by the name of Shields.
And I would say something and thepaper would print it, and he would
say something and the paper wouldprint it, and we went back and forth
basically trying it in the paper.
(34:11):
And one time there was an articlewritten with a title Rebecca.
And.
He was a woman's man and hethought he was a very good
person and the ladies loved him.
So Rebecca said all of these thingsabout him and Embarrassed him.
(34:36):
And because of that, he was so offended.
He went to the editor andasked if I had read it.
And he said, well, I can't tell you that.
, but he didn't deny it.
And I did not allowhim to tell who did it.
The author of that was Mary Todd,would be my wife in the future.
(34:56):
And because of that, hechallenged me to a duel.
Now, when you're challenged to a duel.
You get to choose your weapons and becauseI could handle an axe better than anybody
else Some people say that if we had acontest of cutting down trees the best
guy cuts down his first tree I'm on mysecond and a half tree because I'm very
(35:20):
capable of it so I took the broadswordthe biggest one I could find and We went
to off the shore of Missouri where duelswere legal, and I proceeded to trim
a few tree limbs, and the second Mr.
Shields looked over and said, I believeyou are going to be in deep trouble,
(35:43):
and because of that, we were able tocome to a decision on it of where we
I kind of apologized and we moved onrather than actually going after each
other, but he was considered verygood at dueling and had been in a duel
more than once, and I did not feelthat pistols was a way for me to go.
(36:08):
I'm a little confused on whatwas the purpose of trimming the
tree branches with the sword?
Well, it meant that I had along arm reach and that he was
definitely shorter than me.
And that by doing that, thatthere was some cutting involved.
And if we had been actually goingat it his second realize what I was
(36:29):
saying is that Something's going to gettrimmed and it's not going to be me.
I see.
So when you're reaching up in the tree,you're demonstrating that you've got
these long arms because you're talland probably have a long wingspan.
And he's a little guy and sohe may not even get in because
you're fighting with swords.
Is that what you're saying?
That's what I'm saying.
(36:51):
Oh, my gosh, that's brilliant
.She now a follow up of that.
When I was in Washington, I wasat a reception line one time
and the person came up that hadbeen aware of what had happened.
And they said, howabout the time you were?
Involved in a duel and Istopped what I was doing.
(37:12):
I got very serious and I said, sir, ifwe are ever to be friends any longer,
we will never discuss this again.
And the reason I said that Ibelieve the duel was a young man
that was thinking it was kind ofimpressive to do something like that.
(37:32):
But as a president, I realizedthat it was not something.
That a person in my positionwould do such a deed.
You know, , that situation, , hadyou not been thinking ahead of
outsmarting him with the broadswordsand that had gone to pistols.
I mean, this could have been anAaron Burr, Alexander Hamilton
(37:55):
situation all over again.
Yes, it could.
And I was determined that itwasn't going to be that way.
So I kind of, I guess Iput the odds in my favor.
Yeah.
No, I like that.
I, okay.
So now we're talking about, I know I'masking you all these oddball questions,
but it's just fascinating me to hear aboutyour life and what it looked like before
(38:19):
all the things that, , that we know about,like, your presidency in the civil war.
And, As I think about you jumping ontothis log, thinking, Okay, the river's
going down, I can jump on this log.
And then I think about you as ayoung man deciding, Yeah, absolutely,
I'm gonna get involved in a duel.
It sounds to me like you'redescribing an athletic person.
And , the pictures that we all haveof you are not of you in your youth.
(38:44):
We don't see this youngstrapping swimmer or runner on
the track team in your school.
We see the president.
Were you very athletic in your youth?
Yeah, , I was very healthy when I wouldcut trees or husk corn or whatever,
I could do it much better than anyoneelse because I was, by 17, I was
(39:06):
6'4 I was a very big, strong person.
As I was growing up in school Whenyou would take a recess, you would
have foot races, you would do otherspelling bees and that sort of thing.
And I excelled educationally, so I'dwin all the spelling bees, therefore
I couldn't participate at a pointbecause I was the only one winning.
(39:30):
And we would have foot races and Iwould win them once I got to be as
tall or taller than everybody else.
And I was very athletic.
Wrestling was somethingthat you would do a lot of.
And I always would win.
Now, early on, My sister and I,because all our houses were about
(39:54):
a mile apart, it was hard tofind a neighbor closer than that.
And my sister and I would play togetherdoing things, including wrestling.
And one time well, as we wrestledfor quite a bit and different things,
my sister would always beat me.
Until I grew up.
And I got to be as big as she wasand I was bigger and stronger and
(40:16):
I was able to beat her and one ofthe first times that I beat her.
I was holding her down, justbasking in the fact that I had
won, and she starts screaming.
My parents come out, they wonder, what inthe world are you doing to your sister?
And, I realized at that pointthat you need to let her up easy.
(40:41):
What I mean to say is that if my sisterand I are going to end up playing together
and competing in physical activities aswrestling, when I am able to defeat her,
once I have won, I need to get up Grab herarm, lift her up and say, that was fun.
(41:03):
And you were great and let her up easy,which is something that I use later on
when we were fighting, it was when the,during the war and that once we're over.
And when the fighting is over, we needto let them up easy, which is kind of the
basis for my second inaugural address,Malice Toward None and Charity Toward All.
(41:27):
It's amazing how those lessons of ouryouth, things as simple as, , wrestling
with a sibling, Is something that endsup being so important , as an element
of our character that allows us tobe a better person later in life.
, without that lesson,jeez, I mean, who knows?
Something that simple could havebeen you and Grant standing in a
(41:49):
room and you telling Grant, as soonas you get his sword, you break
that thing and you let those peopleknow that they owe us and they're
going to pay for what they've done.
I mean, it could have been atotally different direction without
those lessons from your family.
Right.
Yeah.
That's absolutely right.
When you were 17 and you weretall and athletic and all that,
(42:10):
did you have the beard at 17?
No.
No, I did not.
. The beard did not come untila month before the election.
And I received a letter from a girl thatwas 11 years old from Westfield, New York.
And she asked me, first of all, if Ihad any daughters, which I did not.
I had four sons.
(42:32):
And she said you're tall and thinand you look better, so you're not
good looking or you're ugly, but ifyou grow chin whiskers, you'll look
better and the ladies will tease theirhusbands and they will vote for you.
And if you do that, youwill become president.
So, I decided to grow the whiskers.
(42:54):
I told Ted, my barber, and I said,Ted, let's let those little things
grow and see if they'll do anything.
And so, when you see me in a beard,you'll know it was after , October 15th.
1860 when I received a letter fromGrace Bedell and when I was going to
Washington to be inaugurated and I madeabout 40 some stops all over the country
(43:21):
that helped let people know who I wasand I stopped there and I thanked them
for voting for me as I did every placeelse and then I asked if anyone knew a
young girl by the name of Grace Bedell.
