The Life of Mary Todd Lincoln Student May 13 th, 2011 History Mrs. Benish
Was Mary Todd Lincoln truly insane or is that just what happened to her after she lost so many loved ones? That question many people wonder, but there is no clear answer. Some people may think she was because she was put in a mental hospital, but she was released not much later. Mary Todd Lincoln s life was full of luxuries and sadness, but her life was very controversial to many people. Before Mary became married to Abraham and before the Civil War started, she had a very interesting life. Mary was born in Lexington, Kentucky on December 13, 1818. Mary s mother was Eliza Todd and her father was Robert Todd. Robert was a powerful banker. When Mary was born she had three other siblings and after she was born there was three more. It was a happy and sad time when the last baby, George, was born. This brought new life to the family, but it also brought death. While giving birth, Eliza, Mary s mother, died. All of this happened in the time that she was born until she was six. After her mother s death there were many more things to happen in Mary s life. First, a few years after Eliza died her father was remarried to Betsy Humphrey. It is bad enough having a new step mother, but to make it worse her 1
father and Betsy had nine more children. With all of the new things going on in the house there was no time left for Mary. This is when it all began. Mary was striving for attention with all of the new people and things going on. One way to get this attention was to have temper tantrums. This did not go over very well with her stepmother Betsy since the two of them did not get along in the first place. Mary didn t like to follow the directions like she was not allowed to wear hoop skirts, so she made her own and then got in trouble. If she did not get her own way she would pull pranks. One time she put salt instead of sugar in Betsy s coffee. Mary had many luxuries growing up. Her family lived in the South which meant that most houses had slaves, including the Todd s. Because her father was so rich, each member of the family had their own slave. Another luxury was that Mary and her sisters went to school while most other girls did not. Having all of these luxuries was nice, but it wasn t going to stay like that forever. Her life was crazy at home so she was smart and went out a lot. Mary would go to school and social events; she even would go to places with boys. Mary then started going to a boarding school where she only came home on the weekends. Many years later, when Mary was twenty, she moved to Springfield, Illinois. There 2
she moved in with her sisters Elizabeth and Frances, and Elizabeth s husband Ninian. Ninian was the governor of Illinois and then became one of the senators of Illinois. Their house was nice and had a lot of room for guests. This is the time in her life when Mary met Abraham. Mary came to the city to find a husband and that dream came true. Mary met Abraham at a dance when he asked her to dance. At first Mary thought he was ugly and had bad manners, but then warmed up to him and figured out she liked him. They eventually became engaged, but ended up breaking the engagement. This did not last for long when they both found out they needed each other and got married. When they became married Abe was ten years older than Mary. One thing that was different for her from when she was growing up was that Abraham did not have a lot of money. Their first home was a very small apartment above Springfield s Globe Tavern. They could not afford and did not want slaves to do work around the house so Mary had to learn how. They had their first son Robert on August 1, 1843. Once they earned enough money to move out, they moved to a one-story cottage which was better for a family. Three years later, they had Edward on March 10 th, 1846. 3
The family then moved to a boarding house in Washington D.C. in August 1846 because Abraham won a seat in congress, this did not last long. Two years later Mary and the boys moved back to Springfield because Abraham thought that the presence on Mary made it difficult for him to do his job. Abraham came home because he was lonely but, unfortunately, Edward became sick and died on February 1, 1850. This caused Mary a lot of grief and was a hard time for her. Even through all of this grief she ended up giving birth to William on December 21, 1850. Not much happened for three years until they had their fourth son, Thomas, on April 4, 1853. The next big thing that happened was Abraham was elected for President of the United States of America. He became President on March 4, 1860. Mary played a role in Abraham s elections. She would go on the road with him and she gave her own interviews. Mary had always loved politics even when she was a kid. One of the first things she did after the election was go to New York to buy dresses. Mary liked the hoopskirts and the low-cut necklines. Many people commented on this, even her husband. Mary, being the First Lady, now had all eyes on her, just what she wanted. That s what she thought at first, but then she realized that it wasn t so great. People always had something to say; normally it was about her spending money or what side of the war she was on. One thing that got a lot of talk was in 4
