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ABRAHAM AND MARY : Love Is Eternal

© Dedicated to : Sweet

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The probability that we may fail in the struggle ought not to deter us from the support of a cause we believe to be just. ~ Abraham Lincoln ~ (1809-1865, Sixteenth President of the USA)

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On November 6, 1860, the people of the United States of America elected Abraham Lincoln their 16th president. Only five and one-half months later, tragedy would strike America in the form of a civil war.

On April 12, 1861 at 4:30AM, the newly-formed forces of the Confederacy would attack Fort Sumter in Charleston--a Union Army base. Soon, the South would secede from the Union, beginning with Virginia, and then just weeks later, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Arkansas. By time the nation finished dividing, eleven states had joined the Confederacy.

Lincoln would stand beside stones that marked over 3,500 fallen soldiers at the Soldiers' National Cemetery at Gettysburg on November 19, 1963. There he would deliver perhaps the most infamous speeches of all time.

On April 15, 1865, while enjoying a British comedy at Washington DC's Ford Theatre, Lincoln would be shot and killed, his wife Mary by his side. He would leave behind a broken nation and a broken-spirited wife who would never recover.

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The daughter of a prominent family in Lexington, Kentucky, Mary Ann Todd (b.12/13/1818) enjoyed a cultured life, appearing in school plays, excelling in school and speaking French. While living with older sister Mrs. Ninian (Elizabeth) Edwards in Springfield, Illinois in the Fall of 1839, Mary would meet Abraham Lincoln for the first time. Not her only suitor, Abraham suffered competition--with the likes of Stephen Douglas.

In the end, Abraham stole her heart away. The lovers married on November 4, 1842 at her sister's home before Reverend Dresser and a group of thirty family and friends. On Mary's gold wedding band, Abraham had inscribed the words "Love Is Eternal."

"Nothing is new here, except my marrying, which to me, is a matter of profound wonder." Abraham Lincoln, in a letter, 1942

A small second-floor room at the Globe Tavern acted as home to the newlyweds. In 1843, blessings came in the form of their first son, Robert (1843-1926). Due to Abraham's success as an attorney and politician, they purchased a home in 1944 at Eighth and Jackson, Springfield. Together, they would fill that house with love, laughter and more children. 1846, the year that Illinois elected Abraham into the House of Representatives, their second child, Edward ("Eddie") would be born. On February 1, 1850, at the age of three years and ten months, Eddie succumbed to what may have been pulmonary tuberculosis. William Wallace Lincoln, nicknamed "Willie" a third son, came into their lives on December 21, 1850. Then, on April 4, 1953, a fourth son, Thomas, known as "Tad," would be named for Abraham's father.

The copyright of the article ABRAHAM AND MARY : Love Is Eternal in Romance Through The Ages is owned by Lynne Remick . Permission to republish ABRAHAM AND MARY : Love Is Eternal in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.