Framed by Blood: The Mary Lincoln Story

Summary

Podcast Summary: Framed by Blood: The Mary Lincoln Story

Podcast Information:

• Title: The Duncan & Coe History Show
• Host/Authors: Mike Duncan and Alexis Coe
• Episode: Framed by Blood: The Mary Lincoln Story
• Release Date: January 15, 2025
• Description: Bestselling authors and historians Mike Duncan and Alexis Coe explore the intricate and often overlooked stories within history, dissecting centuries with precision and insight. In this episode, they delve into the life of Mary Lincoln, shedding light on her struggles and the injustices she faced a decade after her husband's assassination.

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1. Introduction to Mary Lincoln's Story

The episode begins with Mike Duncan introducing the focus on Mary Lincoln, distinguishing her from her more commonly known identity as Mary Todd Lincoln. Alexis Coe sets the stage by recounting an incident from May 19, 1875, when Mary Lincoln receives an unexpected visit from Leonard Sweatt, a former law associate of her late husband, Abraham Lincoln.

• Notable Quote:
  • Mike Duncan [00:00]: "Today’s episode is about Mary Lincoln, not Mary Todd Lincoln."

2. The Unexpected Insanity Trial

Mary Lincoln, ten years post her husband's assassination, arrives in Chicago under the guise of commemorating the tragic event. However, Sweatt reveals that she is being arraigned for insanity, a charge orchestrated without her prior knowledge. This abrupt trial forces her into a legal battle she was never prepared for.

• Notable Quotes:
  • Alexis Coe [00:47]: "She had one hour to dress for a court date she didn't know she had."
  • Mike Duncan [01:58]: "He shows up, you're being tried for insanity in an hour. Get ready, let's go."

3. Mary Lincoln's Troubled Past and Public Perception

The hosts delve into Mary Lincoln's tumultuous life, marked by the loss of three out of four children and the ensuing psychological trauma. They challenge the historical misconception that frequent child mortality fostered emotional detachment, emphasizing that Mary endured profound grief and paranoia.

• Notable Quotes:
  • Mike Duncan [03:03]: "We're all human beings. They were human beings."
  • Alexis Coe [07:06]: "The loss of her husband... left her feeling alienated and paranoid."

4. The Mechanics of the Insanity Trial

Sweatt, who was not only Mary’s former law partner but also the lead prosecutor, manipulates the situation to declare her insane. Mary is provided a lawyer selected by Sweatt, Isaac Arnold, who fails to mount any defense, resulting in a swift and unjust verdict.

• Notable Quotes:
  • Alexis Coe [04:14]: "Alan picked her attorney... Isaac Arnold."
  • Mike Duncan [15:00]: "That's all. Insane. She's not insane. This is insane."

5. Confinement and Manipulation

Mary Lincoln is committed to an asylum run by Dr. Robert Patterson, surrounded by practitioners who have never truly been her caregivers. Instead of receiving genuine treatment, Mary experiences superficial hospitality, further isolating her from support systems.

• Notable Quotes:
  • Alexis Coe [17:42]: "Notice I haven't mentioned anyone's with her. She's alone."
  • Mike Duncan [21:03]: "She's not getting treatment for insanity. She's getting treatment for being stuck in this place."

6. The Turning Tide: Advocacy and Public Support

Amidst her confinement, Mary Lincoln leverages the media to shift public opinion. Myra Bradwell, a pioneering female lawyer and columnist, becomes instrumental in advocating for Mary, highlighting the injustices she faces. This public support catalyzes political and social allies to rally behind Mary.

• Notable Quotes:
  • Alexis Coe [23:45]: "She has a column... she wrote a lot about how men could have women... committed without due process."
  • Mike Duncan [24:39]: "Mary Lincoln just got committed by a bunch of dudes who had never even met her."

7. Reconciliation and Legal Victory

With the aid of Myra Bradwell and the support of influential figures, Mary Lincoln successfully challenges her insanity verdict. Her sister, Elizabeth Edwards, becomes a pivotal figure in her defense, leading to Mary’s release and the restoration of her financial autonomy. This victory not only frees Mary but also damages her son Robert's reputation.

• Notable Quotes:
  • Alexis Coe [29:54]: "And in short order, the jury voted in her favor."
  • Mike Duncan [31:40]: "Now all is well. We are entering the happy ending phase of Mary Lincoln's life."

8. Estrangement and Final Years

Despite her legal triumph, Mary Lincoln grapples with an estranged relationship with her son Robert, who had orchestrated her initial trial to protect his political aspirations. Fearful of further manipulation, Mary chooses self-imposed exile in France, where she spends six years before returning to the United States. Her final months are marked by reconciliation with Robert, leading to a brief period of familial harmony before her death.

• Notable Quotes:
  • Mike Duncan [33:00]: "But she can’t avoid him forever, can she?"
  • Alexis Coe [34:42]: "At the end, she dies a few months later."

9. Legacy and Lessons Learned

Mike and Alexis reflect on Mary Lincoln’s story, emphasizing the societal tendencies to dismiss strong-willed women as unstable. They highlight the importance of familial support and open communication, cautioning against the destructive consequences of estrangement and misunderstanding.

• Notable Quotes:
  • Alexis Coe [37:27]: "It speaks to a larger problem, obviously, in society that we call women crazy a little too easily."
  • Mike Duncan [36:15]: "Don’t put away your mother. You just ask her to go live with her sister in Springfield."

10. Conclusion

The episode concludes with a poignant reminder of Mary Lincoln’s resilience and the enduring impact of her story. Mike and Alexis advocate for a more nuanced understanding of historical figures, urging listeners to look beyond stereotypes and recognize the complexities of individuals like Mary Lincoln.

• Notable Quotes:
  • Alexis Coe [37:42]: "Just ask your parents for money. Don't put them away. Or at least start with a conversation."
  • Mike Duncan [38:06]: "You do not have to drag your own mother through the mud."

Key Takeaways:

• Mary Lincoln's Misrepresentation: Often mislabeled as Mary Todd Lincoln, Mary Lincoln faced an unjust insanity trial orchestrated by her son and his associates to suppress her and control her legacy.
• Societal Attitudes: The episode sheds light on the historical tendency to undermine women's mental stability when they exhibit strong personalities, reflecting broader societal biases.
• Importance of Support Systems: Mary Lincoln's story underscores the critical role of familial and societal support in overcoming personal and public adversities.
• Legal Injustices: The trial exemplifies the misuse of legal systems to marginalize and control, highlighting the need for due process and fairness.
• Resilience and Advocacy: Through strategic advocacy and public support, Mary Lincoln was able to overturn her wrongful confinement, showcasing the power of collective action against injustice.

Final Thoughts: "Framed by Blood: The Mary Lincoln Story" offers a compelling exploration of Mary Lincoln's life, challenging historical narratives and advocating for a more empathetic and accurate understanding of her experiences. Mike Duncan and Alexis Coe adeptly navigate the complexities of her story, providing listeners with valuable insights into the interplay between personal trauma, societal perceptions, and legal injustices.

Transcript

[Mike Duncan]

Hello and welcome to season zero of the Duncan and company History Show. I'm Mike Duncan, my co host is Alexis Ko and we are too far flung history buddies.

[Alexis Ko]

And this is our wide ranging archival mix of a show.

[Mike Duncan]

And today's episode is about Mary Lincoln, not Mary Todd Lincoln. Mary Lincoln. And this came up in our episode on the rabbit holes that we go down when we're out online. And I was bouncing around finding things and wound up on a entry for Mary Todd Lincoln, which I know is, you know, a real, a real pet peeve of Alexis's. And we touched on it just like a little bit, but there's so much more. Alexis, please now tell us the story of Mary Lincoln.

[Alexis Ko]

At one o'clock in the afternoon on May 19, 1875, an unexpected visitor knocked on the door of Mary Lincoln's hotel room. It was Leonard Sweatt, one of her late husband's law associates. Mary Lincoln, who had bestowed the title of first widow on herself, had just arrived in Chicago ahead of the 10 year anniversary of the assassination of her husband, Abraham Lincoln.

[Mike Duncan]

So this is a big deal.

[Alexis Ko]

This is a big deal. She answers the door, she sees it's Leonard Sweatt. She assumes that he's there because he, he read that she had come to town and he was there to pay his respects. He was not. Sweatt told Mary she had one hour to dress for a court date she didn't know she had. She would be tried for insanity, a charge she didn't know had been leveled against her. She would hear testimony from a dozen male doctors, some of whom she'd never met.

[Mike Duncan]

That's crazy. He shows up, you're being tried for insanity in an hour. Get ready, let's go.

[Alexis Ko]

Yes.

[Mike Duncan]

Does she, does she know any of these doctors? Has anybody talked to her before this trial?

[Alexis Ko]

She. Well, so she had met some of the doctors. She had met some of them at the worst possible moments in her life in the middle of her son's deaths. Notice that was plural deaths. So she met one of the doctors in 1850 when her son Eddie, then three, died from an unknown disease. She met another one in when Willie, who was 11, died. And of course, the doctor who saw her in 1871 when Tad, who was 18, died from lung disease, was there too doctors who were not talking to her in her best moments or assessing her for what they are testifying about? She was not the patient.

[Mike Duncan]

Right. And one of the things that we have talked about and actually put this in Hero of Two Worlds is that there's this kind of assumption that people these days have where. Oh, well, in the past, kids just died pretty regularly. So obviously, parents must not have cared about their kids as much or, like, people die all the time. So obviously everybody's just like a more emotionally cold and reserved. And the thing is, like, no, we're all human beings. They were human beings. When their kids died, it was a tragedy. When your parents died, it was a tragedy. It's just that everybody was walking around with a lot of grief and trauma, and Mary Lincoln dealt with a lot of trauma. There's a lot of kids dying. I. I wouldn't have made it through most of this.

[Alexis Ko]

No. It's three out of four children, which Sweat knows. Like, he knows this. He knows every single tragedy we've just reviewed and more. But he's not just an escort. He's not there to just deliver this bad news and then walk her to the courthouse. He was the lead prosecutor.

[Mike Duncan]

Wait, but he was Lincoln's former law partner?

[Alexis Ko]

Yes.

[Mike Duncan]

He's not there to defend her. He's there to prosecute her.

[Alexis Ko]

Yes.

[Mike Duncan]

Does she have an attorney?

[Alexis Ko]

Yes, she does. Sweat took care of that, too. He chose her attorney, a man by the name of Isaac Arnold. He was chosen by Sweatt to lead the defense. But I want to back up first, because obviously Mary Lincoln shows up in Chicago expecting a very different scene.

[Mike Duncan]

Yeah. She's the widow of a martyred president. I'm assuming she thought she would show up and everybody would pay their respects to her. That's what she's there for. That's what she deserves.

[Alexis Ko]

She doesn't expect the best. She thinks that her presence will remind people of her great loss. She does feel, rightly so, that she's been mistreated in the aftermath of Lincoln's assassination, a posture she'll soon deem premature. We have to go back in order to understand this very briefly. April 14, 1865. A notorious day in American history. The night Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. But we're going back to the day so earlier. It started out much better than most in the Lincoln White House. The presidency is hard on any marriage. The Lincolns were no exception. A civil war is not the best for marital relations. So he realizes that Mary could, you know, use a date. Night. The Confederacy had just surrendered six days old, and he's. He's, like, very cute about it. He sent her a note requesting permission to accompany her on an afternoon carriage ride and then to see our American cousin at Ford's Theater. So it was like he was courting her. And the driver, of course, he was eavesdropping on Lincoln because, you know, it's Lincoln and he's saying really interesting things. He's 42 days into his second term and yet there he is talking about their future. And, and part of this is he is trying to sort of make amends with Mary, but they're talking about taking a train ride across America, all the way to California, a steamer to Europe. Lincoln wants to make it to Jerusalem. So he promises Mary, after this, you will have a different life. And hours later, that was true.

[Mike Duncan]

Yeah. And she's already lived this life of like unimaginable tragedy and is about to be sitting right next to her husband when he gets shot.

[Alexis Ko]

It's anachronistic to say that she had ptsd. It's not hard to imagine. And before that, her moods were admittedly unpredictable. But the loss of her husband to such profound violence right in front of her and her three children, to illness and other intimates, to various scandals and disappointing situations, left her feeling alienated and paranoid.

[Mike Duncan]

I think that's fair.

[Alexis Ko]

Right? Right. So, okay, so there's a famous print from the night that Lincoln was assassinated, and I think this sums it up pretty well. His entire cabinet is next to his bedside, but there is someone missing Mary because the cabinet men he had appointed had banished Mary. She's wearing her blood soaked dress and she is not allowed to be in the same room with her husband's body.

[Mike Duncan]

How can they do that?

[Alexis Ko]

They're men. She's a woman. It's the 19th century. Like any first lady, she's no stranger to being assailed by men, in government, by the public. It doesn't help that we're talking about a time when yellow journalism and the stories about like her, her existence as a truly nomadic widow seem to the public like she has a scandal a year. And it sells very well. So these sensational headlines did leave the impression before the 10 year anniversary of Lincoln's assassination. It left the impression of a volatile existence. The problem was that when it came to the insanity trial, her usual response to this kind of scrutiny wasn't applicable. It didn't work. So when Lincoln's friends or foes treated her poorly, she would just physically disappear for a long bout. She would hole up in a hotel room or she would flee the country and write a never ending number of letters in her own defense. That's what she had been doing. That's why people think her name is Mary Todd Lincoln. When William Herndon, another one of Lincoln's awful law partners, described her quote, unlovableness as the kind that felt like a toothache, kept one awake day and night. And remember, Herndon, as I talk about before, is a spurn suitor of Mary's. But in general, he was not the only person who found her to be outspoken and dramatic and a bit too much.

[Mike Duncan]

Yeah, we talked. Herndon came up in the. In the rabbit holes episode and where I admittedly goaded you into correcting me, because this is where Mary Todd Lincoln comes from, rather than Mary Lincoln.

[Alexis Ko]

Yes, yes. So in 1875, she's been the widow of Lincoln for a decade, and it has been lonely. She's been experiencing these migraines, and her most recent one, which struck while she was wintering in Florida before the trial, felt different to her. It was accompanied by this nightmare, and it was terrible. She couldn't ignore it. She had dreamt that Robert, her only surviving son, had fallen ill and it was terminal. And so she needed to talk about this with someone. But she doesn't necessarily believe it's true. She doesn't really have anyone to talk to, but she's worried about him. And she thinks that maybe this is like a manifestation of being worried about her son. The mother's intuition. She's paranoid, yes, but she has a lot to be paranoid about. So she telegrams him. She hops on the next train bound for Chicago. She goes straight from the station to Robert's law office, which ends up helping him quite a bit.

[Mike Duncan]

She goes there before she goes to the hotel?

[Alexis Ko]

Yes. She hasn't heard back from him yet, so she goes to his law office. With all that percolating, she's not in the best state. She may have made a scene. She saw Robert was. Well, she was relieved. And also, Mary Lincoln walks into your law office. It's not a surprise, you know, that she is Robert Lincoln's mother, but you're not expecting her, so obviously everyone's going to pay attention to her. And if she looks like she's been traveling all day from Florida to Chicago and she also has had a migraine, she's going to look the part. And by the way, this is exactly how a colleague of mine described another colleague who had just come to work after having a migraine but could not miss a meeting, I think they're making a big deal out of it because these witnesses also noted that Mary asked Robert to accompany her to the hotel and check these smoke alarms in every room, as if that was really odd. But Chicago had just been up in flames.

[Mike Duncan]

Right. So they're saying, like, look, at this weird lady. She wants him to do this crazy thing, but it's Chicago at this moment in history, which burns down, like, every five years.

[Alexis Ko]

So Robert is, you know, he's mortified, which I do get. He wasn't expecting her. But this is an overreaction because it's not about her, and it's not totally about the anniversary of his father's death because he has his own agenda, just like she has her own agenda. He wants to run for office, and people need to remember that he is the son of Abraham Lincoln. If Mary is there, she's going to dominate the headline. So his advisors tell him what he already wanted to hear, silence her. And the easiest way to do that in the 19th century is you just declare a woman insane.

[Mike Duncan]

So this is all Robert?

[Alexis Ko]

Yes, it's Robert, his advisors, and people who just didn't like her and hadn't liked her for a long time and felt like they had this ownership over Lincoln's legacy and his memory.

[Mike Duncan]

Yeah. Okay. So this is about controlling the legacy and memory of Abraham Lincoln for Robert Lincoln's future political prospects. And Mary Lincoln is just, like, in the way. So does she. Does she know that her only surviving child is behind this plot to have her declared insane and silenced?

[Alexis Ko]

No, because he has been playing the role of dutiful son. He stopped by to visit her that very morning. He said, I will see you this afternoon. To his credit, technically true, because he was waiting at the courthouse. She doesn't suspect him. She doesn't have enough time to. Sweat told her this was Robert's idea. But clearly Robert had feared his resolve because she's not crazy. So he sent Sweat, who had, as predicted, grown impatient with Mary. She did not want to go to the courthouse for obvious reasons. So he began to threaten her. She could walk with him to the courthouse, or he could have a policeman put her in manacles. And if she chose that route, she should probably know that the press was waiting at the courthouse.

[Mike Duncan]

Jesus. Jesus fucking Christ.

[Alexis Ko]

Yes. So she has no choice. Mary Lincoln has to go with Sweat to a kangaroo court, where in the process of three hours, everything will be taken away from her. 18 witnesses, including Robert, testified to her mental state.

