CHAPTER VI.

LINCOLN'S BABYHOOD, BOYHOOD, YOUTH AND YOUNG MANHOOD.

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F A MAN is honest in his mind," said Lincoln one day, "you are pretty safe in trusting him."

Lincoln was honest in his mind, and pure in thought and heart also; the surroundings during his youth and young manhood were not altogether desirable, and yet, in spite of all, he was clean.

He was born into a family distinctively of the lower class; he had few advantages in his boyhood; his father and mother had no education; the neighborhood was peopled by the rough, coarse, ignorant and povertystricken; and the domestic surroundings amid which the babe came into life were wretched in the extreme.

Every condition was miserable.

Lincoln's father was a sort of a carpenter; he was shiftless, migratory, ignorant, and a "squatter" by nature. His mother was superior to her husband in mental qualities, but was no higher in the social scale; both were of that class commonly denominated by Southerners as "poor whites." But Mrs. Lincoln was a good mother, loving and affectionate, and left the impress of what was best in her upon her son.

The Lincoln family was imbued with a peculiar, intense, fervid but unenlightened form of Christianity, mingled with the various superstitions prevalent in the backwoods region in Kentucky in which Washington County is situated.

It was on February 12th, 1809, Abraham Lincoln was born, and not long afterwards his restless father abandoned Kentucky and moved into Indiana.

It is recorded that Thomas Lincoln's household goods consisted of a few cooking utensils, a little bedding, some carpenter tools, and four hundred gallons of the fierce product of the mountain still.

When Abraham was nine years of age his mother died. The rude coffin in which she was buried was nailed together by her husband; and her grave was dug in a clearing near the squalid cabin wherein the family lived.

It was not until a year had passed that religious services were held over the shallow trench where the loving mother slept. A kindly, poor, uneducated, itinerant preacher happened along, who said a few words, read from the Scriptures, and delivered a prayer.

Lincoln's mother had many sterling qualities. It is true the cabin in which she died consisted simply of four log walls and a "brush" roof; the floor was earth, and it was quite a time after the family moved into it before it had either door or window.

Abraham had nothing more than a misty recollection of his mother, but his memories were that she was always loving and kind.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY.

On December 20th, 1859, Lincoln wrote his autobiography at the request of J. W. Fell, of Springfield, Illinois.

A note from Lincoln accompanied the manuscript, which was in these words:

"Herewith is a little sketch, as you requested. There is not much of it, for the reason, I suppose, that there is not much of me.

"I was born February 12, 1809, in Hardin County, Kentucky. My parents were both born in Virginia, of undistinguished families, second families, perhaps I should say.

"My mother, who died in my tenth year, was of a family of the name of Hanks, some of whom now reside in Adams County, and others in Mason County, Illinois.

"My paternal grandfather, Abraham Lincoln, emigrated from Rockingham County, Virginia, to Kentucky, about 1781 or 1782, where, a year or two later, he was killed by Indians, not in battle, but by stealth, when he was laboring to open a farm in the forest.

"His ancestors, who were Quakers, went to Virginia from Berks County, Pennsylvania.

"An effort to identify them with the New England family of the same name ended in nothing more definite than a similarity of Christian names in both families-such as Enoch, Levi, Mordecai, Solomon, Abraham and the like.

"My father, at the death of his father, was but six years of age, and grew up literally without any education.

"He removed from Kentucky to what is now Spencer County, Indiana, in my eighth year,

"We reached our new home about the time the State came into the Union. It was a wild region, with many bears and other wild animals still in the woods.

"There I grew up. There were some schools, so called, but no qualification was ever required of a teacher beyond 'readin', writin,' and cipherin'' to the rule of three.

"If a straggler, supposed to understand Latin, happened to sojourn in the neighborhood, he was looked upon as a wizard.

"There was absolutely nothing to excite ambition for education. Of course, when I came of age I did not know much.

"Still, somehow, I could read, write, and cipher to the rule of three, but that was all. I have not been to school since.

"The little advance I now have upon this store of education I have picked up from time to time under the pressure of necessity.

"I was raised to farm work, at which I continued till I was twenty-two. At twenty-one I came to Illinois, and passed the first year in Macon County. "Then I got to New Salem, at that time in Sangamon, now in Menard County, where I remained a year as a sort of clerk in a store.

"Then came the Black Hawk war, and I was elected a captain of volunteers a success which gave me more pleasure than any I have had since. "I went into the campaign, was elected, ran for the Legislature the same year (1832), and was beaten-the only time I have ever been beaten by the people.

