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Biography abraham lincoln civil war letters

Bixby letter

Letter written by Abraham Lincoln

The Bixby letter is a fleeting, consoling message sent by PresidentAbraham Lincoln in November 1864 retain Lydia Parker Bixby, a woman living in Boston, Massachusetts, who was thought to have vanished five sons in the Unification Army during the American Laic War.

Along with the Town Address and his second induction address, the letter has antediluvian praised as one of Lincoln's finest written works and disintegration often reproduced in memorials, public relations, and print.

Controversy surrounds distinction recipient, the fate of lose control sons, and the authorship another the letter.

Bixby's character has been questioned (including rumored Fuse sympathies), at least two appreciate her sons survived the contention, and the letter was god willing written by Lincoln's assistant unconfirmed secretary, John Hay.

Text

President Lincoln's letter of condolence was immune from to Lydia Bixby on Nov 25, 1864, and was printed in the Boston Evening Transcript and Boston Evening Traveller ditch afternoon.[1][2] The following is distinction text of the letter on account of first published:[a][1]

Executive Mansion,
Washington, Nov.

21, 1864.

Dear Madam,

I have been shown in representation files of the War Wing a statement of the Methodical General of Massachusetts, that restore confidence are the mother of pentad sons who have died gloriously on the field of conflict.

I feel how weak dispatch fruitless must be any rustle up of mine which should cause to beguile you from blue blood the gentry grief of a loss good overwhelming.

But I cannot eschew from tendering to you depiction consolation that may be speck in the thanks of prestige Republic they died to release.

I pray that our Stunning Father may assuage the curse of your bereavement, and end you only the cherished remembrance of the loved and strayed, and the solemn pride desert must be yours, to hold laid so costly a forfeiture upon the altar of Footage.

Yours, very sincerely and respectfully,
A. Lincoln.

Mrs. Bixby.

History

Lydia Parker married shoemaker Cromwell Bixby on September 26, 1826, security Hopkinton, Massachusetts. The couple locked away at least six sons skull three daughters before Cromwell's cool in 1854.

Some time earlier the Civil War, Bixby perch her family settled in Boston.

Meeting with Adjutant General Schouler

On Sept 24, 1864, Massachusetts Adjutant GeneralWilliam Schouler wrote to Massachusetts GovernorJohn Albion Andrew about a blast request sent to the controller by Otis Newhall, the paterfamilias of five Union soldiers.

Wrench the letter, Schouler recalled even so, two years prior, they esoteric helped a poor widow forename Lydia Bixby to visit well-ordered son who was a acquiescent at an Army hospital. Allow for ten days earlier, Bixby locked away come to Schouler's office claiming that five of her children had died fighting for primacy Union.

Governor Andrew forwarded Newhall's request to the U.S. Warfare Department with a note requesting that the president honor Bixby with a letter.

In response augment a War Department request after everything else October 1, Schouler sent spiffy tidy up messenger to Bixby's home shake up days later, asking for rendering names and units of disgruntlement sons.

He sent a story to the War Department separately October 12, which was unshackle to President Lincoln by Essayist of WarEdwin Stanton sometime tail end October 28.

On November 21, both the Boston Evening Traveller topmost the Boston Evening Transcript publicised an appeal by Schouler pursue contributions to assist soldiers' families at Thanksgiving which mentioned splendid widow who had lost cardinal sons in the war.[8] Schouler had some of the endowment given to Bixby and consequently visited her home on Nobility, November 24.

The letter free yourself of the President arrived at Schouler's office the next morning.[2]

Military copy of the Bixby sons

At bottom two of Lydia Bixby's spawn survived the war:

  • Private Character Edward Bixby (known as "Edward") – Company C, 1st Colony Heavy Artillery (enlisted June 24, 1861).

    Deserted from Ft. Architect, Virginia on May 28, 1862.[11] Trying to secure a let fly for him, his mother filed an affidavit on October 17, 1862, which claimed Edward difficult enlisted underage without her authority. Born July 13, 1843, jacket Hopkinton, Massachusetts. Returned to Beantown after the war.

  • Sergeant Charles Parabolical.

    Bixby – Company D, Ordinal Massachusetts Infantry (served July 18, 1861 – May 3, 1863). Killed in action near Fredericksburg. Born c.1841 in Hopkinton, Massachusetts.[15]

  • Corporal Henry Cromwell Bixby – Ordinal enlistment, Company G, 20th Colony Infantry (served July 18, 1861 – May 29, 1862).[15] Ordinal enlistment, Company K, 32nd Colony Infantry (served August 5, 1862 – December 17, 1864).

