What ever happened to Abe Lincoln's children and grandchildren?

[Dover]

I was watching a program about Lincoln's life on PBS (very interesting) and realized I knew absolutely nothing about what had become of his four sons after his death. Well, actually I knew two of his sons had died young. But what of their first son Robert "Bob" Tod? If you know something about their stories and lives, please share.

•Edward (Eddie) Baker Lincoln: Born March 10, 1846 in Springfield, Illinois. Edward died quite young in Springfield, Illinois on February 1, 1850 from pulmonary tuberculosis.



•William (Willie) Wallace Lincoln: Born December 21, 1850 in Springfield, Illinois. William died when he was 11 years old on February 20, 1862 in Washington, D.C. of typhoid fever.
http://marriage.about.com/gi/o.htm?zi=1/XJ&zTi=1&sdn=marriage&cdn=people&tm=249&gps=158_261_1008_550&f=00&su=p284.9.336.ip_&tt=2&bt=0&bts=0&zu=http%3A//mrlincolnswhitehouse.org/inside.asp%3FID%3D18%26subjectID%3D2



•Thomas (Tad) Lincoln: Born April 4, 1853 in Springfield, Illinois. Tad died at age 18 in Chicago on July 15, 1871 of tuberculosis.
http://marriage.about.com/gi/o.htm?zi=1/XJ&zTi=1&sdn=marriage&cdn=people&tm=388&gps=400_480_1008_550&f=00&su=p284.9.336.ip_&tt=2&bt=0&bts=0&zu=http%3A//mrlincolnswhitehouse.org/inside.asp%3FID%3D17%26subjectID%3D2



In 1865


Robert Todd Lincoln (August 1, 1843 – July 26, 1926) was an American lawyer and Secretary of War, and the first son of President Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd Lincoln. Born in Springfield, Illinois, United States, he was the only one of Lincoln's four sons to live past his teenage years.

...snip..

Lincoln had a distant relationship with his father, in part because Abraham Lincoln spent months on the judicial circuit during his formative years. Robert would later say his most vivid image of his father was of his packing his saddlebags to prepare for his travels through Illinois.<1> Abraham Lincoln was proud of Robert and thought him bright, but also saw him as something of a competitor, and once said, "he guessed Bob would not do better than he had."<2> The two lacked the strong bond Lincoln had with his sons Willie and Tad, but Robert deeply admired his father and wept openly at his deathbed.<3>

Following his father's assassination, in April 1865, Robert Lincoln moved with his mother and his brother Tad to Chicago, where Robert completed his law studies at the University of Chicago (a school different from but whose name was later assumed by the university currently known by that name). He was admitted to the bar on February 25, 1867.

On September 24, 1868, Robert Lincoln married the former Mary Eunice Harlan (September 25, 1846 - March 31, 1937), the daughter of Senator James Harlan and Ann Eliza Peck of Mount Pleasant, Iowa. They had two daughters and one son:

Mary "Mamie" Lincoln (October 15, 1869 - November 21, 1938)
Abraham Lincoln II (nicknamed "Jack") (August 14, 1873 - March 5, 1890 - died of blood poisoning)
Jessie Harlan Lincoln (November 6, 1875 - January 4, 1948)

His mother's "spend-thrift" ways and eccentric behavior concerned Robert Lincoln. Fearing that his mother was a danger to herself, he was left with no choice but to have her committed to a psychiatric hospital in Batavia, Illinois in 1875. With his mother in the hospital, he was left with control of her finances. On May 20, 1875, she arrived at Bellevue Place, a private, upscale sanitarium in the Fox River Valley.<4>

Three months after being installed in Bellevue Place, Mary Lincoln engineered her escape. She smuggled letters to her lawyer, James B. Bradwell, and his wife, Myra Bradwell, who was not only her friend but also a feminist lawyer and fellow spiritualist. She also wrote to the editor of the Chicago Times, known for its sensational journalism. Soon, the public embarrassments Robert had hoped to avoid were looming, and his character and motives were in question. The director of Bellevue, who at Mary’s trial had assured the jury she would benefit from treatment at his facility, now in the face of potentially damaging publicity declared her well enough to go to Springfield to live with her sister as she desired.<5> The committal proceedings led to a profound estrangement between Lincoln and his mother, and they never fully reconciled.

...cont'd
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Todd_Lincoln


Bob's mansion in Vermont .......................

[Tx4obama]

1. Everyone died.

The family line has been extinct since the last living descendant, Robert Todd Lincoln Beckwith, died on December 24, 1985 without any children.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lincoln_family_tree

[boppers]

6. Uhm, there's the matter of Timothy Lincoln Beckwith...

Produced during the marriage of Robert Todd Lincoln Beckwith to Annamarie Hoffman, but 6 years after Robert had a vasectomy. Genetic testing never occurred.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timothy_Lincoln_Beckwith

[Drunken Irishman]

8. Well without DNA testing, at best we can say he's an unofficial decedent.

So, as far as we know, the line ended with Robert Todd Lincoln Beckwith.

