teer; still if, after considering this, you still deem it important, you may substitute the inclosed slip by pasting it down over the original clause. I find some of our friends here attach more consequence to getting the national convention into our State than I did, or do. Some of them made me promise to say so to you. As to the time, it must certainly be after the Charleston fandango; and I think, within bounds of reason, the later the better. As to that matter about the committee, in relation to appointing delegates by general convention, or by districts, I shall attend to it as well as I know how, which, God knows, will not be very well. Write me if you can find anything to write. Yours as ever, [Inclosure.] A. LINCOLN. LETTER TO MESSRS. GEORGE W. DOLE, G. S. HUBBARD, AND W. H. BROWN SPRINGFIELD, ILLINOIS, December 14, 1859. Gentlemen: Your letter of the 12th instant is received. To your question: "In the election of senator in 1854 [1855 you mean], when Mr. Trumbull was the successful candidate, was there any unfairness in the conduct of Mr. Judd toward you, or anything blamable on his part?" I answer, I have never believed, and do not now believe, that on that occasion there was any unfairness in the conduct of Mr. Judd toward me, or anything blamable on his part. Without deception, he preferred Judge Trumbull to myself, which was his clear right, morally as well as legally. To your question: "During the canvass of last year, did he do his whole duty toward you and the Republican party?" I answer, I have always believed, and now believe that during that canvass he did his whole duty toward me and the Republican party. To your question: "Do you know of anything unfair in his conduct toward yourself in any way?" I answer, I neither know nor suspect anything unfair in his conduct toward myself in any way. I take pleasure in adding that of all the avowed friends I had in the canvass of last year, I do not suspect a single one of having acted treacherously to me, or to our cause; and that there is not one of them in whose honor and integrity I have more confidence to-day than in that of Mr. Judd. You can use your discretion as to whether you make this public. Yours very truly, A. LINCOLN. LETTER TO G. M. PARSONS AND OTHERS SPRINGFIELD, ILLINOIS, December 19, 1859. Gentlemen: Your letter of the 7th instant, accompanied by a similar one from the governor-elect, the Republican State officers, and the Republican members of the State Board of Equalization of Ohio, both requesting of me, for publication in permanent form, copies of the political debates between Senator Douglas and myself last year, has been received. With my grateful acknowledgments to both you and them for the very flattering terms in which the request is communicated, I transmit you the copies. The copies I send you are as reported and printed by the respective friends of Senator Douglas and myself, at the time-that is, his by his friends, and mine by mine. It would be an unwarrantable liberty for us to change a word or a letter in his, and the changes I have made in mine, you perceive, are verbal only, and very few in number. I wish the reprint to be precisely as the copies I send, without any comment whatever. Yours very truly, A. LINCOLN. LETTER TO J. W. FELL SPRINGFIELD, December 20, 1859. My dear Sir: 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. If anything be made out of it, I wish it to be modest, and not to go beyond the material. If it were thought necessary to incorporate anything from any of my speeches, I suppose there would be no objection. Of course it must not appear to have been written by myself. Yours very truly, A. LINCOLN. I was born February 12, 1809, in Hardin County, Kentucky. My parents were both born in Virginia, of undistinguished familiessecond 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, and others in Macon 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 the 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 he grew up literally without 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 happen 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, which I continued |