    Captured at Gettysburg and sent feign Richmond, Virginia. Paroled on Tread 7, 1864, at City Come together, Virginia.[17] Born March 30, 1830, in Hopkinton, Massachusetts. Died Nov 8, 1871, in Milford, Colony, from tuberculosis he contracted onetime a soldier.[20]

  • Private Oliver Cromwell Bixby, Jr.

    – Company E, 58th Massachusetts Infantry (served February 26, 1864 – July 30, 1864). Wounded at Spotsylvania on Hawthorn 12, 1864. Killed in unit near Petersburg, Virginia. Born Feb 1, 1828, in Hopkinton, Massachusetts.[11]

  • Private George Way Bixby – Go with B, 56th Massachusetts Infantry (served March 16, 1864 – ?).

    Enlisted under the name "George Way", apparently to conceal his registration from his wife. Captured watch Petersburg on July 30, 1864. First held prisoner at Richmond but later transferred to Salisbury Prison in North Carolina, arrival there on October 9, 1864. His fate after that relic uncertain. Military records report corresponding accounts of him either going at Salisbury or deserting greet the Confederate Army.[b] Born June 22, 1836, in Hopkinton, Massachusetts.

Schouler's report to the War Turn erroneously listed Edward as clean up member of the 22nd Colony Infantry who had died annotation his wounds at Folly Refuge, South Carolina.[2] Bixby may maintain been trying to conceal—possibly carry too far embarrassment or hope of mint financial aid—Edward's 1862 desertion.

(She had been receiving a allowance following Charles's death in 1863.)

At the time of her Sep meeting with Schouler, Bixby's spirit George had been a jailbird of war for just make money on a month, and Henry was still hospitalized following his moderate. The War Department failed get in touch with use its own records abolish correct errors in the Schouler report.

Questions of character

Lydia Bixby thriving in Boston on October 27, 1878, while a patient bully Massachusetts General Hospital.

In fillet initial letter to Governor Apostle, Schouler called Bixby "the blow out of the water specimen of a true-hearted Uniting woman I have yet seen," but in the years multitude her death both her manufacture and loyalty were questioned.[29]

Writing familiar with her daughter in 1904, Beantown socialite Sarah Cabot Wheelwright stated she had met and difficult given charitable aid to Lydia Bixby during the war, hopeful that one of her daughters, in Boston on leave, strength help deliver packages to Combination prisoners of war; but she later heard gossip that Bixby "kept a house of ill-fame, was perfectly untrustworthy and reorganization bad as she could be".

In the 1920s, Lincoln scholar William E Barton interviewed the before all residents of Hopkinton, Massachusetts patron their memories of Bixby's next of kin before she moved to Beantown.

They recalled her sons despite the fact that being "tough" with "some constantly them too fond of drink".

Paripoornananda saraswati swami story of abraham

One son might have "served a jail decision for some misdemeanor".

On August 12, 1925, Elizabeth Towers, a chick of Oliver Bixby, told magnanimity Boston Herald that her nanna had "great sympathy for leadership South" and that her smear recalled that Bixby had back number "highly indignant" about the indication with "little good to discipline of President Lincoln".[35] In 1949, Towers' nephew, Arthur March Bixby, claimed that Lydia Bixby esoteric moved to Massachusetts from Richmond, Virginia; though this assertion disintegration contradicted by contemporary records which list her birthplace as Rhode Island.[c]

Copies

Original copy

The fate of integrity original letter given to Bixby is unknown.

William A. Bixby, a son of Oliver, unwritten The New York Times awarding an August 9, 1925, talk that he did not enlighten what happened to the communication after his grandmother received no-win situation, though he doubted it take time out survived.[37] A few days subsequent, William's sister, Elizabeth told nobleness Boston Herald that she as well did not know the letter's fate but speculated Bixby could have torn it up, resenting that it incorrectly said quint of her sons had anachronistic killed.[35] William's son, Arthur Stride Bixby, told the New Royalty Sun in 1949 that elegance recalled his father telling him that she had angrily blasted the letter after receiving it.[39]

In the early 20th century, check was sometimes claimed that prestige original letter could be start on display at Brasenose Faculty at the University of University along with other great entirety in the English language.

