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Show "hat thepresidencu Did to Lincoln ..s . awlkawaw i-- . T, rh. Conqressman .T. . . , . "The president-LiecL" " . from Illinois" V ThcyTcolnUouglay l86o l 1848 .1858 TS7 r-tl, By ELMO 8C0TT WATSON ?,,nN. " "lirA PRIL 14 Is the annlver- X, T x .W" sary of one of the great , ft 5 - ' ' A tragedies In American "V A fv"- y T history. For it was on ' .. ' f YY f ff' I VI that date Just 63 years & " . - I,-: -r'-V" go that the bullet of - : ' 1 VJ H v struck down Abraham is f -s ' sMaSSf Lincoln and plunged a whole nation, X, -f v 'v ,' rejoicing that four years of war was " fyfffS ft " ------ Jr . t last ended, Into the deepest sorrow. I fe I , ,.1 I' 1 " Jd i 1 Ever since that day there has been 1 X " t , , " $1 g J f ' . endless speculation as to "what might V" ' 1 A ' ill i "'! " "l4- ha?e been" If he had been spared. ''J Smr jK y J jfj"lt f 4 Would the North bare been a more !I-J! I ' ,s " l generous victor and the South have XC lT''flljV' 'v I s been spared the ruin and despair of Sl ; J? C2,, 1 - AiliJfJ the Reconstruction era? Would the E&rS Vtut wounds of the most terrible civil war 0JrS . TZrtTTZltl The SpeSettysburg" 'TtaJtarf W mentons years if there h.id been at the r tH. luh uhcowJ head of the nation the man who hnd Courtiv LtrTw,ow HCu By ELMO 8C0TT WATSON I'KIL 14 Is the anniversary anniver-sary of one of the great tragedies In American history. Tor It was on that date Just 63 years ago that the bullet of John Wilkes Booth " " struck down Abraham Lincoln and plunged a whole nation, rejoicing that four years of war was t last ended, Into the deepest sorrow. - Ever since that day there has been endless speculation as to "what might have been" If he had been spared. Would the North have been a more generous victor and the South have been spared the ruin and despair of the Reconstruction era? Would the wounds of the most terrible civil war In history have been more quickly healed during those next four momentous mo-mentous years If there h.id been at the head of the nation the man who had said "With malice toward none; wltb charity for all; with firmness In the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are In," No one Can answer those questions positively, but there can be but little doubt In anyone's mind that the answer In each case Is "Yes." Useless though such speculation may be, It suggests another lnterest- log possibility. Suppose John Wilkes Booth had been balked In trying to carry out his mad scheme and the tragedy of that terrible night In Ford's theater bad been averted. Might not death In some other guise than the assassin's bullet have prevented Abraham Lincoln from realizing his To that Ludwlg adds this comment: com-ment: "There be stands burdened with things which bis fashionable wife must have forced upon him, too elegantly ele-gantly attired, lest he should look like a backwoodsman a man used to wearing his clothes Just anyhow, decked out with a useless walking stick, transformed into a comedy figure fig-ure and all the more a mark of silent sarcasm. There he stands for the first time he Is to speak to the nation as a whole, for be is embarrassed by this fine new stick wltb a gold knob, and the terribly shiny top hat What Is he to do? Dreadful moments, but fate has sent him bis longtime enemy, who, as If in irony, is watching bis plight at close hand. Douglas it Is who sunken far under his enormous brows. , . . There was over his whole face an expression of sadness, and a faraway far-away look In his eyes, which were utterly ut-terly unlike the Lincoln of former days." The wonder Is that the war President Presi-dent did not break nnder the strain. For, says Ludwlg, "For blm, private life had ceased to exist Work, agitations, agita-tions, enemies at home, reverses sbroad, danger threatening to undo the work done by tbe fathers of the country and to frustrate the activities of his own career such bad been bis lot for three or four years, almost without cessation. The tree-feller's tall body had been attacked from within, with-in, mined as It were and weakened ambition "to finish the work we are In"? For such a possibility Is not so Lj Improbable as It may seem at first thought It has become almost axiomatic that the Presidency of the United States Is a "man-killing Job." For ex-Presidents the average length of life after turning turn-ing over the reins to their successors bas been a little over 11 years. But when there Is added to the heavy du-' du-' ties of tbe Presidency, the crushing burden of leading the nation In a great war even that span of years Is greatly reduced. Woodrow Wilson, the World war President, left the White House in 1921, a