[boppers]

9. Well, it was made official on the birth certificate.

Genetically accurate, maybe not so much, but perhaps this is merely a semantic quibble....

Considering fathers listed on birth certificates who support their "children" (which are not related to them) are considered legally responsible for their children, it's kind of a messy area.

[annm4peace]

2. the Lincoln line didn't go further

robert didn't have any grandchildren.

My family went to Springfield to the wonderful Museum. It is multimedia. then there is also the Lincoln home with actors being Lincoln and others of that time period.

they have an excellent gift shop with wonderful books

[boppers]

7. See #6.

Interesting story there, and Timothy's still young enough to produce offspring.

Their genetic lineage, however, may be contested.

[Dover]

12. Seems odd to me that Timothy hasn't had any DNA testing.

Not just simply because of the inheritance of money, but of his historical significance.
Well, it seems he has received a large sum of money from various organizations as though
he were, in fact, related to Lincoln, so perhaps there has been some sort of confirmation
that's been kept quiet.

If I were Timothy I'd have gotten a DNA test by now just so I'd know. Can't imagine he
doesn't know the answer to that one...

[boppers]

15. Have you been tested about your parentage?

Have you, personally, done the same thing?

[Retrograde]

19. No, but there's nothing to inherit

If I were thought to be descended from someone as famous as Abraham Lincoln and stood to inherit some of Robert Lincoln's estate it would be worth looking into, though.

[Dover]

22. Apparently there WAS an inheritance (according to Wikipedia) in the form of a trust.

If you go to this link for Robert Todd Lincoln Beckwith -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Todd_Lincoln_Beckwith -
you'll find the link to Timothy Beckwith and this information:


Timothy Lincoln Beckwith (born October 14, 1968) is the son of Annamarie Hoffman and once was thought to be the son of her husband Robert Todd Lincoln Beckwith, the last undisputed descendant of Abraham Lincoln.

Timothy Beckwith was born on October 14, 1968, in Williamsburg, Virginia, to Mrs. Annemarie Hoffman Beckwith and supposedly to Robert Todd Lincoln Beckwith. His mother grew up in Hanover, Germany, moved to America and became a student at the College of William and Mary. She married Beckwith in 1967. Six months after the marriage, Beckwith received a letter indicating that his wife was pregnant. However, Robert had had a vasectomy six years before he and Annemarie were wed. He visited his doctor and concluded that he was ‘completely sterile’.

Just before the baby was born, Robert urged his wife to list the baby’s father as unknown on the birth certificate and gave her $7,500 plus the hospital cost. However, when Timothy was born, she listed Robert as the father and gave the child the name Timothy Lincoln Beckwith, after his claimed father. Annemarie then returned to Europe with her son.

Robert filed divorce proceedings, but they were delayed by a countersuit held by Annemarie. In 1976, the District of Columbia Superior Court ordered Annemarie to return with her son, so that Timothy could take blood tests to determine if he was Beckwith's son. Annemarie refused to return to the United States and the Superior Court accordingly ruled her son was the product of an 'adulterous relationship'. However, since Timothy had not actually been proven to not be Beckwith's son, the Court said that the boy retained the right to present a future claim of being a Lincoln descendant, thereby inheriting the Lincoln estate.

Robert Todd Lincoln Beckwith died in 1985 and Annemarie moved to West Berlin. By 1994, she was said to have remarried and was living somewhere in the United States.<1> Timothy Lincoln Beckwith currently lives in West Palm Beach, Florida, where he is an attorney with the Florida State Attorney's Office.<2> According to an article appearing in The New Yorker, upon the death of Robert Todd Lincoln Beckwith, the beneficiaries of the Lincoln family trust—the American Red Cross, Iowa Wesleyan College, and The First Church of Christ, Scientist—agreed that a considerable sum of money would go to Timothy so that their legacy would be free and clear.<3> He apparently never has had his DNA tested to confirm his paternity.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timothy_Lincoln_Beckwith

[Retrograde]

29. Beckwith, yes, me, no

Which is what I thought I was replying to (i.e., does everyone get their paternity tested?)

[Dover]

13. dupe/delete

[roguevalley]

3. Edmund Booth, John Wilke's brother was standing on a subway

platform in New York when he stumbled or was jostled and was going to fall into the train. An arm caught him and pulled him back. It was Robert Lincoln.