By that time, she was 12 years old,and a person in the back said yes, and
he said, I asked, where is she, andhe said, she's here, brought her up,
(43:45):
I gave her a swing around, I thankedher for the good counsel, and I asked
her what she thought of the beard,and she thought it looked very good.
A wise man receives counsel fromanywhere, as long as it is good
counsel, and apparently some ofyours come from 11 year old girls.
Which I would suggest to anyone, thatif you know someone, and not necessarily
(44:09):
girls, but young people, that have put alot of thought into something, that you
might want to listen to them, becausemaybe, it'll be a life changing decision.
. Why is it, speaking of the war, why is itthat the war took so long, , four years
of vicious fighting and so many deaths?
(44:33):
How is it that, , nobodygives in, or there's no way
to find common ground sooner?
Did it, didn't it seem like it wenton just so much longer than it,
than anybody would have guessed?
Absolutely.
One, I was hopeful thatthere wouldn't be a war.
And the problem was early on whenthe states started leaving the Union,
(44:57):
Buchanan, which was the at that time, wasa Democrat from the South, and he knew
that if he intervened To stop those thatwere closing down the different military
facilities that he would be into somethinghe really didn't want to get into.
So he just let it happen.
(45:18):
Well, what happened was most of themilitary facilities in the country.
Would have gentlemen from the Southand you say, well, why is that?
Well, it's because if a slave owner'sfather passed away, who gets the property?
Who becomes the next person in charge?
(45:40):
Well, that's the oldest son.
So, if your son numbertwo, three, four or five.
What are you going to do?
Distinguish yourself and be someoneimportant as your older brother is.
So you either become a lawyer go intopolitics, or you become a military
person and because of that, many ofthe well educated from a plantation,
(46:07):
Would seek training at West Point andnot only training, but they would be
some of the best because of the bettereducation that they had with a family
that was capable of providing it.
And because of that, you get yourbest qualified people in the military
facilities and probably well over halfof them were from the South because
(46:32):
they were much better educated and theyseem to do much better at West Point.
When they were being trained.
And because of that, when the war brokeout, and you seceded from the Union,
the person that is in charge of thedifferent military facilities, one third
of them, And when they resigned, theytook with them everything that was in
(46:56):
that military facility that would assistthem in the war if it were to take place.
They would take gunswith them and the like.
One example of that isNorth Oak, Virginia.
The person in charge there took boats,took ammunition, took whatever they
could with them when they went tothe South to withdraw from the Union.
(47:19):
That's it.
And when they left, they didn'twant to leave anything, so they
tried to blow up what was left.
Fortunately, the attempt of blowingsomething up did not ignite, and therefore
they didn't lose everything at Norfolk.
Now, knowing this, I havedifferent military facilities.
(47:39):
They've all been resigning.
I go to Colonel Magruder, which isthe head of the Washington City,
Military facility and he is fromthe South and I asked him, he
says, Colonel, what are your plans?
And he says, I was raised underold glory and I'll die under
old glory . I take a deep breathand I say, okay, this is great.
(48:03):
You are truly a Southern gentleman.
Three days later, he resides.
So now I have in Washington, no onein charge of the military and there's
going to be fighting and I'm wonderingwhat in the world we're going to do.
So I call up 75, 000 men volunteersto come and fight for the North
(48:29):
while I'm waiting for them to come.
I'm having military facilities.
There's those are leaving, and whenthey leave, there's no one in charge.
Now, the problem in Washington itself,Washington City is many of the homes in
Washington were either owned or rented,operated by Southern wealthy people.
(48:54):
That were members of Congress whenthey left the union, resign from
Congress and the people left towatch their houses are Southerners.
So if I call up the militia,what's going to happen?
I'm going to be calling up Southernsympathizers and therefore.
(49:15):
, I can't do that.
So I'm waiting patiently for the 75, 000to come and protect Washington City from
any possible attacks from the South.
And therefore, it's avery precarious situation.
And because of that, I have tofind a way of moving forward
(49:40):
until we can secure the north.
But it doesn't look good because thegreat leadership that we had in the
military facilities have gone south.
Robert E.
Lee, I asked him if he would stayon, and he indicated he would.
Until Virginia left the Union.
When Virginia left the Union,he said, I cannot take up arms
(50:06):
against my fellow statesmen.
And therefore he left.
So, best military leaderswe have in the country.
have left.
They've gone south.
Robert E.
Lee, for 10 years, had beensuperintendent of West Point.
And on Sunday afternoon, he wouldask these cadets, the promising
(50:29):
ones, to come to his house, and theywould talk about military strategy.
And because of these get togethers, hewould say, in the Battle of Waterloo, You
take on so and so's position and whatever,and with that knowledge, come back and
tell what you would have done different.
So he knows the men that hadmilitary positions, and now
(50:55):
they're fighting for the South.
So he knows these men intimately.
He knows what your capabilities are, andwe in the North are stuck with not the
skilled leadership that the South has.
For that reason, the first battle ofBull Run, four o'clock in the afternoon,
we're ahead, and it looks like we'vewon, and I go for a carriage ride.
(51:19):
In the middle of the carriage ride, Iget the cavalry comes up and says, Mr.
President, we have a problem, and whathad happened A man by the name, would get
the nickname Stonewall Jackson saw theman retreating, and he decided to take
out his revolver, and he said, the nextperson that takes a step toward me is
(51:39):
a dead man, and they took him serious,and they turned around, and the tide of
The Battle of Bull Run changed, and welost, and for the next two years, we were
trying to find a way of getting someonethat was capable of winning, and on our
(52:00):
side the first officer we had in chargewas Winfield Scott, and he had been a
hero from , the Battle of Mexico, Buthe was 75 years old, he weighed 310
pounds, and he had a bad case of the gout.
, the problem was when he would go to reviewthe troops, he would go to get a horse and
(52:25):
the horses would cower in the back cornerhoping that they wouldn't be chosen.
Oh, my gosh.
So when he left, we were looking forsomeone to take his place, and we
thought it was early on with the Battleof Rich Mountain in western Virginia.
Now, the people in western Virginiadid not believe the same as Virginia.
(52:50):
The rest of Virginia, because they,there were fewer people, they were
mountain people and they were, theygot their support and the things they
needed from Pennsylvania and Ohio.
And when they would elect legislatorsand want money for improvement
of roads and so forth, they veryseldom got what they wanted.
(53:12):
So they relied on Pennsylvania and Ohio.
And when the war broke out, theywanted to stay with the Union.
And one of the early battleswas at Rich Mountain.
And as General McClellan would goup the mountain with a new device
called a telegraph, he would put upthe lines and, Send us a telegraph
(53:33):
saying I'm going up Rich Mountain.
When I get up there, we're going towin and when they did get up on the
top of a local person came by andsaid, Hey, if you want to defeat
them, I'll show you a back way in.