broken, prematurely-aged prematurely-aged man who was In his grave three years later. So with this recent tragic example before us, it is not beyond the realm of belief that a similar fate might have awaited Abraham Lincoln, who was called upon to bear the most crushing load of responsibility and sorrow ever placed upon the shoulders of any American, not even excepting those of George Washington In the darkest days of the Revolution, Some interesting evidence of the heartbreaking task which was Lincoln's Lin-coln's and of tbe fact that not even bis great strength' could have much longer endured It Is presented In the reproduction of photographs which Illustrate Emll Ludwlg's "Lincoln," published recently by Little, Brown comes to his rescue; Douglas as a valet, Douglas who stretches out his short arm to take the hat and hold It for half an hour, like a footman, till all Is over, and the new President can take it back from the senator wltb a friendly nod." A tragically-comic figure this, and a pathetic figure this backwoodsman thus thrust upon the stage of national affairs before the scornful gaze of official offi-cial Washington. But the sneers of the snobbish are the least of the worries wor-ries of this Man of Destiny. For almost al-most immediately there comes to htm the overwhelming knowledge of the task before blm. "lie is a stranger; he has never held executive olllce before, be-fore, and now he has been suddenly thrust Into the highest position In the Union ; he has to cope with a situation unprecedented In the history of the country; alone, unaided, without congress, con-gress, and with an unwilling cabinet, he has to make the gravest decision ever made by a President of the Union." ' That decision Is to make war upon the states which have withdrawn from the Union, And when he makes It sorrow begins to carve the first lines in the face which Is never again to be wholly free from those signs of suffering suffer-ing such as few men have ever been called upon to endure. "Then comes the first brush with the Southerners, here and there; he was laid up for awhile by a modified smallpox, caught In a visit to the front ; be complained , that his legs were always cold, but he would not give way; very rarely Indeed, In-deed, after a sleepless night wonld he He down on Welles' sofa, or say that he was too tired to receive visitors. vis-itors. 'I hardly know how to rest It may be good for the body. But what is tired in me lies within, and can't be got at' "As the years went by, the tensions Increased rather than diminished. If things were going well in the field, he would be harassed by the violence of the political factions; when all was quiet In that quarter, the result would be a decline In recruiting; and If, for a moment matters really seemed to be milking progress everywhere, he would still be perturbed by the mutual Jealousies of the members of the cabinet cab-inet or the governors. In addition be was distressed by tbe dally sight of sufferings caused by the war, for hospitals hos-pitals abounded In Washington, and the surrounding bills were sprinkled with tents for the temporary accommodation accom-modation of the sick and wounded, while the stretchers seemed to pass In unending succession whenever the President went out for air or exercise. Riding was about his only exercise," But even this was not safe for once he was fired upon by a hidden assassin. Ills horse bolted and quickly bore him away from the spot and a soldier who and company. Five of these are shown above and they, more vividly than words, tell that story. Although It Is a familiar story which the distinguished German writer tells In his biography of Lincoln, Lin-coln, It bas a particular Interest at this time when the anniversary of the Great Emancipator's death recalls to Americans the tragedy of his whole life, "Lincoln's career, more than thnt of any other man in history, is so grandly conceived by Fate that the first act Is illuminated by the last, and every scene Is bound together by dramatic dra-matic Intensity," writes Ludwlg. In one of the word pictures of Lincoln Lin-coln which Ludwlg presents, he Is a "comedy figure," albeit a tragic-comic one. The scene is the inauguration on March 4, 1800, on a platform tn front of the east portico of the Capitol. Cap-itol. "What do the audience see? They look up at the speaker, but his friends are little pleased by his aspect" as-pect" writes Ludwlg, who then quotes the words of one who witnessed that scene and wrote as follows: "His newly grown beard was short and stubby like a shoe brush : grizzled, stiff, and hideous; disfiguring a face that without it expressed power and deep feeling. He wore a brand-new suit with a swallow-tall