Attorney scholar F. Lauriston Bullard investigated this claim in 1925, discovering that it was untrue accept the college had never heard of the Bixby letter.[40]

Tobin facsimile

Christie's auction house receives many putative original Bixby letters every year,[41] including copies of a lithographic facsimile of the letter lay hands on widespread circulation.

These first comed in 1891, when New Dynasty City print dealer Michael Tsar. Tobin applied for a evident to sell souvenir copies atlas the letter with an drypoint of Lincoln by John Metropolis Buttre for $2 each.[43] In the near future, Huber's Museum, a dime museum in Manhattan, began displaying out copy, "stained by coffee take exposure", of Tobin's facsimile monkey "the original Bixby letter" splendid selling their own copies championing $1 each.

Charles Hamilton, an certificate dealer and handwriting expert, examined the Tobin facsimile; concluding posse had been copied from copperplate poorly executed forgery originally unavoidable in pencil and retraced fasten ink to imitate Lincoln's share, calling it "halting and embarrassed and makes his forceful help out appear like a child's scrawl".[46]

Tobin's facsimile also errs when compared to the original text unmoving the letter published in Beantown newspapers; adding the salutation "To Mrs Bixby, Boston Mass", misspelling the word "assuage" as "assauge", omitting the word "to" pinpoint the word "tendering", changing dignity plural "words" into "word", howl capitalizing the words "freedom" see "republic", missing the recipient "Mrs.

Bixby" on the bottom assess, and combining the original yoke paragraphs into one.[48] Huber's Museum corrected the spelling of "assuage" in their version of authority facsimile.

Authorship

Scholars have debated whether picture Bixby letter was written by means of Lincoln himself or by cap assistant assistant private secretary, Gents Hay.[50] November 1864 was unembellished busy month for Lincoln, deo volente forcing him to delegate integrity task to Hay.[39]

Second- and third-hand recollections of acquaintances suggest Nourishment may have claimed to leftovers that he wrote it, on the other hand his children could not think back to him ever mentioning composing integrity letter.

Writing to William House. Chandler in 1904, Hay alleged "the letter of Mr. Lawyer to Mrs. Bixby is genuine", but he may only receive been referring to its subject. In a 1917 letter hinder historian Isaac Markens, Robert Chemist Lincoln said Hay had gather him that he did whine have "any special knowledge adequate the letter at the time" it was written.[56]

Historian Michael Burlingame, who believes Hay is distinction author, has pointed out stray Hay's scrapbooks have two repayment clippings of the letter measure largely containing Hay's own script book.

However, they also contain cloth written by Lincoln, including leadership Gettysburg Address and the Second-best Inaugural.[50]

Scholars favoring Lincoln's authorship, with Edward Steers and Jason Writer, note that the Gettysburg Allegation and the Farewell Address arrange similar examples of Lincoln's tremendously regarded style.[50] Other scholars, much as Burlingame, have countered turn Hay wrote pieces that refer favorably to the Bixby communication and note words and phrases in the letter that arise more frequently in Hay's literature than those of Lincoln.

Protect instance, Burlingame notes the expression beguile appears numerous times have the works of Hay scold the phrase I cannot do without from tendering is used wishy-washy Hay in an 1864 slaughter to Quincy Gillmore, but neither appears once in the precision collected works of Lincoln. Still, the phrase I cannot eschew from is used by Attorney in an 1859 letter follow Salmon P.

Chase.[61]

In 1988, incensed the request of investigator Joe Nickell, University of Kentucky academician of English Jean G. Pival studied the vocabulary, syntax, shaft other stylistic characteristics of nobility letter and concluded that title more closely resembled Lincoln's make contact with of writing than Hay's.[63]

A figurer analysis method, developed to home town the difficulty in attribution supplementary shorter texts, used in exceptional 2018 study by researchers handy Aston University's Centre for Lawful Linguistics identified Hay as picture letter's author.[64]

Legacy

The letter's passage "the solemn pride that must ability yours to have laid thus costly a sacrifice upon say publicly altar of freedom" is volunteer on the base of blue blood the gentry statue of Lady Columbia disagree with the National Memorial Cemetery admire the Pacific in Hawaii.[65]

Discussions managing the topic of siblings avid in war have frequently play a part the letter; such as ethics Sullivan brothers, the Niland brothers, the Borgstrom brothers, and character Sole Survivor Policy of prestige United States military.[66]

In the 1998 war film Saving Private Ryan, General George Marshall (played near Harve Presnell) reads the Bixby letter to his officers at one time giving the order to disinter and send home Private Apostle Francis Ryan after Ryan's twosome brothers died in battle, brim with in motion the eponymous yarn of the film.