So you sneak in on him and he did.
And.
One of the generals that encouragedMcClellan to do this, talked him into it.
(53:58):
They went single file, leadingtheir horses, cause it was too
dangerous to ride them, across whatI call the laurels, or goat path.
And they went in, weresuccessful in routing them.
But when the signal wasgiven, McClellan did not.
Respond to it and comein and help them out.
(54:19):
So 12 hours after they had been routed.
And they left.
He sent someone in to seewhat had happened and realized
they were all gone and we won.
So he, with his telegraph,said, Rich Mountain is ours.
Twelve hours too late.
But because he was the highest rankingofficial, officer, he was given
(54:43):
credit for and became a military hero.
And therefore we put him in as thehead of the military in the East for
the next better part of two years,we spent trying to get him to fight.
He was great with training the troops.
They would do anything for him,but I believe he loved his men
(55:05):
so much that he didn't fight.
That way he wouldn't lose them.
And that was the situation wehad for the first two years.
Year or two of the war because itwent so poorly and we lost so many
battles that I needed to find a wayof being able to win and I had to
(55:27):
take the strength away from the South.
Like so many, I've always admired Lincoln,the amount of effort that it took to
hold the nation together during the civilwar was nothing short of Herculean.
But then when you find out that during thefirst two years, all the talent, he needed
to fight the war was on the other side.
It, makes it all thatmuch more impressive.
(55:48):
In the next episode, we're going to talkabout what emancipation looked like,
the challenges of finding a general thatwould fight and why he recruited people
to his cabinet, that didn't like him.
I'm glad you're enjoying this podcast.
And if you haven't yet subscribednow, and we'll see you at the next
episode of the calling history podcastwith part two of Abraham Lincoln.
Um, Tony Dean.
And today we'll be calling yesterdayto speak with Abraham Lincoln.
He'll be answering our call on April13th, 1865, two days before his
assassination at Ford's theater.
Just days prior to thisconversation, Robert E.
Lee surrendered, the south.
After four years of brotherkilling brother and hundreds
(00:49):
of thousands of deaths.
Abraham Lincoln'sinstructions were very clear.
Forgive them.
Or as he said it.
Uh, charity towards alland malice towards none.
When was the last timeyou saw a politician?
I destroy his opponent and thentreat them with that level of grace.
It's no wonder thatLincoln is often voted.
(01:10):
America's best president.
But long before he became president,
he was a young athlete and a wrestlingchampion that grew up poor in a log cabin.
He later became a shopkeeperand then a brilliant lawyer.
And then when the nation needed himmost as president, he turned those
life experiences into stories thatinspired and motivated those around
(01:34):
him to work towards his visionof a United America at all costs.
Ladies and gentlemen, fellow history,lovers, and masters of the broadsword
everywhere I give you Abraham Lincoln.
Hello, is that you, President Lincoln?
Yes, it is, sir.
(01:54):
Thank you for receiving me today.
My name is Tony Dean, and I'm talking toyou from the future in the 21st century.
The device that you're holding iscalled a smartphone, and it allows you
and I to speak as if we were standingin the same room as one another.
It also allows me to share a record ofour conversation with People around the
(02:16):
world and President Lincoln, I was hopingI could ask you some questions today.
But before I do, I understandthis is a strange introduction.
Can I answer any questionsthat you may have first?
What in the world is a smart phone?
Is it anything like a telegraph?
Well, you know, I guess there aresome similarities as a telegraph.
(02:40):
But if you think of the telegraph whereyou are very slowly transmitting these
messages one letter at a time, which iswhat I think that does, with a smartphone
you can just talk like we are rightnow and you can, Transmit documents
and you can send things very quickly.
Obviously, we're way into thefuture and so the technology
(03:02):
had advanced quite a bit.
I would probably guess that this wouldhave been something that you would have
liked very much to have during some ofyour trials during the Civil War, which I
think is just coming to an end right now.
Well, that sounds very interesting,and I was always looking for
ways to bring the war to an end.
(03:22):
So if this would have helped,it would have been nice to have.
Yeah, anything that would bringthe war to an end, , at what
stage are you in the war right now?
You're right at the tail end, aren't you?
Yes today is April the 13th.
It is just before a meeting tomorrowthat I will have with the cabinet.
(03:44):
General Grant is coming to sharehis story as to how he received the
surrender of Lee and how he handled it.
But today I had a chanceto talk to my son, Robert.
Because he was on the staff of Grant andhe came and gave me his version because he
was able to sit in the room at AppomattoxCourthouse and hear the proceedings
(04:09):
that took place, which was absolutelyincredible that I'd hear that from Robbie.
. So what did Robert say about that?
Well, he was surprisedas to how forgiving.
Grant was of Lee, and that when he tookhis sword, instead of breaking it as you
would normally do if you were defeated,, but then he gave unconditional surrender,
(04:35):
which was his tradition, and when hewas through, he gave the sword back,
treated him with respect, asked himwhat he needed, What is men needed?
And he said, they need food becausethey haven't eaten for two weeks.
And he says, tell themto draw the rations.
And that was incredible.
They did that.
(04:56):
, and he also told them that ifthey had made the pledge that they
would not take up arms against theUnion, then they could go home.
If they had their own guns, theycould take them with them, take
their horses if they had them.
And they would be able to goback and plant their crops
because it's growing season.
(05:16):
And because of that my son wasamazed with what he had seen.
Then when they went out on the porchLawrence Chamberlain from Gettysburg
had his men come to attention andsalute Lee as he left in respect of
the great man in general that he was.
And I was just amazedof what really happened.
(05:39):
, I actually didn't know that it wasnormal procedure for when someone
surrendered that the winninggeneral would break their sword.
And, did you instruct Grant totreat these people like Americans
rather than as enemy combatants?
Well, it's interesting.
(05:59):
A while back, Grant asked mewhen I went to City Point to
visit with him, and he says, Mr.
Lincoln, . What do you want me to do?
With Jefferson Davis.
And I said, that reminds me of a story.
I at one time had a case witha two elderly couples that just
bickered their entire life and.
(06:22):
The wife, one day, was upset withher husband, grabbed a log from the
side of the fireplace, hitting theside of the head, and killed him.
And I was asked to defend her.
And it looked as though they were goingto put an 86 year old lady in prison.
Which made no sense to me.
So I asked for a recess and I went to abuilding nearby and shortly after when
(06:47):
I came out, I came by myself and personasked me, well, why did you do that?
, well, because she asked me whereI could get a cold drink of water.
And I pointed to the open windowand I said, I believe Tennessee.
And Grant looked over at me and henodded his head and I nodded my head
back and I believe he understood Iwas saying, what purpose would it
(07:12):
serve to punish Jefferson Davis?
And he interpret that also with Robert E.
Lee.