Instead of the customary frock coat; he had a very shiny stovepipe hat, evidently Just taken out of the bandbox, and a huge ebony stick, with a gold head as large as an egg. In this unusual rig-out he looked so uncomfortable that It was quite pathetic. Matters were even worse when he reached the platform for he did not know what on earth to do with his hat and his stick. There be stood, a target for thousands of eyes, holding these two encumbrances, the image of hopeless perplexity. After a little hesitation, he leaned his stick against the rail, but could not find any place except the floor for his awsk. bat, and, as I saw, be did not wish to put It there, Douglas, who noted his T embarrassment, came to the help of 1 bis old rival, relieved blm of the hat and wounded are borne back on stretchers through the streets on their way to the Cnpltol. It Is the blood of his brothers that Lincoln for the first time sees oozing through the hastily improvised bandages; the blood of Innocent In-nocent youngsters, who have no Interest In-terest in politics, and are neither for slavery or against it; men who have only rallied to the colors In response to tbe cry: "The Union bas been broken." The story of what Lincoln endured during the first two years of the war his struggle to secure the co-operation of a wrangling, discordant cabinet, his repeated disappointments in bis generals gen-erals who either wouldn't fight or who fought only to be defeated disastrously disastrous-ly and all the other factors which thwarted him at every turn Is matched as a record of despair only by what followed. For when he Issued the Emancipation Emancipa-tion Proclamation "the effect was catastrophic. Confusion was widespread wide-spread throughout the North, there was a slump on the stock exchange; the elections were adverse ; the Democrats Demo-crats declared that thousands of whites were being forced to give their blood in order that their fellow countrymen coun-trymen might be Illegally deprived of property. . . . When congress was sitting In December, the President's unceasing personal struggle on two fronts, the near approach of the momentous mo-mentous date fixed for the enforcement enforce-ment of the proclamation, tbe varying and for the most part unfavorable fortunes for-tunes of war, the skepticism of friends regarding the new measure and the scorn In which it was held by enemies, made blm weary and dispirited as well." An unforgettable picture of the Lincoln Lin-coln of this period is given by an old friend who bad not seen him for six years and whose description of him Is cited by Ludwlg as follows: "The change . . . was simply appalling Ills whiskers bad grown and had given additional cadaverousnegs to his face, . . . Tbe light seemed to have gone out of bis eyes, which were went to the place found his tint lying on the ground with a bullet hole through the crown. "Sometimes after riding into Washington in the small hours he would spend the rest of the night at the White Ilouse, writing or reading, and would ride back to the Soldiers' home when morning cume, depressed In mood. Such depression was common enough, for Lincoln was Incapable of taking much delight In victory or of feeling hatred for the enemy, and civil war was doubly dis-tresssing dis-tresssing to him, since the enemies were his brothers. 'The war" be said In a Bpeech during the Inst year of his life, 'has carried mourning to almost every home, until It can almost be said that the heavens are hung in black I'" Nor did the gloom lift when tbe end of the war finally came and Appomattox Appomat-tox silenced the four-year clamor of the guns. For, as Lincoln looked back upon those four years, he could see naught but tragedy personal as well as national. "Where, now, is Douglas, who had been so full of life and activity? Where Is old friend Baker? Where are his little boys, wilted and perished like half-open buds nipped by the frost? Death was grinning grin-ning at him from every corner I Would history speak, of him only as the Lord of Death; would history be Justly entitled en-titled to give him such a name?" Such are the thoughts which Ludwlg Lud-wlg puts In his mind as he enters Ford's theater that night of April 14. Then the shot, the cry of "Sic semper sem-per tyrannis!" the scream of Mary Lincoln and In a little house across the street the next morning "he dies at seven o'clock ; in a strange bed like a pilgrim, slain on Good Friday like a prophet." And the tragedy of Abraham Abra-ham Lincoln's whole life was summed up by his little son, Tad, who "when he stood beside the coffin In the White House, said 'Is father In heaven now? Yes? Then I am glad, for be was not really bappy here.'" |
