ASSOCIATION WITH DENNIS HANKS 25

wordy contests; was delighted with the arguments and contention evoked by a neighborhood controversy, and if a dispute was being aired in the squire's court he was certain to be on hand an earnest and absorbed listener.

Dilating on Lincoln's reputation as a physical laborer serves to recall an interview I had with Dennis Hanks. It was at Charleston, Illinois, where he was living in the fall of 1886. I write from notes of the conversation written at the time.

In August, 1826, Abe, Dennis Hanks, and Squire Hall — the last two having married daughters of Abe's stepmother, Sarah Bush Lincoln - all set out for Posey's Landing on the Ohio River, distant twelve miles from their homes at Gentryville, Indiana, to cut wood, it being reported that there was a brisk demand for that kind of fuel by the boats plying up and down the river. When they arrived they learned that the demand for wood had slackened materially and that, if they succeeded in securing an order for any, they would probably have to take their pay in merchandise, as there was then but a scant supply of cash in the community. How many days they tarried there Hanks did not indicate, but it was long enough to cut nine cords for which they were given nine yards of white domestic at twentyfive cents a yard. "Out of this," related Hanks, "Abe had a shirt made, and it was positively the first white shirt which, up to that time, he had ever owned or worn. It was also the first time he had ever hired out and worked away from home."

When he visited Indiana, Herndon learned that in 1827 Lincoln and his stepbrother, John D. Johnston, journeyed together to Louisville where they secured work

for a brief time on the Portland Canal, then in process of construction around the falls of the Ohio. They were paid in silver dollars, probably the first silver money of any consequence Abe ever received. Naturally he was very proud of it and by virtue of frugal expenditures and determined self-denial managed to carry a goodly portion of it home with him when he returned to Gentryville.

Regarding the history of Mr. Lincoln's days while he lived in Indiana, including glimpses into the social conditions which prevailed there and thus had such a decided influence on his development into manhood, too much weight cannot be attached to the recollections of Dennis and John Hanks. Nor should the activities of Herndon in thus preserving their testimony be overlooked. Lincoln had hardly met his death in 1865 until Herndon was at work securing from both men all the information he could extract which tended to shed any light on the former's birth and boyhood. His method in dealing with Dennis was both systematic and effective. In addition to what the latter told him and which he carefully recorded at the time, Herndon induced him to put his testimony in writing also; but in order to keep him within certain limits and yet retain only so much as was essential to the continuity of the story, Herndon put his inquiry in the form of questions which he numbered, directing Dennis to number his answers also. There are many pages of these letters or statements, most of them dated and all of which were duly turned over to me. Knowing that I had spent more or less time with and had myself interviewed Dennis, Herndon seemed to think I was the proper depositary of the material both of us had gathered. These papers of Dennis, though written in

LETTERS OF DENNIS HANKS

27

defiance of the rules of grammar, capitalization, spelling, etc., are nevertheless of decided historic value. One dated December 24, 1865, is so characteristic and faithful a portrayal of life in Indiana when Lincoln lived there, I venture to reproduce it exactly as Dennis Hanks drew it, observing incidentally, that of the thirteen persons who formed the emigrant party that drove from Gentryville, Indiana, to Decatur, Illinois, in March, 1830, only two could write: their names: Abraham Lincoln and Dennis Hanks:

December 24 1865.

you speak of my Letter written with a pencil. the Reason of was my Ink was frose.

this

part first. we ust to play 4 Corner Bull pen and what we cald cat. I No that you No what it is and throwing a mall over our Sholders Backwards, hopping and half hamen, Resling and so on.

2nd what Religious Songs. The only Song Book was Dupees old Song Book. I Recollect Very well 2 Songs that we ust to Sing, that was

"O, when shall I see jesus and Rain with him aBove." the next was "How teageous and tasteless the hour when jesus No Longer I see."

I have tried to find one of these Books But cant find it. it was a Book used by the old predestinarian Baptists in 1820. this is. my Recollection aBout it at this time. we Never had any other the Next was in the fields

"Hail Collumbia Happy Land if you aint Broke I will Be Damned" and "the turpen turk that Scorns the world and Struts aBout with his whiskers Curld for No other man But himself to See" and all such as this. Abe youst to try to Sing pore old Ned But he Never could Sing Much.

CHAPTER III

The question of Lincoln's birth and descent-The various books on the subject Investigations by Herndon and the author in Kentucky and elsewhere - The Enloe tradition - The Lincoln family Bible record - Sarah LincolnThe John L. Scripps incident - Herndon's story of his ride with Lincoln to Petersburg-Dennis and John Hanks, who they were and whence they sprang - Their letters to Herndon regarding the Lincoln family tree.

To what extent the knowledge of his lowly if not obscure origin contributed to the pensive and melancholy tendency in Lincoln's nature is a question not easily answered; but certain it is that much of the curious and absurd speculation regarding his genealogy, which has grown up in the popular mind, is largely due to his vague and evasive attitude when confronted by inquiries regarding his lineage or family history. In most instances the subject has been overlooked or glossed over by Lincoln's numerous biographers, but now that he has attained such. enviable proportions among the other great figures in the temple of fame, and is therefore beyond "our power to add or detract," the feeling, gradually developed in the popular mind, that the truth should be known, cannot always be ignored. Nor can a portrait of the real Lincoln be deemed complete or exact which in any appreciable degree fails to bring out all the facts. The reading public has just been favored with "The Paternity of Abraham Lincoln," a book written by Dr. William. E. Barton, who has for some time been a student of the subject mentioned in the title. It is a careful and exhaustive essay and will be warmly appreciated by the army of Lincoln students and admirers over the country.

BIRTH AND DESCENT

29

Prior to 1858, Lincoln's achievements had not been noteworthy or momentous enough to attract, extensively, public attention, and it was not till after the debates with Douglas, and especially the Cooper Institute speech, that he began to attain anything like national recognition. When he was thus looming up large on the horizon, the people, manifesting the same degree of interest and anticipation with which they had awaited the history of every other man whose successful exploits had swept him into the limelight, naturally turned to him for the story of his life. At this juncture had he, with his accustomed spirit and candor, met the question squarely and imparted the facts as he understood them, the nebule which, for so many years, enveloped him would not have gathered, and the world would have been spared the nauseating and incredible "disclosures" which, under the guise of "revealing the true genesis of a wonderful man," have from time to time drifted into the open sea of public notice.

Among the books which attempt to settle the question of Lincoln's birth and family descent are "The Sorrows of Nancy," published in Richmond, Virginia, and written by a woman under the name of Lucinda Boyd; the "Sad Story of Nancy Hanks," a copyrighted pamphlet by William M. Coleman, of Dallas, Texas; "Truth Stranger than Fiction: or, The True Genesis of a Wonderful Man," by James Cathey, of Bryson City, North Carolina; and "The Parentage of Lincoln," a series of newspaper articles by D. J. Knotts, of Swansea, South Carolina, in which the author seeks to prove that Abraham Lincoln was the son of John C. Calhoun, who became intimate with Nancy Hanks and, for five hundred dollars,