"The next and three succeeding biennial elections I was elected to the Legislature. I was not a candidate afterwards.

"During the legislative period I had studied law, and removed to Springfield to practice it.

"In 1846 I was elected to the lower house of Congress. Was not a candidate for re-election.

"From 1849 to 1854, both inclusive, practiced law more assiduously than ever before.

"Always a Whig in politics, and generally on the Whig electoral ticket, making active canvasses.

"I was losing interest in politics, when the repeal of the Missouri Compromise aroused me again.

"What I have done since then is pretty well known.

"If any personal description of me is thought desirable, it may be said I am in height six feet four inches, nearly; lean in flesh, weighing, on an

average, one hundred and eighty pounds; dark complexion, with coarse black hair and gray eyes-no other marks or brands recollected."

Members of the New England family mentioned by Lincoln settled at Hingham and Salem, Massachusetts, in 1636 and 1644. Six Lincolns lived there, four being named Thomas, one Samuel, and one Daniel.

They were millers, coopers, weavers, etc., and it is said they came from Norfolk County, England. Their kinship to each other is not known.

It is claimed by some that Abraham Lincoln was descended from the Samuel Lincoln who lived at Salem. Mordecai, fourth son of Samuel, had six children, two of whom, Mordecai and Abraham, went to Monmouth County, New Jersey; from there Mordecai moved, first, to Chester, and then to Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania.

Mordecai's eldest son, John, removed, in 1758, to that part of Augusta County which is now Rockingham County, Virginia; he had five sons, one of whom, Abraham, emigrated to Kentucky.

It is said that Abraham's son, Thomas, became the father of Abraham Lincoln, who became President of the United States.

When Abraham Lincoln had become a distinguished man he put down these few words in acceding to the request of a lady who desired information as to his ancestry:

"The short and simple annals of the poor."

In 1848 Abraham wrote a relative: "We have a vague tradition that my great-grandfather went from Pennsylvania to Virginia and that he was a Quaker."

Abraham's father, however, always stubbornly insisted that neither a Puritan nor a Quaker was among his ancestors.

It is doubtful if he knew very much about the matter.

ABRAHAM GETS A STEP-MOTHER.

A year after Abraham's mother died his father married a bright and enterprising Kentucky widow, rich in worldly possessions to the extent of a wagonload of bedding and furniture. She proved a good mother to Abraham; saw that he attended school-although his schooling did not continue to the extent of a year—and, in addition, gave him the benefit of instruction at home.

Who could imagine that a future President was being reared in these environments? Abraham did not learn much at school-he had little opportunity-but he had the rare gift of teaching himself,

From the time he learned to read he devoured every book he could find, and while these were few in number, they were all good.

Among them were the Bible, Aesop's Fables, Robinson Crusoe, Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, Life of Washington, and a history of the United States. Shortly after he had read these the lives of Henry Clay, Franklin, Shakespeare, and Burns fell in his way.

In every way his mentality differed from those around him, but it was natural many of his characteristics should show a similarity to those of his age in the neighborhood.

It was a time when youths and men depended upon their physical strength for personal safety. Abraham was not often compelled to resort to hostilities, but the startling discovery was soon made that he was fully qualified to take care of himself.

Of course, he had to fight now and then, but as he was the Hercules of his county he was much respected. He did not pose as a popular hero, being ever modest and retiring, but he would not be imposed upon. When the time came to fight it out his opponent invariably found a foeman worthy of his best efforts, and at the finish knew he had been struck by something. There was no sunshine in Lincoln's early life; the region was not calculated to stir the imagination of the poet; his labor was ill-paid; he worked hard; and until he became of age his earnings belonged to his father.

As late as 1825 he was a man of all work, turning his hand to anything and everything.

LINCOLN COMES TO ILLINOIS.

Abraham had not reached his twenty-first year when his nomadic parent decided upon another change, this time migrating to Illinois, finally settling upon the north bank of the north fork of the Sangamon, a small river which empties into the Ohio.

Here Abraham was initiated into the mysteries of rail-splitting. He also assisted in clearing timber land, planting the crops and made himself useful in every way.

When he was given his freedom he left his father's cabin, and from that time had little or no communication with his parent. His first adventure after attaining his majority was a trip down the Mississippi on a flatboat. Its cargo consisted of hogs, pork and corn destined for the New Orleans market. It was on this trip he first came in contact with slaves and slavery. "If ever I get a chance to hit that thing, I'll hit it hard!" he remarked one day to a companion.