I realized today that my last post went live while I was away from home. I had written it before a road trip and scheduled it for a few days later, after I had already left. This one I’m writing today and hope to publish today. It’s my BICHOK for today. Well, one of them.
That road trip took me to New England. I visited several sites related to Abraham Lincoln, even if sometime they were rather obliquely related. I discovered some surprising Lincoln connections much close to my hometown. As just one example, an old house I had passed many times turns out to have been owned by Junius Brutus Booth, Jr. Booth was the son of famous Shakespearean thespian (and bigamist) Junius Brutus Booth, Sr. Perhaps more importantly, he was the eldest brother of John Wilkes Booth, Abraham Lincoln’s assassin. To double the surprise, Booth, his wife, and some of his children are buried in the local cemetery I had driven past a hundred times. I also found a statue of abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison a couple of towns over in the other direction. Turns out he was born there.
On this trip I visited New Bedford, the whaling town on the southern coast of Massachusetts. Not only was it one of the wealthier cities before natural gas and petroleum made whale oil obsolete, but it was also a safe haven for African Americans escaping from Southern slavery. Its most famous resident was Frederick Douglass. Douglass, originally Frederick Bailey, then Johnson, stayed initially with Nathan and Polly Johnson, who convinced Fred to change his last name again to Douglass. The Johnson house remains today, as does a new “Abolitionist Row” park directly across the street, complete with a seafaring Douglass statue. Douglass later moved to Lynn, MA, where there has recently been painted a mural covering the side of a large building. From Lynn he would go to Rochester, NY, but it was in Massachusetts that he began his public speaking as an abolitionist.
I made other stops along the way, but New Bedford is where I spoke with Judy Roderiques, one of three people I’ll mention in this post. I had originally seen Judy in an online program in which she, in character as an 19th century woman, interviewed Frederick Douglass (played by the inimitable Nathan Richardson). They discussed Douglass’s time in New Bedford, so I made a point of meeting with Judy while she volunteered at the New Bedford Whaling National Park. We had a delightful conversation that I’ll write more about later, during which she clued me in to a plaque on the wall of an old bank located on the site where Lincoln gave a speech in 1848. On the plaque is a fragment from a melted bell once used to warn escaped slaves of slave hunters in the area.
I had eaten dinner the night before with Bill Hanna, author of a book called Abraham Among the Yankees, which documented Lincoln’s 1848 visit to the Bay State. We had a far-ranging conversation about where Lincoln spoke, why he was there, and what he said. It would be Lincoln’s only visit to Massachusetts (other than to change trains on his way to New Hampshire twelve years later). But was it consequential? According to Bill, not so much. His book was written in 1983 (rereleased essentially unchanged in 2020). Since that time, he has done extensive follow up research and sees no mention in the newspapers of Lincoln’s earlier visit when he much more famously returned to New England the year of his election to president. Bill left me with a lot to think about.
A third person who graciously sat down with me to chat was Gordon Harris, the Ipswich Town Historian. We met early on a beautiful Sunday morning at Zumi’s, the local coffee shop, to discuss the nearby mural depicting the town’s history. Among the many recognizable figures was Abraham Lincoln. “Lincoln never came to Ipswich,” Gordon tells me, unlike George Washington, who trots across the mural on his white charger. Lincoln is there along with other figures depicting the town sending volunteers for the Union army at the beginning of the Civil War. During our conversation I realize that the town is a microcosm of the nation as a whole – colonial rebellion against taxation without representation, war of independence, civil war, the rise and fall of textile mills, and the fight against slavery. Again, much to think about.
All three conversations, as well as those I’ve had recently with other historians, highlight the complexity of our national existence. One aspect of this was captured in a recent book, Our Ancient Faith, by erudite historian Allen Guelzo, when he discusses Lincoln’s second inaugural speech. Lincoln points out that “both sides prayed to the same God” for his guidance and help during the war, but the fact of the matter is that both North and South were complicit in slavery, that “all Americans had been invested in the evils of slavery, that all had suffered in the war that ended it.” Guelzo further suggests that “Lincoln could hope for a democracy that rose above the giddiness of venom.”
Perhaps all Americans should spend more time learning the lessons of history.
This coming week I’ll be visiting the York PA Civil War Round Table to talk about how Lincoln influenced science and technology in the Civil War and beyond. A couple of weeks later I’ll be chatting with the White House Historical Society as part of their History Happy Hour program. Much more in the works so stay tuned.
[Photo of Detail of Frederick Douglass statue in New Bedford by David J. Kent]
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David J. Kent is President of the Lincoln Group of DC and the author of Lincoln: The Fire of Genius: How Abraham Lincoln’s Commitment to Science and Technology Helped Modernize America and Lincoln: The Man Who Saved America.