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Come-Outers And Community Men: Abraham Lincoln And The Idea Of Community In Nineteenth-Century America, Allen C. Guelzo

Civil War Era Studies Faculty Publications

The most eloquent and moving words Abraham Lincoln ever uttered about any community were those "few and simple words" he spoke on the rear platform of the railroad car that lay waiting on the morning of February 11, 1861, to take him to Washington, to the presidency, and ultimately to his death. As his "own breast heaved with emotion" so that "he could scarcely command his feelings sufficiently to commence" (in the description of James C. Conkling), Lincoln declared that "No one, not in my situation, can appreciate my feeling of sadness at this parting." To leave Springfield was to …