Mary Todd Lincoln Mary Todd Lincoln's Behavior Was Not What It Seemed

LincolnAbraham

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Here is an excellent article by independent Lincoln researcher Kerry Ellard about Mary Todd Lincoln's fight for pension during the last two years of her life. It's quite shocking at times how the wife of Abraham Lincoln was treated by the media. The article includes and draws on many newspaper articles from the time and challenges much of the conventional wisdom about Mary Todd Lincoln and her behavior.

https://lincolnabraham.com/wiki/mary-todd-pension-her-fight-against-the-government-introduction/
 
I'll try to read the article a bit later when I have more time. But what I can remember, she really didn't help herself in seeking a pension increase, or her popularity. I think she was offered about the same amount as the widows of Harrison and Taylor but wanted Lincoln's full amount of his second year. I think the two previous widows got $25,000...quite a bit for that time period. But she still wanted more and used her husband's name to try to get it.

It was really a no-win situation for anyone it seems.
 
I am the author mentioned - Mary Lincoln definitely didn't do much to help her popularity, but what I've tried to show with my very long article is that she was really never after popularity; she just wanted to live life on her own terms, eccentricities and all (she even said in one of her letters that popularity and getting things done are two different things, and she was after the latter). She wanted the money/recognition as Lincoln's survivor/the means to live independently despite health issues. She did not care that much for popularity with the general public (she had more than a few close friends and had become immune to scalding media coverage by that point). And she managed to get most of what she wanted despite being very unpopular and being the subject of extremely embarrassing and critical media coverage. She wanted all four years' salary, which is understandable but for obvious reasons was not politically feasible. But no matter how many people tried to dismiss her (and they tried hard), she kept going, for better or for worse. It's definitely a story that shows popularity isn't everything.


ETA: I also think it's important to recognize that at the time, a wife really couldn't "use her husband's name" in a negative sense - his name was hers, and she was supposed to be a part of him. Women had to use a man's name - they were defined in relation to it. And it wasn't like she could just go get a job - even though women had started to work more, it would have been considered disrespectful to Lincoln's memory. Women had to frame everything in terms of their husbands or other male relatives - on the whole, she was not very exploitative and actually helped create some of the narratives that led to his glorification. A lot of widows wrote memoirs about their husbands for cash, but she did not.
 
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Here is an excellent article by independent Lincoln researcher Kerry Ellard about Mary Todd Lincoln's fight for pension during the last two years of her life. It's quite shocking at times how the wife of Abraham Lincoln was treated by the media. The article includes and draws on many newspaper articles from the time and challenges much of the conventional wisdom about Mary Todd Lincoln and her behavior.

https://lincolnabraham.com/wiki/mary-todd-pension-her-fight-against-the-government-introduction/
Interesting article. Thanks for posting.
We have not been kind to many president's widows (or for that matter, former presidents until the mid 20th century). Ms. Lincoln may be the saddest example of all.
 
Isn't that all any of us really want?
She may have been eccentric. But she was human.
Unfortunately too many people do want more than that - they want others to live on their terms as well. It's sad. There's a novel, Grief, that deals with Mary Lincoln's letters that I really liked. The main character reads the letters and tries to discuss them with various people, who respond "oh, but wasn't she bipolar?" like that totally ends the discussion and invalidates every experience and trait she may have had. There are a lot of people who regard eccentrics as not deserving of human dignity, especially ones like Mary who are aggravating and not ashamed about it. The aggravation is understandable, but unfortunately no one is guaranteed a comfortable life. George Washington's mother and Prince Philip's mother both had some similar behaviors to those of Mary Lincoln's, but they just accepted it the best they could and didn't let it hold them back. And the people who just want to be human and are punished for it sometimes lead by example - despite all of Prince Phillip's mother's problems, she hid a Jewish family during the Nazi occupation.
 
Unfortunately too many people do want more than that - they want others to live on their terms as well. It's sad. There's a novel, Grief, that deals with Mary Lincoln's letters that I really liked. The main character reads the letters and tries to discuss them with various people, who respond "oh, but wasn't she bipolar?" like that totally ends the discussion and invalidates every experience and trait she may have had. There are a lot of people who regard eccentrics as not deserving of human dignity, especially ones like Mary who are aggravating and not ashamed about it. The aggravation is understandable, but unfortunately no one is guaranteed a comfortable life. George Washington's mother and Prince Philip's mother both had some similar behaviors to those of Mary Lincoln's, but they just accepted it the best they could and didn't let it hold them back. And the people who just want to be human and are punished for it sometimes lead by example - despite all of Prince Phillip's mother's problems, she hid a Jewish family during the Nazi occupation.
Thanks for your response.
I am reminded of Jonathan Edwards' Sunshine Go Away Today: "He can't even run his own life, I'll be damned if he'll run mine...."
 
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