, interesting.
, in our time.
You are known for telling thesekinds of stories and them
having great meaning to others.
(07:32):
, where does this come from, thisability to relate to people and tell
stories that, , either give peopleinstructions or calm them down when,
things are getting a little too heated.
Where does this come from?
Well, when I was younger, wedid not have , any books in the
house, other than the Bible.
And that was from a very poor family.
(07:54):
And as I learned to read and write, andthe books that I finally were able to, I
have in my presence with my stepmother,which was Aesop's Fables, and when I
read it, it was animals were talking,and they told stories that had morals
(08:15):
to them, and I learned from that.
And other stories that I heard Robinson,Crusoe, I believe it was, where they had
lived on an island, and were surviving,and they found a person that lived
there, and was walking along on thebeach, and his, we named him Friday.
(08:36):
And the unique thing about it was, byhim being on Friday, that if he did all
the work, then everything was done byFriday, he went to have her weekends free.
This is where all ofyour stories came from.
They just came from books?
From books.
And what I would do is take those as wellas biblical things that I read and would
(08:57):
relate them to particular situations.
Now sometimes they were to get a pointacross one particular case I had early
on riding the circuit is that I hada man that was walking wrong and mind
his own business and the other personjust kept pestering and pestering.
He finally got upset with him.
(09:19):
So he just clobbered him,beat the tar out of him.
And the person that had been , pastoringhim took him to court, and I was asked
to defend him, and when we gave allthe stories and all the things with
it, I was asked , what I would sayabout it, and I said it reminds me of a
story of a man that's walking down theroad with a pitchfork on his shoulder.
(09:42):
Mining his own business, and thisferocious dog comes out at him, and
he puts a pitchfork down in frontof him, and the dog comes at him,
he jumps into it, and kills the dog.
The owner comes out, and he says,my dog, why did you kill my dog?
And he says, well, whydid your dog attack me?
And he says, well, why didn't you go afterhim with the other end of the pitchfork?
(10:07):
I turn around and put my rear endand wave it at the jury and I said,
well, why didn't he come after me withhis other end the jury laughed and we
won the case because they understoodexactly what I was saying by the
illustration that if you pick on someone.
And you get yourself introuble, you're gonna run into
(10:28):
someone where you won't win.
Wow.
And I would tell cases likethat to get a point across.
When I was in Washington, I had peopleconstantly coming in and just absolutely.
Terribly upset and I would tell thema story and I'd say, this reminds me
of a story and I'd start telling themto them and the story had nothing
(10:52):
to do with what they were in thereand what they were upset about.
And the more I told of the story, theywould listen and try and say, well, how
does this relate to what's happening?
And then when I would get to the punchline and they would laugh and then I would
say, now, what was it you came in for?
And what did I do?
I disarmed them.
And therefore.
(11:13):
We could talk reasonably about what washappening rather than me listening to the
tyrants of what they were upset about.
It just calm them down, just breaktheir pattern, give them a moment to
take a couple deep breaths and thenbe rational again, it sounds like.
That's exactly what would happen.
It worked for me quite often.
(11:34):
Now, I would do itoccasionally with the cabinet.
I would say, well, thisreminds me of a story.
And they'd say, oh no,don't tell me another story.
And one time they said Stanton, I believeit was, said, I believe you would tell a
story if you were within a mile of hell.
And I said, well, that's just about thedistance it is from here to the Congress.
(11:56):
That's Oh, geez, that is fantastic.
That really is.
You know, and it seems like when youwere working as a lawyer, but I certainly
in politics too, what am I saying?
But , this is a perfect fit for this.
Because as a lawyer, , you're certainlyalways trying to change somebody's mind
or persuade somebody, which I guesswould be no different than politics.
(12:18):
But do you have a, I'm curious,do you have a preference?
Yes.
Between politics and law, do youlike one better than the other?
Well, law is where youtry and help someone out.
And when someone has wronged themor they believe that they have been
wronged now I've always told my clientsand would work my best to resolve the
(12:40):
situation instead of going to court.
Because you never know what willhappen when you're in court.
And if you can avoid doingthat, I would always do that.
But the real problem is with politicsis that you never know what the other
person Is going to do and it's beingable to persuade them and work with them.
(13:02):
But I always liked politics.
Henry Clay was my idol.
I thought he would be a president someday.
And I kind of patterned my life afterhim, but I was interested in treating
people fairly and that they weretreated fairly and taken care of.
, but I enjoyed.
Being an attorney, because I rode thecircuit in the spring and the fall for
(13:23):
three months and would leave home andleave poor Mary to watch after the boys,
because we did have four boys, and shewould take care of them while I was gone.
And then I would what I call practicelaw and I really enjoyed that time
with the other attorneys and thejudge, and just that time together
(13:44):
and growing relationships that Iwould cherish for the rest of my life.
I'm wondering if this feeling of thisneed to be fair with people sometimes
affected you negatively in the courtroom.
Because in our time, when peopleend up in a courtroom, It doesn't
(14:05):
appear, and I don't know if thisis true, but it doesn't appear that
people are looking for fairness.
They're looking to win.
When you go to court,aren't you looking to win?
Well, actually, if I had a case and I knewI was wrong, my client was guilty matter
of fact, one time I did, I asked for arecess and I left and I never went back.
(14:26):
I just could not defendsomeone that was guilty.
But I would try and find a way toprove that someone was, and sometimes
I was successful at doing it.
An example of that was when JackArmstrong had a son named Duff,
and after he had passed away, DuffArmstrong was accused of murder.
(14:48):
And at 11 o'clock at night, by thelight of the moon, They said that
he, with a slingshot, killed a man.
And I knew his mother, which was a widowat that time, and I went and defended
Duff for her at no cost because of thekindness that they had shown to me.
(15:08):
And during the case, I had the personthat saw what happened in the middle
of the night repeat it several times.
So there was absolutely noquestion what they were saying.
And then I pulled out the almanac.
And the almanac said, at 11 o'clockat night, there was not a full moon.
(15:30):
And the whole case went the other way.
And it's just a matter of looking andsearching and trying to find a way of
proving that the person that you believewas being unfairly convicted or tried,
that you find a way of making it right.
(15:50):
And that's what I workvery hard to be able to do.
So what about making things rightwith somebody like Jefferson Davis?
Because I understand with Grantand , the direction that you had
given him about showing Robert E.
Lee respect because Robert E.
Lee was being a soldier.
(16:11):
He was doing what he was told to do.
But , Jefferson Davis, I feel like hissituation is a little bit different
because he's the one telling people.
And he's a little bit more responsible.
As far as the decisions in the South,the buck kind of stops with him, I think.
Does somebody like thatdeserve forgiveness?
I'm wondering what yourfeelings are on him.
(16:33):
Well, it was as I said in the otherstory, and that a person's 85 years
old and they're going to go to theprison, what purpose does it serve?