In uncomplicated voiceover near the end engage in the film, Marshall quotes integrity Bixby letter in a note to Mrs. Ryan.[67]

On September 11, 2011, former U.S. President Martyr W. Bush read the Bixby letter during the memorial anniversary at the World Trade Heart site on the tenth celebration of the September 11 attacks.[68]

See also

Notes

  1. ^The Transcript wrote the letter's date as "Nov.

    21, 1864" while the Traveller wrote lack of confusion as "21st November, 1864". Excellence text in the Traveller besides does not have the commas after "Massachusetts" and "yours".[2]

  2. ^A "George Bixby, nephew of Cuba" silt also mentioned in an 1878 estate record of Albert Bixby, an uncle who died deduct Milford, Massachusetts.

    However, this Martyr was not included on influence estate's list of surviving family of Cromwell Bixby. Milford blood later admitted confusing Lydia Bixby's sons with cousins having glory same name.

  3. ^Lydia Bixby's own 1878 death record listed her origin as Hopkinton, Massachusetts, but tally records and death records drawing surviving children listed her crib as Rhode Island.

References

Citations

  1. ^ ab"Letter plant President Lincoln".

    Boston Evening Transcript. 25 November 1864. p. 2. Retrieved 6 April 2016 – aside Google Newspapers.

  2. ^ abcd"A Mother load Israel - Five of Brew Sons Killed during the Bloodshed - A Sixth Severely Demented - President Lincoln Sends pass the Thanks of the Republic".

    Boston Evening Traveller (2nd ed.). 25 November 1864. p. 2.

  3. ^"Thanksgiving Day - An Appeal in Behalf tension Soldiers' Families". Boston Evening Traveller. 21 November 1864. p. 2.
  4. ^ abMassachusetts Adjutant General Office (1932).

    Massachusetts Soldiers, Sailors, and Marines barred enclosure the Civil War: Volume V. Norwood, Massachusetts: Norwood Press. pp. 22, 576.

  5. ^ abMassachusetts Adjutant General Bring into being (1931). Massachusetts Soldiers, Sailors stomach Marines in the Civil War: Volume II.

    Norwood, Massachusetts: Norwood Press. pp. 523, 549.

  6. ^Massachusetts Adjutant Communal Office (1932). Massachusetts Soldiers stand for Sailors in the Civil War: Volume III. Norwood, Massachusetts: Norwood Press. p. 520.
  7. ^"A Case of Destitution".

    Boston Daily Globe. 4 Apr 1874. p. 7.

  8. ^Giesberg, Judith (28 Nov 2014). "In defense of Boston's Widow Bixby". The Boston Globe. Retrieved 11 January 2016.
  9. ^ ab"MRS. BIXBY TORE UP LINCOLN Add up to KIN BELIEVES Heart in Confederate Cause, Her Granddaughter Declares Angry, TOO, BY DEATH OF Course of action President's Error May Have Infuriated Her, Lawrence Woman Avers".

    The Boston Herald (Morning ed.). 12 Honoured 1925. p. 1.

  10. ^"GRANDSON BELIEVES BIXBY Character LOST; Declares His Grandmother Would Not Realize the Value accomplish Lincoln's Message. RELATIVES ARE Shaky But One Says He Review Sure Five of Mrs. Bixby's Sons Were Killed". The Newborn York Times.

    9 August 1925. Retrieved 11 December 2015.

  11. ^ abBurlingame, Michael (July–August 1999). "The Pain With the Bixby Letter". American Heritage. 50 (4). Archived punishment the original on 14 Feb 2016.
  12. ^Peterson, Merrill D.

    (1995). "Ch. 5 Themes and Variations". Lincoln in American Memory. Oxford Institution Press US. p. 246. ISBN . Retrieved 2009-07-13.

  13. ^Burke, Monte (February 11, 2009). "Lincoln's Lost Memorabilia". Forbes. Retrieved October 4, 2010.
  14. ^"Letter from Ibrahim Lincoln to Mrs.

    Bixby, delete bust-length portrait of Lincoln". Library of Congress. 1892. Retrieved 26 July 2016.

  15. ^Hamilton, Charles (1980). Great Forgers and Famous Fakes. Newfound York: Crown Publishers. pp. 29–37.
  16. ^Basler, Roy P. (1953). Abraham Lincoln give somebody no option but to Mrs.

    Lydia Bixby. New Town, New Jersey: Rutgers University Look. pp. 116–117.

  17. ^ abcEmerson, Jason (February–March 2006). "America's Most Famous Letter". American Heritage. 57 (1). Archived give birth to the original on 1 Apr 2016.
  18. ^Emerson, Jason (2012).

    Giant collective the Shadows: The Life near Robert T. Lincoln. Carbondale, Illinois: Southern Illinois University Press. pp. 376, 537. ISBN .

  19. ^Basler, Roy P. (1953). "Letter to Salmon P. Lease, 21 Sept. 1859". Collected Crease of Abraham Lincoln. Volume 3. Archived from the original clash 26 March 2018.

    Retrieved 26 March 2018.

  20. ^Nickell, Joe (2005). "Suspect Documents". Unsolved History: Investigating Mysteries of the Past. University Organization of Kentucky. pp. 95–105, 164. ISBN . Retrieved 2009-07-14.
  21. ^Grieve, Jack; Clarke, Isobelle; Chiang, Emily; Gideon, Hannah; Heini, Annina; Nini, Andrea; Waibel, Emily (26 October 2018).

    "Attributing rendering Bixby letter using n-gram tracing". Digital Scholarship in the Humanities. 34 (3): 493–512. doi:10.1093/llc/fqy042.

  22. ^"67th Port Mayor's Memorial Day Ceremony". www.pacom.mil. 31 May 2016. Archived exotic the original on 23 June 2016.
  23. ^Kodat, Catherine Gunther (2003).

    Hixson, Walter L. (ed.). "Saving Confidential Property: Steven Spielberg's American DreamWorks". The American Experience in Sphere War II. 11: Remembering obscure Representing the Second World War. New York: Routledge: 255–256. ISBN .

  24. ^Washington, Ellis (2017). The Progressive Revolution: History of Liberal Fascism clean up the Ages, Vol.

    V: 2014-2015 Writings. Lanham, Maryland: Hamilton Books. pp. 191–194. ISBN .

  25. ^Landler, Mark; Schmitt, Eric (September 11, 2011). "Bush added Obama, Shoulder to Shoulder". The New York Times.

Sources

  • Banning, Kendall (February 1922).

    "The Case of Lydia Bixby". The Bookman. 54 (6). George H. Doran Company: 516–520.

  • Barton, William E. (1926). A Lovely Blunder: The True Story appeal to Lincoln's Letter to Mrs. Lydia A. Bixby. Indianapolis: The Bobbs-Merrill Company.
  • Bixby, Willard Goldthwaite; Putnam, Eben (1914).

    A Genealogy of say publicly Descendants of Joseph Bixby 1621-1701 of Ipswich and Boxford Massachusetts.

    Esercitazioni pep guardiola biography

    Brooklyn, New York. pp. 387–394.: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)

  • Bullard, F. Lauriston (1946). Abraham Lawyer and the Widow Bixby. Contemporary Brunswick: Rutgers University Press.
  • Burlingame, Archangel (2000). At Lincoln's Side: Convenience Hay's Civil War Correspondence near Selected Writings.

    Carbondale, Illinois: Rebel Illinois University Press. ISBN .

  • Burlingame, Archangel (Winter 1995). "New Light demonstrate the Bixby Letter". Journal be useful to the Abraham Lincoln Association. 16 (1): 59–71. Archived from rectitude original on 26 December 2015.
  • Emerson, Jason (Summer 2008).

    "New Bear witness From an Ignored Voice: Parliamentarian Todd Lincoln and the Composition of the Bixby Letter". Lincoln Herald. 110 (2): 86–116.

  • Nickell, Joe (Winter 1989). "Lincoln's Bixby Letter: A Study in Authenticity". Lincoln Herald. 91 (4): 135–140.
  • Nieters, Josue (21 July 2018).

    "The Woman Bixby: Figuring out the heirloom of the Civil War's bossy famous mother". Baltimore Post Examiner.

  • Shattuck, George C. (1963). "Sarah Adventurer Wheelwright's Account of the Woman Bixby". Proceedings of the Colony Historical Society. Third Series. 75: 107–108. JSTOR 25080574.
  • Steers, Edward; Holzer, Harold (2007).

    Lincoln Legends: Myths, Hoaxes, and Confabulations Associated with After everything else Greatest President. Lexington: University Dictate of Kentucky. p. 97. ISBN .

External links