the first year of being at the white House she was given $20,000 to renovate many of the rooms. Mary overspent which made Abe very mad. Many people thought that Mary was a spy for the South, but this was not true. The next thing that happened was that Willie died, he died February 1862. This hit Mary very hard because he was her favorite. Mary stayed in her room for many days after his death grieving about her loss. May people did not think that that was right and that everyone loses people and they need to deal with it. She said that she would not let it bother her because now she knows what really sorrow is like. This helped her stand up to the people that hated her because it won t bother her as much if the people say things about her.. She did not know why the people hated her. She did nice things like help injured soldiers and raised money to 5 P a g e help them. After all of this tragedy in Mary s life there soon was one of the biggest tragedies. Her husband, Abraham Lincoln was assassinated on April 14, 1865. They were at a play, Our American Cousin, at the Ford s Theatre and just as Mary was forgetting about her life and enjoying the play Abe got shot in the head by John Wilkes Booth. Mary was hanging on to his hand when this happened and tried to catch him as he fell forward. He did not die right away but 5
died the next morning. This caused Mary more grief than ever before She stayed locked in her bedroom for a long while. Mary did not even go to the funeral. She received many letters expressing sympathy; she even received one from Queen Victoria of England. After Abe died she started giving away his possessions. There were few people that came to visit Mary after he died because she had locked herself in her bedroom, but she did receive many letters expressing sympathy. Mary now did not know what to do; she was homeless and had little money. Mary and her son Tad ended up moving in with Mary s other son Robert. Mary then thought that the country owed her money. They said no at first, but then Mary convinced them to give her $22,000. Mary always dressed in black mourning clothes. Mary stressed over money without Abe there to help her; she even tried to sell her ball gowns. Mary lost a lot of money and moved back to Chicago. This did not last long because then she and Tad sailed to Europe. Tad went to a boarding school and Mary kept traveling around the world. She went to England, Italy, France, and Scotland. On the ship back from Europe Tad caught a very bad cold and died at 18 on July 15, 1871. Mary then went in to deep sorrow because the only other person left in her family was Robert. She began to hallucinate and have migraine headaches. Mary 6
also carried a lot of money around with her at all times. All of this did not stop Mary from traveling; she traveled around the world for a few years after Tad s death. Mary s son Robert found Mary partially dressed in her hotel room. This caused him to think and realize all of her weird behaviors. He declared her insane, went to trial which only took ten minutes and sent Mary to a mental hospital in 1875. Mary did not like being there and complained about many things. Then, she went to trial to fight for her freedom and the court agreed that she was no longer insane. The rest of her life was spent traveling. When she traveled she suffered from diabetes, migraines, and arthritis. Mary spent a lot of time at her sister Elizabeth s house when she was not traveling. She died in July of 1882 while at her sister s house. Mary Todd Lincoln s life was full of luxuries and sadness, but her life was very controversial to many people. Mary had a rough life growing up; she lost her mother and had many fights with her stepmother. She then married Abraham Lincoln who was soon the President of the United States of America. They had four kids together. Sadly, all of them died except Robert. Mary went on with her 7
life, even after the deaths. She just was full of sorrow and was always depressed. Mary would buy things with money she did not have and was in deep debt her whole life. Mary would buy extravagant dresses that were very expensive. She was ridiculed by and people about her spending habits. Mary was declared insane after the death of her son Tad and was put into a mental hospital by her oldest son Robert. She was soon released, traveled the world and soon after died. 8
Bibliography Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum Visitor Experience. Web. 12 May 2011. <http://www.lincolnlibraryandmuseum.com>. Fleming, Candace. The Lincolns: a Scrapbook Look at Abraham and Mary. New York: Schwartz & Wade, 2008. Print. Mayo, Edith. The Smithsonian Book of the First Ladies: Their Lives, Times, and Issues. New York: H. Holt, 1996. Print. Melick, Arden Davis. Wives of the Presidents. [Maplewood, N.J.]: Hammond, 1972. Print. Santow, Dan. Mary Todd Lincoln. Danbury: Children s, 1999. Print. Skarmeas, Nancy J. First Ladies of the White House. Nashville, TN: Ideals Publications, 2004. Print. 9