If we put Jefferson Davis in prison andshoot him or whatever, what purpose would
that serve for him and for the country?
And my feeling was that as I said inthe second inaugural address, malice
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toward none and charity toward all.
What I'm looking for is thatwhen the war is over, I want Mrs.
Helms, which is Mary's my wife's sisterto be able to come to the White House and
visit with us and not feel bad about it.
And that we can together moveforward, move where we're going to go.
(17:19):
We have family memberson each side of the war.
They're good people.
And when the war is over, we needto bring the country back together.
Because we're not tryingto destroy another country.
We're trying to rebuild or bring back ourcountry together so that our two brothers
(17:42):
that fought on each side can embrace eachother and say, what can I do to help you?
How do you heal that divide whenyou've got brothers killing brothers
and neighbors killing neighbors?
You think back, and you go way back inhistory, that even stories of like, Romeo
and Juliet, and you talk about thesefamilies where, , somebody accidentally
(18:04):
kills somebody else's pig, and nextthing you know, , over the next hundred
years, , they're killing each other.
, these kinds of stories have goneon throughout history these feuds
that have lasted for generations.
How do you heal, , this dividewith so many hundreds of thousands
of people, , killing each other?
Well, it says that youshould forgive your brother.
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And if we follow that and believewhat is in the Bible and what, how it
tells us to live with our neighbor.
If you look at the story of the prostituteand they wanted the stoner because that's
what the law was and what did Jesus do?
He leaned down, he wrote in thesand and he says, the first one
(18:48):
of you is that is without sin.
So the first stone and they graduallyas he traced something on the
ground, they all left because weall are guilty of doing something
that we should not be doing.
And how can we or do to other peoplewhen we're not perfect either?
(19:12):
That's pretty tough to argue with.
You've mentioned the Bible several times.
As we've been talking and whatis your relationship with the
Bible and with religion and God?
Well when I was born in a log cabin thatwas 16 by 18 With a dirt floor and we
only had one book because that's allwe could afford it would be the Bible.
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So When, on the Sunday, we alwayswould take the Bible out, and
my mother would read to me, eventhough she was illiterate, and you
say, well, how did she do that?
Well, she at least knew the wordDavid, and Noah, and other biblical
characters, and then she would tellthe story, . But when my sister and
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I had enough education we could read,we read, basically, to my mother.
To my mother because we were able to dothat and I had great curiosity in wanting
and desire to read anything I could.
. I read it through many times.
(20:17):
I memorized many parts ofit, and therefore this.
The stories in the Bible tell us how totreat our neighbor and how we want to be
treated and how we should treat others.
in the same fashion.
And because of that it was ingrained inmy mind as to what God wanted us to do.
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Now, there were times in my lifethat I questioned the Bible,
as I think most people do.
But when Particularly when I wentto the war, as I left Springfield on
February the 11th, I said the challengebefore me is greater than that of
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Washington, and I know not when orif I will ever return to Springfield.
So I knew that the task before mewas a big one and whether or not
I would survive it, I wasn't sure.
And I indicated that in my speech, soyou never know where you're going to be.
(21:25):
And also, the Bible is whatwill help you get through it.
I asked my fellow citizens inSpringfield to pray for me.
Because without that prayer, and thedivine help of God, I don't know how
I will get through the next period oftime, not knowing that it would take
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four years rather than just a fewmonths or hopefully not fighting at all.
And because of that, there weretimes the world was not going well.
So I called for prayerand fasting nine times.
I asked people to go to theirplace choice of worship and sit
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down and quietly ask your God.
What do you want us to do?
I felt maybe the South was outpraying us.
Maybe that was the reasonthe war didn't go well.
And then toward the end of the war, Isigned a document that would allow the
phrase of four words be put on our coins.
(22:30):
And in 1864, on a two cent piece, therewas put the phrase, In God We Trust.
I went to my knees many times duringthe war., I was so distraught.
And the only comfort that I could findis when I would take and read the Bible
for a little bit, and then pray, andthen let God handle whether we'd win at
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Gettysburg or not, or whether we'd winat Chancellorsville or not, and then be
able to go from there and live with it.
, are you telling me That, prior to thatmoment, , because at this time in history,
all the coins say in God we trust on them.
(23:16):
All of them do.
Are you telling me that prior to thatmoment in 1964, where you're looking
for any way to add more prayer, sothat we can pray more, , that the coins
did not say in God we trust on them?
They did not.
That was the first coin, ourcoin, that has a God We Trust
on it, was 1864, two cent piece.
(23:39):
, that was the first time that it occurred.
You had mentioned Washington a fewminutes ago, President Washington.
Yeah.
And, is he a hero of yours?
Oh.
Yes, he was.
we would not be a country withoutWashington and the challenge that he
had in saving us from Great Britainand fighting an impossible battle.
(24:05):
In war of dividing ourselves froma way of life that we did not
want, and being successful at it.
Of course I really wish he had whenhe wrote the Constitution, they had
solved the problem of slavery, butunfortunately he didn't left that for me.
He apparently thoughtyou were more capable.
I guess he thought someonein the future would be.
(24:28):
If you could go back in time, andyou could ask him a couple questions
or you could make some comments.
Is there anything else that comesto mind that you'd want to ask him?
Well, what I've read is Battle of Trentonand in the gamble that he took in the dead
of night of attacking on Christmas Day.
, in just the different things thathe did that were unconventional, but
(24:52):
yet without that courage and, I guessdetermination we wouldn't be a country.
the talk with him for a few minutes wouldbe something that would be remarkable.
Well, now, you know how Ifeel . So let me ask you about
you had said that you went to war.
(25:13):
Now, when I was preparing to speakwith you, you actually did go to war.
I think except for Washington, andI may be wrong on this, but I think
you were one of the few presidentsto actually go onto a battlefield.
In fact, I read something about whereyou, there were bullets flying everywhere
and you were standing up on top of ahill and somebody grabbed you and pulled
(25:36):
you down and said, , you crazy person.
Get down here, you're gonna getkilled, or something like that.
Can you tell me about this story?
I don't know the details.
You're probably referring to Fort Stevens.
Fort Stevens is a mile from the summercottage where we stayed, but probably
over four miles from downtown Washington.
And Marion and I and some otherswere visiting Fort Stevens.
(26:02):
And when we were there, Thebattlefield was laying in front
of us, and we were just looking,and then some firing took place.
People started firing at people, and wesent Mary and the ladies about a mile
away in the carriage to get away from it.
I'm standing on the battlefieldlooking out over it.
(26:25):
And they start firing, and some bulletsare coming our way, and a gentleman by
the name of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
stands up and says, Getdown, you dang fool!
Or words to that effect.
And a bullet, from a sharpshooter,shot a private that was within
(26:46):
a couple arms length of me,indicating that I was under fire.
