The last home of the parents of Lincoln. Built by his father, Thomas, in 1831, near Farmington, Coles Co., Ill. The father died here in 1851 and the step-mother, Sarah Bush Lincoln, in 1869. After Lincoln was elected President in 1860, and before leaving for Washington to be inaugurated, he visited his mother in this cabin for the last time. As he was leaving her, she made a prediction of his tragic death. With arms about his neck, with tears streaming down her cheeks, she declared it was the last time she would ever see him alive, and it proved to be so.
Lincoln once said, "I was told that I never would make a lawyer if I did not understand what 'demonstrate' means. I left my situation in Springfield, went to my father's house, and stayed there till I could give any proposition in the six books of Euclid at sight. I there found out what demonstrate means."
LINCOLN HOMESTEAD, SPRINGFIELD, ILLINOIS
On Monday, February 11, 1861, Mr. Lincoln and family in company with a party left Springfield, Illinois, for Washington, D. C. A light rain mixed with snow was falling at the time which made the occasion a somewhat gloomy one. Mr. Lincoln appeared on the rear platform of the car where he bade farewell to his neighbors in the following address:
"My friends, no one not in my position can appreciate the sadness I feel at this parting. To this people I owe all that I am. Here I have lived more than a quarter of a century. Here my children were born, and here one of them lies buried.
"I know not how soon I shall see you again. A duty devolves upon me which is greater, perhaps, than that which has devolved upon any other man since the days of Washington. He never would have succeeded except for the aid of divine Providence, upon which he at all times relied.