[Dover]

4. According to Wikipedia it was the other way around -

Booth saved Lincoln -


In an odd coincidence, Robert Lincoln was once saved from possible serious injury or death by Edwin Booth, brother of John Wilkes Booth. The incident took place on a train platform in Jersey City, New Jersey. The exact date of the incident is uncertain, but it is believed to have taken place in late 1864 or early 1865, shortly before John Wilkes Booth's assassination of President Lincoln.

Robert Lincoln recalled the incident in a 1909 letter to Richard Watson Gilder, editor of The Century Magazine:

The incident occurred while a group of passengers were late at night purchasing their sleeping car places from the conductor who stood on the station platform at the entrance of the car. The platform was about the height of the car floor, and there was of course a narrow space between the platform and the car body. There was some crowding, and I happened to be pressed by it against the car body while waiting my turn. In this situation the train began to move, and by the motion I was twisted off my feet, and had dropped somewhat, with feet downward, into the open space, and was personally helpless, when my coat collar was vigorously seized and I was quickly pulled up and out to a secure footing on the platform. Upon turning to thank my rescuer I saw it was Edwin Booth, whose face was of course well known to me, and I expressed my gratitude to him, and in doing so, called him by name.
Months later, while serving as an officer on the staff of General Ulysses S. Grant, Robert Lincoln recalled the incident to his fellow officer, Colonel Adam Badeau, who happened to be a friend of Edwin Booth. Badeau sent a letter to Booth, complimenting the actor for his heroism. Before receiving the letter, Booth had been unaware that the man whose life he had saved on the train platform had been the President's son. The incident was said to have been of some comfort to Edwin Booth following his brother's assassination of the President.<9><10>

[roguevalley]

20. You are right. My dyslexia never lets me down. :) It was the other way

around. Sort of a very weird and personal twist to history. I hope it helped Edmund. He never acted again.

[verges]

24. His name was Edwin, and yes, he did.

He was lready well known at th time of Lincoln' death. And, Edwin laid low for awhile afterwards. But his greatest triumphs as an actor were yet to come! InJanuary 1866, he beagan his legendary Broadway run in Hamlet (100 performances). His fainal performance was in 1891, as Hamlet. He died in 1893 at the age of 59 in his apartmant at the Player's Club in NYC. The actor's club that he had founded and is still going strong.

[roguevalley]

26. actually, I read the biography of John Wilkes that was a best seller

that traced him and all his activities. It told a lot about his family. I am referring to that. I can be wrong or else I'm prematurely senile. I prefer wrong. :)

[Dover]

5. Hmmm...and is it just coincidence that I 've posted this on the anniversary of Willie's death?

...just noticed that. :wow:

[boppers]

10. 12 Lincolns (excluding Timothy)

Counting birth and death dates that's 24, so a probability of 24 out of 365.

Pretty high odds.

[Dover]

11. The Lincoln family portrait

[cali]

14. Hildene

Hildene, located at Manchester in the U.S. state of Vermont, was the summer home of Robert Todd Lincoln and his wife Mary Harlan Lincoln. He was the eldest son of President Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd Lincoln.

Robert Todd Lincoln first visited Manchester, Vermont at age 20 in the summer of 1863 when he, his brother Tad, and their mother stayed at the nearby Equinox House to escape the heat of Washington.

The name Hildene means hill and valley. Completed in 1905 in the Georgian Revival style, Hildene is located on a 300 foot promontory overlooking the Battenkill Valley and a greensward called "The Meadows", the latter a part of the property which is used for horseback riding and outdoor events. A formal garden in the form of a Gothic cathedral's stained glass window was planted in 1907. The window pattern is defined by privet hedge and filled with mixed borders of annual and perennial flowering plants providing the multicolored "stained glass." The garden is especially noted for its collection of over 1,000 herbaceous peonies. In 1908 an Æeolian pipe organ was installed at a cost of $11,500.

Hildene remained occupied by descendants of the Lincoln family until 1975, when the next to last descendant of the Lincoln-Harlan family, Mary Lincoln Beckwith, granddaughter of Robert and Mary, died there. In 1978 the non-profit organization, the Friends of Hildene, purchased the property and began restoration of the house, outbuildings and gardens.

Hildene is furnished almost entirely with Lincoln family furniture, and contains artifacts belonging to Robert Todd Lincoln and his parents. In 1980 the Friends of Hildene restored the Æeolian pipe organ.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hildene

[Clio the Leo]

16. Robert Todd was present at three Pres. assasinations...

Robert Todd Lincoln, eldest son of President Abraham Lincoln, had the unique distinction of being present at three Presidential assassinations. It is a fact that Robert Lincoln was on the scene of three different presidential assassinations, but assassination lore has it that he played a shadowy, almost supernatural role in all three.

