About three months ago a lady came to see me in New York and asked to be shown some Lincoln letters. I used the cataloguer’s phrase and spoke of holographs, fair copies, A. L. S., and the usual rigmarole of the collector. I then exhibited before her interested eyes a letter of Lincoln’s which I treasured, because it is perhaps the only one in which Lincoln swore. It was addressed to John T. Stuart, his law partner, dated Vandalia, Illinois, February 14, 1839, and he refers to a man named Ewing as follows:—
Ewing won’t do anything. He is not worth a damn.
Your friend,
A. Lincoln
The lady exclaimed, “I know what you mean by A. L. S. I did not understand you at first. You mean Abraham Lincoln swore!”
Americana really is the collector’s best bet. I can never be too grateful to Uncle Moses for his advice to me. I have kept zealously almost every piece relating to the Civil War, and I think that I have succeeded in the past thirty years in gathering the finest collection relating to it, except the national collection in Washington. I have such remarkable Lincoln documents as his first draft of the Emancipation Proclamation, entirely in his autograph, written six months before it was finally put into operation on January 1, 1863; his famous Baltimore address, in which he gives his celebrated definition of liberty; the original manuscript of his speech about the formation of the Republican Party; and many other pieces of the greatest historical significance, which can never come a collector’s way again.
I cannot resist giving Lincoln’s speech on the party of which he was the most illustrious leader:—
Upon those men who are, in sentiment, opposed to the spread and nationalization of slavery, rests the task of preventing it. The Republican Organization is the embodiment of that sentiment; though as yet, it by no means embraces all the individuals holding that sentiment. The party is newly formed, and in forming, old party ties had to be broken, and the attractions of party pride, and influential leaders, were wholly wanting. In spite of all differences, prejudices, and animosities, its members were drawn together by a paramount common danger. They formed and maneuvered in the face of the disciplined enemy, and in the teeth of all his persistent misrepresentations. Of course, they fell far short of gathering in all of their own. And yet, a year ago, they stood up, an army over thirteen hundred thousand strong. That army is, today, the best hope of the nation, and of the world. Their work is before them, and from which they may not guiltlessly turn away.
I have spoken of the unfurling of the first American battle flag. The following is Lincoln’s beautiful acknowledgment of a flag sent him by some ladies of a patriotic society:—
Executive Mansion