And at that point, Idecided to listen to Mr.
Holmes, and I found a little saferplace to be than standing up with
my hat sticking up as a target.
Now, a little later, when I wentback to the carriage to find Mrs.
(27:07):
Lincoln, my hat blew off.
And the problem was, when the soldiersPicked it up for me and showed it to me.
There was a bullet hole throughit, which means it wasn't
totally the way it should be.
Now, I asked him to take the hat and notshow it to Mary in particular and acquire
(27:28):
a new one for me so that Mary would notbe aware of how close things really were.
Is this a pattern of yours?
Taking incredible riskswith your life like this?
guess I don't understand this.
Is there not somebody on yourcabinet or somebody in your security
detail that says, Why are you here?
(27:51):
This is not where you belong.
You're the decision maker,not the guy holding the gun.
Well, Wade Lamont was a fellow attorneywhen I was on the circuit and he came
to me when I realized I was going toWashington as a bodyguard, basically.
And he was kind of in charge of securityfor me and he many times would just
(28:15):
throw his hands up and he says, Lincoln,if you aren't going to help me any by
going to the telegraph office in themiddle of the night with no one with you.
How in the world can I keep you alive?
And if you keep doing that, I'm justgoing to give up on you and leave.
And so he got prettyupset at times with me.
(28:36):
But there were times that I justneeded to either be by myself
or I didn't want to bother.
The soldiers at 11 or 12 o'clockat night when I needed to go to the
telegraph office and find out what hadhappened in the battle during the day.
And sometimes I would take my son,Tad, with me and we would go over.
(29:00):
But it just, I didn'twant any inconvenience.
Now, one time, I was always lookingfor ways to bring the war to an end.
And looking for something that wouldbe more efficient to what we had.
And I went out behind the White Houseone time, test firing a Remington.
And when I was back there and fireda couple times, my bodyguards that
(29:22):
were around the front of the WhiteHouse came running as fast as they
could with their guns, all ready tofind me in a precarious situation.
And they realized all they weredoing was test firing guns.
And they got a little upset with meand I had to apologize and make sure in
(29:44):
the future that when I was test firingout back, which I did a few times,
that I let them know beforehand so theywouldn't get so upset or disturbed.
I wonder if, cause I don't thinkthat standing on the front lines
it almost looks irresponsiblelike Like you have a death wish.
, but I know that isn't true.
I think that you were probably tryingto inspire people and show courage.
(30:07):
But I wonder if maybe there was even , abelief that you had some divine protection
or maybe even luck on your side.
Because I think during your life, weren'tthere several times where you almost died?
Yes, there were.
And when I was a youngster, I had afriend named Austin, and after a big
(30:32):
rain, we went down to the river that wehad been a day or two before, and there
was a log across the stream, but we hadalways been warned that , after a big
storm, that you should stay away fromthe water, because it's very dangerous.
And I told Austin that I thinkI can get across that log the
(30:52):
same as I had the day before.
The previous day and when I tried it,I was wrong and I fell in and Austin
grabbed a stick and poke me with it andby poking me with it, I grabbed for it
and fortunately grabbed a hold of itand he pulled me in and saved my life.
(31:15):
And, had he not been there, and I liketo share that we should learn that
whenever we do anything, we should havesomeone with us, particularly if there's
any possibility, particularly aroundwater, possibility of danger, and so he
did save me and otherwise we wouldn'thave been telling you this story today.
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Another time was, I was older, and we, would take our grain to the local granary.
Now when the water is down,you would take your mule.
So I took my mule with mecarrying the grain that we had.
And I waited quite a while.
And I was getting frustrated,.
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You wait in line long enough youjust want to get it over with.
And so it was finally our turn.
And I hooked our mule up.
I put the grain in and was working as Ishould, and I had a little switch that I
would encourage him to go a little faster,because I wanted to get done before dark.
And I would go, giddy up, andthen a mule hit me in the head
(32:21):
and I was saying giddy up.
And that was the end of it andknocked me out cold and I lay there
and the story they tell me is thatthe owner of the mill came out and
wondering what in the world happenedand he thought I was , a real goner.
And then.
A few minutes later, I woke up andI said, giddy up and finish what I
(32:44):
was trying to get the mule to do.
And I realized, oh, I'm notbehind the mule anymore.
So, yes, I believe I'm on this earth.
For a reason.
I don't know for sure what itis, but I feel that I'm here to
do something that will make mestand out among my fellow men.
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And whether that's divineor not, I'm not sure.
I just feel I'm here for a reason.
Well, I'd have to ask you aboutone more situation like this.
I don't know if you brought this onyourself, or if, you outsmarted somebody.
But is there truth to a story that youwere nearly in a duel and you chose to
(33:27):
duel with swords rather than pistols?
Yes, funny you should ask that.
Well, President Lincoln, I'mspotting a trend here, so go ahead.
Well, early as a lawyer.
We were trying a case with a widowthat had lost her property and a
man came along and said that someoneelse had bought it from her husband
(33:51):
before he died and I was defending her
.And the person I was against the other attorney was , a
man by the name of Shields.
And I would say something and thepaper would print it, and he would
say something and the paper wouldprint it, and we went back and forth
basically trying it in the paper.
(34:11):
And one time there was an articlewritten with a title Rebecca.
And.
He was a woman's man and hethought he was a very good
person and the ladies loved him.
So Rebecca said all of these thingsabout him and Embarrassed him.
(34:36):
And because of that, he was so offended.
He went to the editor andasked if I had read it.
And he said, well, I can't tell you that.
, but he didn't deny it.
And I did not allowhim to tell who did it.
The author of that was Mary Todd,would be my wife in the future.
(34:56):
And because of that, hechallenged me to a duel.
Now, when you're challenged to a duel.
You get to choose your weapons and becauseI could handle an axe better than anybody
else Some people say that if we had acontest of cutting down trees the best
guy cuts down his first tree I'm on mysecond and a half tree because I'm very
(35:20):
capable of it so I took the broadswordthe biggest one I could find and We went
to off the shore of Missouri where duelswere legal, and I proceeded to trim
a few tree limbs, and the second Mr.
Shields looked over and said, I believeyou are going to be in deep trouble,
(35:43):
and because of that, we were able tocome to a decision on it of where we
I kind of apologized and we moved onrather than actually going after each
other, but he was considered verygood at dueling and had been in a duel
more than once, and I did not feelthat pistols was a way for me to go.
(36:08):
I'm a little confused on whatwas the purpose of trimming the
tree branches with the sword?
Well, it meant that I had along arm reach and that he was
definitely shorter than me.
And that by doing that, thatthere was some cutting involved.
And if we had been actually goingat it his second realize what I was
(36:29):
saying is that Something's going to gettrimmed and it's not going to be me.
I see.
So when you're reaching up in the tree,you're demonstrating that you've got
these long arms because you're talland probably have a long wingspan.
And he's a little guy and sohe may not even get in because
you're fighting with swords.
Is that what you're saying?
That's what I'm saying.
(36:51):
Oh, my gosh, that's brilliant
.She now a follow up of that.
When I was in Washington, I wasat a reception line one time
and the person came up that hadbeen aware of what had happened.
And they said, howabout the time you were?
Involved in a duel and Istopped what I was doing.
(37:12):
I got very serious and I said, sir, ifwe are ever to be friends any longer,
we will never discuss this again.
And the reason I said that Ibelieve the duel was a young man
that was thinking it was kind ofimpressive to do something like that.
(37:32):
But as a president, I realizedthat it was not something.
That a person in my positionwould do such a deed.
You know, , that situation, , hadyou not been thinking ahead of
outsmarting him with the broadswordsand that had gone to pistols.
I mean, this could have been anAaron Burr, Alexander Hamilton
(37:55):
situation all over again.
Yes, it could.
And I was determined that itwasn't going to be that way.
So I kind of, I guess Iput the odds in my favor.
Yeah.
No, I like that.
I, okay.
So now we're talking about, I know I'masking you all these oddball questions,
but it's just fascinating me to hear aboutyour life and what it looked like before
(38:19):
all the things that, , that we know about,like, your presidency in the civil war.
And, As I think about you jumping ontothis log, thinking, Okay, the river's
going down, I can jump on this log.
And then I think about you as ayoung man deciding, Yeah, absolutely,
I'm gonna get involved in a duel.
It sounds to me like you'redescribing an athletic person.
And , the pictures that we all haveof you are not of you in your youth.
(38:44):
We don't see this youngstrapping swimmer or runner on
the track team in your school.
We see the president.
Were you very athletic in your youth?
Yeah, , I was very healthy when I wouldcut trees or husk corn or whatever,
I could do it much better than anyoneelse because I was, by 17, I was
(39:06):
6'4 I was a very big, strong person.
As I was growing up in school Whenyou would take a recess, you would
have foot races, you would do otherspelling bees and that sort of thing.
And I excelled educationally, so I'dwin all the spelling bees, therefore
I couldn't participate at a pointbecause I was the only one winning.
(39:30):
And we would have foot races and Iwould win them once I got to be as
tall or taller than everybody else.
And I was very athletic.
Wrestling was somethingthat you would do a lot of.
And I always would win.
Now, early on, My sister and I,because all our houses were about
(39:54):
a mile apart, it was hard tofind a neighbor closer than that.
And my sister and I would play togetherdoing things, including wrestling.
And one time well, as we wrestledfor quite a bit and different things,
my sister would always beat me.
Until I grew up.
And I got to be as big as she wasand I was bigger and stronger and
(40:16):
I was able to beat her and one ofthe first times that I beat her.
I was holding her down, justbasking in the fact that I had
won, and she starts screaming.
My parents come out, they wonder, what inthe world are you doing to your sister?
And, I realized at that pointthat you need to let her up easy.
(40:41):
What I mean to say is that if my sisterand I are going to end up playing together
and competing in physical activities aswrestling, when I am able to defeat her,
once I have won, I need to get up Grab herarm, lift her up and say, that was fun.
(41:03):
And you were great and let her up easy,which is something that I use later on
when we were fighting, it was when the,during the war and that once we're over.
And when the fighting is over, we needto let them up easy, which is kind of the
basis for my second inaugural address,Malice Toward None and Charity Toward All.
(41:27):
It's amazing how those lessons of ouryouth, things as simple as, , wrestling
with a sibling, Is something that endsup being so important , as an element
of our character that allows us tobe a better person later in life.
, without that lesson,jeez, I mean, who knows?
Something that simple could havebeen you and Grant standing in a
(41:49):
room and you telling Grant, as soonas you get his sword, you break
that thing and you let those peopleknow that they owe us and they're
going to pay for what they've done.
I mean, it could have been atotally different direction without
those lessons from your family.
Right.
Yeah.
That's absolutely right.
When you were 17 and you weretall and athletic and all that,
(42:10):
did you have the beard at 17?
No.
No, I did not.
. The beard did not come untila month before the election.
And I received a letter from a girl thatwas 11 years old from Westfield, New York.
And she asked me, first of all, if Ihad any daughters, which I did not.
I had four sons.
(42:32):
And she said you're tall and thinand you look better, so you're not
good looking or you're ugly, but ifyou grow chin whiskers, you'll look
better and the ladies will tease theirhusbands and they will vote for you.
And if you do that, youwill become president.
So, I decided to grow the whiskers.
(42:54):
I told Ted, my barber, and I said,Ted, let's let those little things
grow and see if they'll do anything.
And so, when you see me in a beard,you'll know it was after , October 15th.
1860 when I received a letter fromGrace Bedell and when I was going to
Washington to be inaugurated and I madeabout 40 some stops all over the country
(43:21):
that helped let people know who I wasand I stopped there and I thanked them
for voting for me as I did every placeelse and then I asked if anyone knew a
young girl by the name of Grace Bedell.
By that time, she was 12 years old,and a person in the back said yes, and
he said, I asked, where is she, andhe said, she's here, brought her up,
(43:45):
I gave her a swing around, I thankedher for the good counsel, and I asked
her what she thought of the beard,and she thought it looked very good.
A wise man receives counsel fromanywhere, as long as it is good
counsel, and apparently some ofyours come from 11 year old girls.
Which I would suggest to anyone, thatif you know someone, and not necessarily
(44:09):
girls, but young people, that have put alot of thought into something, that you
might want to listen to them, becausemaybe, it'll be a life changing decision.
. Why is it, speaking of the war, why is itthat the war took so long, , four years
of vicious fighting and so many deaths?
(44:33):
How is it that, , nobodygives in, or there's no way
to find common ground sooner?
Did it, didn't it seem like it wenton just so much longer than it,
than anybody would have guessed?
Absolutely.
One, I was hopeful thatthere wouldn't be a war.
And the problem was early on whenthe states started leaving the Union,
(44:57):
Buchanan, which was the at that time, wasa Democrat from the South, and he knew
that if he intervened To stop those thatwere closing down the different military
facilities that he would be into somethinghe really didn't want to get into.
So he just let it happen.
(45:18):
Well, what happened was most of themilitary facilities in the country.
Would have gentlemen from the Southand you say, well, why is that?
Well, it's because if a slave owner'sfather passed away, who gets the property?
Who becomes the next person in charge?
(45:40):
Well, that's the oldest son.
So, if your son numbertwo, three, four or five.
What are you going to do?
Distinguish yourself and be someoneimportant as your older brother is.
So you either become a lawyer go intopolitics, or you become a military
person and because of that, many ofthe well educated from a plantation,
(46:07):
Would seek training at West Point andnot only training, but they would be
some of the best because of the bettereducation that they had with a family
that was capable of providing it.
And because of that, you get yourbest qualified people in the military
facilities and probably well over halfof them were from the South because
(46:32):
they were much better educated and theyseem to do much better at West Point.
When they were being trained.
And because of that, when the war brokeout, and you seceded from the Union,
the person that is in charge of thedifferent military facilities, one third
of them, And when they resigned, theytook with them everything that was in
(46:56):
that military facility that would assistthem in the war if it were to take place.
They would take gunswith them and the like.
One example of that isNorth Oak, Virginia.
The person in charge there took boats,took ammunition, took whatever they
could with them when they went tothe South to withdraw from the Union.
(47:19):
That's it.
And when they left, they didn'twant to leave anything, so they
tried to blow up what was left.
Fortunately, the attempt of blowingsomething up did not ignite, and therefore
they didn't lose everything at Norfolk.
Now, knowing this, I havedifferent military facilities.
(47:39):
They've all been resigning.
I go to Colonel Magruder, which isthe head of the Washington City,
Military facility and he is fromthe South and I asked him, he
says, Colonel, what are your plans?
And he says, I was raised underold glory and I'll die under
old glory . I take a deep breathand I say, okay, this is great.
(48:03):
You are truly a Southern gentleman.
Three days later, he resides.
So now I have in Washington, no onein charge of the military and there's
going to be fighting and I'm wonderingwhat in the world we're going to do.
So I call up 75, 000 men volunteersto come and fight for the North
(48:29):
while I'm waiting for them to come.
I'm having military facilities.
There's those are leaving, and whenthey leave, there's no one in charge.
Now, the problem in Washington itself,Washington City is many of the homes in
Washington were either owned or rented,operated by Southern wealthy people.
(48:54):
That were members of Congress whenthey left the union, resign from
Congress and the people left towatch their houses are Southerners.
So if I call up the militia,what's going to happen?
I'm going to be calling up Southernsympathizers and therefore.
(49:15):
, I can't do that.
So I'm waiting patiently for the 75, 000to come and protect Washington City from
any possible attacks from the South.
And therefore, it's avery precarious situation.
And because of that, I have tofind a way of moving forward
(49:40):
until we can secure the north.
But it doesn't look good because thegreat leadership that we had in the
military facilities have gone south.
Robert E.
Lee, I asked him if he would stayon, and he indicated he would.
Until Virginia left the Union.
When Virginia left the Union,he said, I cannot take up arms
(50:06):
against my fellow statesmen.
And therefore he left.
So, best military leaderswe have in the country.
have left.
They've gone south.
Robert E.
Lee, for 10 years, had beensuperintendent of West Point.
And on Sunday afternoon, he wouldask these cadets, the promising
(50:29):
ones, to come to his house, and theywould talk about military strategy.
And because of these get togethers, hewould say, in the Battle of Waterloo, You
take on so and so's position and whatever,and with that knowledge, come back and
tell what you would have done different.
So he knows the men that hadmilitary positions, and now
(50:55):
they're fighting for the South.
So he knows these men intimately.
He knows what your capabilities are, andwe in the North are stuck with not the
skilled leadership that the South has.
For that reason, the first battle ofBull Run, four o'clock in the afternoon,
we're ahead, and it looks like we'vewon, and I go for a carriage ride.
(51:19):
In the middle of the carriage ride, Iget the cavalry comes up and says, Mr.
President, we have a problem, and whathad happened A man by the name, would get
the nickname Stonewall Jackson saw theman retreating, and he decided to take
out his revolver, and he said, the nextperson that takes a step toward me is
(51:39):
a dead man, and they took him serious,and they turned around, and the tide of
The Battle of Bull Run changed, and welost, and for the next two years, we were
trying to find a way of getting someonethat was capable of winning, and on our
(52:00):
side the first officer we had in chargewas Winfield Scott, and he had been a
hero from , the Battle of Mexico, Buthe was 75 years old, he weighed 310
pounds, and he had a bad case of the gout.
, the problem was when he would go to reviewthe troops, he would go to get a horse and
(52:25):
the horses would cower in the back cornerhoping that they wouldn't be chosen.
Oh, my gosh.
So when he left, we were looking forsomeone to take his place, and we
thought it was early on with the Battleof Rich Mountain in western Virginia.
Now, the people in western Virginiadid not believe the same as Virginia.
(52:50):
The rest of Virginia, because they,there were fewer people, they were
mountain people and they were, theygot their support and the things they
needed from Pennsylvania and Ohio.
And when they would elect legislatorsand want money for improvement
of roads and so forth, they veryseldom got what they wanted.
(53:12):
So they relied on Pennsylvania and Ohio.
And when the war broke out, theywanted to stay with the Union.
And one of the early battleswas at Rich Mountain.
And as General McClellan would goup the mountain with a new device
called a telegraph, he would put upthe lines and, Send us a telegraph
(53:33):
saying I'm going up Rich Mountain.
When I get up there, we're going towin and when they did get up on the
top of a local person came by andsaid, Hey, if you want to defeat
them, I'll show you a back way in.
So you sneak in on him and he did.
And.
One of the generals that encouragedMcClellan to do this, talked him into it.
(53:58):
They went single file, leadingtheir horses, cause it was too
dangerous to ride them, across whatI call the laurels, or goat path.
And they went in, weresuccessful in routing them.
But when the signal wasgiven, McClellan did not.
Respond to it and comein and help them out.
(54:19):
So 12 hours after they had been routed.
And they left.
He sent someone in to seewhat had happened and realized
they were all gone and we won.
So he, with his telegraph,said, Rich Mountain is ours.
Twelve hours too late.
But because he was the highest rankingofficial, officer, he was given
(54:43):
credit for and became a military hero.
And therefore we put him in as thehead of the military in the East for
the next better part of two years,we spent trying to get him to fight.
He was great with training the troops.
They would do anything for him,but I believe he loved his men
(55:05):
so much that he didn't fight.
That way he wouldn't lose them.
And that was the situation wehad for the first two years.
Year or two of the war because itwent so poorly and we lost so many
battles that I needed to find a wayof being able to win and I had to
(55:27):
take the strength away from the South.
Like so many, I've always admired Lincoln,the amount of effort that it took to
hold the nation together during the civilwar was nothing short of Herculean.
But then when you find out that during thefirst two years, all the talent, he needed
to fight the war was on the other side.
It, makes it all thatmuch more impressive.
(55:48):
In the next episode, we're going to talkabout what emancipation looked like,
the challenges of finding a general thatwould fight and why he recruited people
to his cabinet, that didn't like him.
I'm glad you're enjoying this podcast.
And if you haven't yet subscribednow, and we'll see you at the next
episode of the calling history podcastwith part two of Abraham Lincoln.
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