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/presidents_and_first_ladies/89601

[Dover]

25. I read that too. And apparently he took it to heart.

When there was noise among his party about him possibly running for the presidency, he wouldn't even consider tempting that fate relative to those experiences and his involvement in all three.

[NCarolinawoman]

17. Fascinating post and all the comments here.

I can understand why Mary Todd might have been susceptible to having a nervous breakdown:

Wife and first lady of the Civil War president, loss of children, loss of husband through assassination. She was surrounded by turmoil and death. She had to endure all of this in the public eye.


Robert was apparently made of very strong "stuff".

[Dover]

21. That was my feeling as well re: Mary Todd

She also lost her brothers in the war, if I recall correctly. I can't even imagine losing one child, but THREE! AND a husband and all that came with that very public life. AND being surrounded by all the death, division and difficulty of those times while being at the epicenter for the pressure cooker of unimaginable responsibilities and decisions required at the White House. Horrific!

I love that website (link provided in the OP for Willie and Tad) that provides information on some very private and intimate exchanges between the family members. You can begin to get a feel for how they were with one another and how they responded to life and loss. So moving...


I think Robert "Bob" might have shut down emotionally as a means of survival. He also created a geographical distance by leaving home early for school and being away from Washington D.C. much of the time. And he, more than the other boys, felt a bit oppressed living in his father's shadow and worked hard to get out from under it.

[Drunken Irishman]

28. Makes you wonder how Jackie O made it...

Thankfully she wasn't alive to see her son's death.

[AzDar]

18. An excellent book on this subject : 'The Last Lincolns' by Charles Lachman.

A really great read... and although I fancy myself to be somewhat of a Lincolnphile, it contains pix and info that I'd not encountered. :)

[Dover]

23. Thanks! ...n/t

[rasputin1952]

27. Robert Lincoln had a life that crossed so many paths and so many

coincidences it is almost surreal. While Lincoln was president, there were claims about sacrifices made by citizens, while Robert was in the WH, safe and sound. This prompted both Abe and Robert to agree that he would enter the Army. He was commissioned a 2nd Lieutenant and served as an aide to several high placed officers, it was rumored he saw action, but there is not definitive proof he did. Regardless, it placated the critics of the Lincoln Administration. There is no reason to believe that Robert did not share his father's bravery. Abe had stood on the earthworks of a fort, well within musket range, an officer beside him was shot in the leg, Abe may have been the target. He also rode without escort on numerous occasions to visit a soldiers home and find respite out side of DC, once having his famous stove-pipe hat shot from his head by a sniper.

Robert was present at the assassinations of Garfield and McKinley, and of course, was in the room where his father died in 1865. It has been said that he felt as if he had some kind of "aura", that brought about the demise of the three. He was successful in the RR industry, and while he did not want to admit it, and tried everything to avoid it, he knew that some of his success was dependent upon his father being president.

Having his mother committed as insane was a tough choice for him, but considering the times and the lack of psychological sciences as we know them today, he did not have much else of a choice, or felt he didn't. Mary was constantly claiming poverty, while having several thousand dollars sewn into her black dresses. She borrowed expensive jewelry, then "forgot" to return it. She only wore black after the death of Lincoln, refused to leave the WH after Johnson had set up residence and she was essentially what we would call agoraphobic today. Considering what she had gone through, and during the war add the fact that her loyalty was questioned because of relatives in the Confederate Army...well, if anyone had a reason to breakdown, she would be a prime candidate.

Almost assuredly, if Robert had decided to enter politics, he would have been elected to any position desired. I think though, that he would have had enough of politics in his life.

The Edwin Booth/Robert Lincoln story is true, and Edwin Booth had once said that he felt as if he had made a small atonement for what his brother John had done. There is no record of a firm friendship after that episode, however Edwin, though almost universally liked by the theater going public, always walked in the shadow of what his brother had done.

Asides to the story that has somewhat odd twists...the house where John W. Booth died on the porch is long gone, one might think it might have been preserved. Like so many other things of that era, it faded away, and just a few yards from where Booth died after being shot in the neck an paralyzed is a road that passes trough the property. The man who shot Booth was an Army Sergeant named Boston Corbett, who had castrated himself after sex with a prostitute to "make up for his sin". He disappeared in the West after a drunken binge, he was never seen again. The action of Booth that night in April at Ford's Theater, set the stage for Radical Republicans to further subjugate the South and made the lives of the Southerners miserable as the occupation was the primary reason for the Ku Klux Klan to be formed, which eventually turned on AA's with horrific results. It has been said that the livestock numbers did not reach pre-CW levels until 1938!

There are so many things involved with the CW and the last Lincoln son, it is difficult to whittle them down and not go on...for pages and pages.