President Lincoln’s greatest load during the Civil War was the carnage and the letters that he personally wrote to the grieving families. Fanny’s Letter of Condolence, was written by Lincoln, to the daughter of one of his closest friends, after his death in Mississippi. The father was a one-armed, one-eyed, fifty year old enlistee. An Illinois court clerk for twenty years, he had handled many legal issues for Lincoln and they had socialized regularly. Lieutenant-Colonel William McCullough was killed leading a charge in Mississippi and his death rocked President Lincoln to the core.
Lincoln, who handled all letters of this sort, took inordinate and pain-staking care composing this particular correspondence, dated December 23, 1862.
“Dear Fanny,
It is with deep grief that I learn of the death of your kind and brave Father; and, especially, that it is affecting your young heart beyond what is common in such cases. In this sad world of ours, sorrow comes to all; and, to the young, it comes with bitterest agony, because it takes them unawares. The older have learned to ever expect it. I am anxious to afford some alleviation of your present distress. Perfect relief is not possible, except with time. You can not now realize that you will ever feel better. Is not this so? And yet it is a mistake. You are sure to be happy again. To know this, which is certainly true, will make you some less miserable now. I have had experience enough to know what I say; and you need only to believe it, to feel better at once. The memory of your dear Father, instead of an agony, will yet be a sad sweet feeling in your heart, of a purer and holier sort than you have known before.
Please present my kind regards to your afflicted mother.
Your sincere friend,
A. Lincoln”
The bloodbath, that was the Civil War, required Lincoln to somehow bear the burden of the hundreds of thousands dead and wounded. President Lincoln’s load could only be relieved and assuaged by his innate wisdom, patience and faith.
Bummer
Sorry, I just kept thinking “Take a load off Fanny”.
Pat,
Some of Bummer’s old peers expect a little Rock and Roll, with their morning beverage, whatever that might be.
Bummer
If Lincoln’s ambition was “a little engine that knew no rest,” as Billy Herndon said, you have to wonder if he didn’t question the value of it at times like that. So many people killed because of his powers and his orders.
Louis,
The carnage, misery and grief of the nation, had to be beyond fathom. Bummer chooses not to dwell on the subject, having seen his share, enough to last several lifetimes. Lincoln’s choice of buffering and insulating himself from some, if not all of the sorrow, were in many of his Cabinet, i.e. Stanton and Chase, also his Generals Grant and Sherman. Abe had to have known that the cost of suppressing the rebellion was huge and that he may have been the only one to execute the solution. There is a fine line between genius and insanity, many of the players during the Civil War walked that fine line. Thanks for the…..Food For Thought!
Bummer