[Mike Duncan]

Many of which we've already established, had never, I think, maybe even met her before. So what? So what's her lawyer doing? She's got a lawyer, right?

[Alexis Ko]

Yes. Isaac Arnold, Mary's appointed lawyer by the prosecution. He didn't call a single witness in her defense. He asked a few of the doctors to confirm their credentials, and when he Was satisfied that they were indeed experts. He had no other questions for them. And Mary, meanwhile, this person who is crazy is frustrating everyone in the room, particularly journalists, because they're there to see some sort of indication of her madness. They wanted her in manacles. They wanted her looking disheveled, as she'd been described in the law office. But instead she is sitting there quietly, absolutely shocked into silence.

[Mike Duncan]

Yeah, she's getting absolutely railroaded here. How is this even legal?

[Alexis Ko]

No, no one seemed concerned that at the trial of the widow of Abraham Lincoln, the great emancipator, every procedure had been violated. She should have received legal notice of an impending hearing in advance. She should have had enough time to hire her own attorney, to consult with her own attorney, to call witnesses, any sort of preparation, but there was none. So it didn't take a long time for the all male jury for them to come to a conclusion. It took 10 minutes for them to declare her insane. Guess who the court designated as her conservator? Robert. They revoked her financial autonomy and the court ordered her committed to an asylum run by Dr. Robert Patterson. Now, Dr. Patterson had been there for all three hours. He had testified against Mary in court, but that was the first time they actually met when he took her into custody.

[Mike Duncan]

That's all. Insane. She's not insane. This is insane. And I think if I'm doing the math here, right, we're like four hours and ten minutes since she was told that this was all happening, right? Because she got told an hour before the trial starts, Then the trial takes three hours, then they deliberate for like 10 minutes. We're like four hours and 10 minutes later, and she's been stripped of everything by. By a bunch of dudes who have never literally met her.

[Alexis Ko]

Right? And notice I haven't mentioned anyone's with her. She's alone. She is utterly alone.

[Mike Duncan]

Well, she wasn't alone. She had her son, Robert, who would always be there for her, right? Her last surviving close relative. He was there to take care of her, check the smoke detectors, make sure nothing bad happened to her, and then he's like one of the ringleaders of all this.

[Alexis Ko]

Yes, And Robert has Dr. Patterson and all the other fine men who are helping him with his problem. Woman Dr. Patterson was well known for treating lady patients at Bellevue, which was not anything we would recognize as a hospital. It's basically a multi story house set on a couple dozen acres of countryside outside of Chicago. And it's a funny place. I mean, it had bars on the patient's windows, but you Weren't allowed to call them bars. Dr. Patterson insisted they be called ornamental screens.

[Mike Duncan]

Great.

[Alexis Ko]

Let's. I think we should hear from Dr. Patterson. So I am going to give you Mike Duncan his notes from May 1875. So when she was admitted. And can you read from the top of page 26, please?

[Mike Duncan]

Oh, I'm. I'm now playing the role of Dr. Patterson. Direct primary source. May 1875.

[Alexis Ko]

20Th.

[Mike Duncan]

Mrs. Mary Lincoln, admitted today from Chicago, age 56, widow of ex President Lincoln. Declared insane by the Cook County Court, May 19, 1875. Case is one of mental impairment, which probably dates back to the murder of President Lincoln. More pronounced since the death of her son, but especially aggravated during the last two months. May 21. Mrs. Lincoln slept well last night. Today her pulse is 100, but she has no fever. May 22. Mrs. Lincoln has seemed cheerful and is apparently contented. She took a long walk this morning. Sleeps well at night.

[Alexis Ko]

Mary Lincoln was Dr. Patterson's most high profile patient at Bellevue. He had better paying patients. But Mary Lincoln, by far the most famous patient. But I use the word patient pretty loosely. He did not treat her like a patient. She took her meals with Patterson's family, His wife, his children in full dinner dress. Or she ate alone in her private suite. She was free to wander the grounds. She had full use of the Patterson family carriage.

[Mike Duncan]

So she's getting special treatment here?

[Alexis Ko]

Yeah, she's not getting treatment for insanity. She's getting treatment for being stuck in this place. People know she shouldn't be. Most of the women under his care were an inconvenience to fathers who could not marry them off. Or husbands who had no patience for postpartum depression or personal opinions.

[Mike Duncan]

Yeah, it does not sound like she is somebody who is like a danger to herself or society or they believe is a danger to herself or society or anything like that. This is just a woman who's at this place with them, and they have to take care of her. So what's his end game? What's Patterson's endgame? