Where Is Mary Lincoln's Memoir?
This has been posted on my Medium page since the summer of 2017. I plan to update it occasionally, in the hopes that someone will eventually get lucky and come across something. Tips and questions always welcome!
A version of this was published in the newsletter of the Abraham Lincoln Association.
On October 15, 1872, shortly after the first anniversary of her son Tad’s death, Mary Lincoln wrote a letter to William Reid.
“About a year since, in the midst of my overwhelming bereavement, I received a note from you, notifying me that our kind old friend Dr. Smith of Dundee, had left quite a number of papers relative to my husband, in your charge for me. I have transferred these papers to the Hon Isaac N. Arnold of Chicago, Ill, and you will kindly oblige, by immediately forwarding them to him.”¹
Mary’s pursuit of these papers continued for some time, as she wrote to Arnold on January 18, 1873.² Arnold was working on books about Lincoln at the time, and these were presumably to help him with his research.³
“I am quite anxious to learn whether you have received the papers from Scotland. Unfortunately the letter Mr Reid wrote me sixteen months since, when my mind was so deeply agonized, that I was unable to cast a thought upon anything save my terrible bereavement — that letter must have been carelessly tossed aside … Yet I cannot realise that Mr. Reid left to himself — would act otherwise than in good faith — should he have received our letters.”
Dr. James Smith had been the Lincolns’ pastor in Springfield, and President Lincoln had appointed him to the Dundee consulate. He spent time with Mary and Tad when they lived in Europe in 1870, and corresponded with her before and after the visit. In letters sent in June 1870, Mary had provided commentary to Smith regarding his defense of Lincoln’s religion and marriage in response to assertions made by William Herndon.⁴ In 1871, Smith died eleven days before Tad did.
According to an 1890 book, Reid was a “capitalist and Banker” from Dundee, Scotland.⁵ After taking a “literary course,” he was admitted to the bar in 1867, and “acted as counsel for the United States for several American claimants under the Alabama treaty.” The biographical sketch noted that “While employed on this work he was appointed by President Grant as United States Consul at Dundee, and held the office at that port until his removal to Oregon in 1874,” at which point he permanently relocated to Portland.
But the most interesting sentence of the sketch was the following: “In 1868 he was employed by Mrs. Mary Lincoln, widow of the President, to assist in the preparation of the Reminiscences of Abraham Lincoln.” An 1886 biography reiterated the claim: “While at Dundee he met Mrs Lincoln … and performing for her some literary service, was rewarded by the appointment of U. S. vice-consul at Dundee …”⁶
Though Mary was overwhelmed with grief after the assassination, there is evidence that she desired to tell her side of the story. In a letter written to a book publisher, she turned down the offer, yet implied that if her circumstances improved, she might give in to the “temptation.”
“… The temptation to me is sometimes very great that many incidents that occurred in so momentous a time, under my immediate notice connected with my very beloved husband & the country, should be truthfully placed before the public . . . It will be impossible for me, under present circumstances, to subject myself to the annoyance of public clamor.”⁷
One month later, the unexpected publication of Behind the Scenes by her friend and seamstress Elizabeth Keckly may have intensified this desire. From the time of the Old Clothes scandal in 1867, through 1870, periodic newspaper reports appeared that Mary was working on a book. Their truth cannot be ascertained. Mary could have introduced Reid via letter to Dr. Smith as early as late 1868, when she arrived in Europe. Reid’s “literary” training and close relationship with the trusted Dr. Smith may have made him attractive as a ghostwriter. Tad’s death in July 1871 may have ended Mary’s interest in publishing the work.
William Reid died in 1914,⁸ but he had given an interesting interview to the Oregonian a few years earlier, on June 18, 1911.
“… Mary Todd [Lincoln] . . . is shown by letters in the possession of William Reid, a Portland attorney, to have been an ardent supporter of the Union and as having abundant faith in Mr. Lincoln’s ability and justice. The letters, which the local attorney will not have published until after his death, were written in a series covering several years, while Mr. Reid was engaged in writing “The Reminiscences of Abraham Lincoln,” materials for which Mrs. Lincoln furnished. More than 40 years ago, when Mrs. Lincoln and her son were residing in Europe, Mr. Reid and Rev. M. Smith, American Consul, were asked by Mrs. Lincoln to write a book on Mr. Lincoln’s life. She supplied the material . . . Later the work was turned over to Mr. Reid.”
The article quoted Reid as saying “Mrs. Lincoln … while living herself in Germany, frequently crossed to Dundee to examine Dr. Smith’s manuscripts so I frequently saw her . . . Dr. Smith … she said had two sons who were rabid secessionists and had joined the confederate army. She feared that, as Dr. Smith’s wife backed her sons, an attempt might be made to stop the publication of the reminiscences if Dr. Smith died. So she authorized me and so did the Doctor, to finish the work there at Dundee, where I was practising law. In the interval she promised me and faithfully did forward from Germany new sources of material.”
What happened to the work “turned over” to Mr. Reid? If he was telling the truth, in 1911 he still had the letters that had been the basis of the work, but the letters have not come to light.
Reid wrote a letter to The Oregon Daily Journal in 1912, mentioning that he was “one of the authors of the ‘Reminiscences of Abraham Lincoln,’ through his widow’s desire while a young man in Scotland.” While Reid did use this association in a self-promotional way, he first mentioned it while Mary Lincoln was still alive. A letter from “Hon. William Reid, U. S. Consul at Dundee, Scotland,” was copied from an article in the Oregonian, dated March 4, 1874, and published in the Illinois State Journal on May 16, 1874. It is likely that someone connected to Abraham Lincoln had asked Reid to write this letter, which mostly defended Lincoln against charges of being an infidel.
“… knowing Mrs. Lincoln personally, having been in correspondence with that lady, and having also been of some assistance in a work entitled ‘Reminiscences of Abraham Lincoln’ . . . I am proud to think I have in my possession — as a reward for a few insignificant services done by me on account of Mrs. Lincoln — the great and Martyred President’s psalm book . . . A word before I close, as to Mrs. Lincoln. She is a lady of great merit, and spite of Herndon’s mad expression to the contrary, was dearly loved by the President, as his letters to her will show …”
Thus, Reid first spoke of his work in 1874, and implied that he had letters written by Abraham Lincoln to his wife. Interestingly, he minimized this work as “a few insignificant services,” perhaps because Mary did not want the project known in the Springfield community.
On March 7, 1915, The Oregon Daily Journal reported that Reid had been survived by five children and his widow. Reid’s two daughters gave the psalm book Reid had received from Mary to a Lincoln collector, Rev. William Johnstone of St. Paul. Johnstone learned that they had possession of Reid’s papers, but he seems to have been so excited about the psalm book that he did not inquire about them. Inquiries to Reid’s descendants have been made but nothing has been discovered.
It is interesting that Reid repeatedly referred to the work as though it was a finished and known draft. William Johnstone believed it became the identically named compilation by Allen Thorndike Rice (NY, 1886), but the works seem unrelated, and no essay by Reid appears in the Rice volume. Perhaps Mary’s version of those “many incidents that occurred in so momentous a time, under my immediate notice connected with my very beloved husband,” will be discovered some day.
[1] https://www.rrauction.com/PastAuctionItem/3281901, sold in Jan. 2013.
[2] Justin G. Turner and Linda Levitt Turner, Mary Todd Lincoln: Her Life and Letters (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1972), 602–603. Turner and Turner’s footnote mistakenly identified ‘Mr. Reid’ as Rev. James A. Reed of Springfield.
[3] The Chicago Historical Museum did not know of any references to Reid.
[4] Turner and Turner, 564–569.
[5] Harvey Scott, History of Portland, Oregon with illustrations and biographical sketches of prominent citizens and pioneers (Syracuse, N.Y.: D. Mason & Co., 1890).
[6] Hubert Howe Bancroft, History of Oregon (San Francisco: History Co., 1886–88), 2 vols.; 2:
[7] Mary Todd Lincoln to A. D. Worthington, March 7, 1868. Viewable at https://www.gilderlehrman.org/collections.
[8] The Oregon Daily Journal, June 8, 1914.
[9] https://www.baumanrarebooks.com/catalogues/february2017/index.html#16/z