Gettysburg Home Hosted President Night Before Historic Address

When President Abraham Lincoln first arrived in Gettysburg, Pa., it was the day before he was to speak at the dedication of the National Soldiers Cemetery, and his comments hadn’t yet been completed. He needed a placed to stay the night and work. Gettysburg attorney David Wills owned the largest house on the downtown square and he had also been the person to invite the President to speak at the dedication. So in November 1863, it wasn’t surprising that he played host to Abraham Lincoln. Wills Role in the Gettysburg Address It was Wills who convinced the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania to purchase 17 acres to become a cemetery for the soldiers killed in the Battle of Gettysburg that had occurred less than five months prior. He planned the cemetery dedication for November 19, 1863, with Edward Everett as the main Read more…

Counterfeiters try to steal Lincoln’s body

In the 1870s a gang of counterfeiters turned grave robbers in an attempt to free one of their members by holding Abraham Lincoln’s body hostage. One of the country’s largest counterfeiting gangs ran its operation in Illinois. When Ben Boyd, a master engraver, was thrown in jail, the gang’s supply of counterfeit money dwindled. From Counterfeiting to Grave Robbing The gang’s leader, Big Jim Kennally came up with an idea to steal Abraham Lincoln’s corpse and hold it hostage for $200,000 in gold and Boyd’s freedom. However, one night one conspirator, Ben Sheridan, had too much to drink and talked too much to one hostess of a local brothel. He revealed the plot to her, and she told others of the plot. The story spread and the gang had to flee Springfield. The Second Attempt Kennally didn’t give up the idea. Read more…

Female reporter on Gettysburg Address gets her recognition 78 later

Mary Shaw Leader of Hanover got up early on November 19, 1863, and started off on her walk to work. Hours later, after a cold 15-mile walk, she arrived in Gettysburg to attend the dedication of the Soldiers’ National Cemetery. Since the Battle of Gettysburg in July, the cemetery had been laid out and the remains of the soldiers killed in the battle had been reinterred. She, along with hundreds of other people, stood through U.S. statesman Edward Everett’s two-hour-long speech and President Abraham Lincoln’s less-than-three-minute speech. Eyewitness accounts of Lincoln’s speech, which would become known as “The Gettysburg Address”, have said that initial reaction to it was mixed. Historian Shelby Foote has said that applause was “barely polite.” Sarah Cooke Myers, who attended the speech, recalled in 1931, “There was no applause when he stopped speaking.” However, the New Read more…

LOOKING BACK 1945: Lincoln's chair reappears

Last week, I wrote about how the chair that Abraham Lincoln may have used using the Gettysburg Address ceremony disappeared from Gettysburg College. This week, the rest of the story…. For years, Gettysburg College had displayed a rocking chair believed to have been the one Abraham Lincoln used as he sat on the platform during the dedication of Soldiers’ National Cemetery where he delivered his Gettysburg Address. At some point in the 1920’s, it disappeared from the collection. No one knew who had taken it or how and no big deal was made of its loss. Then  on April 7, 1945, the Gettysburg Times reported, “The little old rocking chair that Abraham Lincoln is reputed to have used on the platform in the National cemetery November 19, 1863, when he delivered his deathless Gettysburg  Address, has come back to the Read more…

LOOKING BACK 1920's: Lincoln's chair vanishes

On November 19, 1863, thousands of people gathered in Gettysburg for the dedication of Soldiers’ National Cemetery. The keynote speaker of the event was Edward Everett. As his speech continued on and on, people standing in the crowd had to sit or risk their legs buckling. On the stage, the speakers had chairs to rest on until their time to speak came. President Abraham Lincoln sat in a rocking chair between Everett and Secretary of State William Seward. “Mr. Lincoln sat on the platform all the time in a rude, little stiff-backed chair, hard, and uncomfortable, but he hardly ever moved,” Dr. Henry Jacobs recalled in the Gettysburg Times in 1923. He had been a young boy in the audience at the dedication. When Everett had finished his two-hour speech, the president stood up from his rocker, walked to the Read more…

Lincoln’s Last Visit to Harrisburg, Pa.

On April 21, 1865, a locomotive slowly pulled out of the depot in Washington D.C. carrying about 300 people. Those who saw the train generally bowed their heads. Many of them cried. The train was carrying the remains of President Abraham Lincoln who had been assassinated a week earlier and Willie Lincoln who had died in 1862 back to Springfield, IL. The Lincoln Special The train consisted of the funeral car, baggage cars and coaches and the engine, which had a photo of Lincoln mounted on the front of the train over the cowcatcher. The funeral car was decorated with black garland and silver tassels and had a U.S. coat of arms painted on the side of it. “With sixteen wheels for a smoother ride, rounded monitor ends, fine woodwork, upholstered walls, [and] etched glass windows” this funeral car surely Read more…

First Lincoln Assassination Report Found After 147 Years

This summer, we’ll hear that Abraham Lincoln is a vampire still living today. Luckily, we can also read an interesting non-fiction report that hasn’t been seen since 1865. The first doctor to reach President Abraham Lincoln after he was shot wrote his report on the day that Lincoln died. However, his report was filed away in the National Archives and believed to not have been seen since that time.I saw this story and found it interesting. I’ve read some books about the Lincoln assassination and even written a little about it. There are so many books out there about Lincoln that it’s hard to find something new about him (hopefully, you don’t consider Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter a fresh view). Dr. Charles Leale was 40 feet from Lincoln in Ford’s Theater the night the President was shot. He rushed to Read more…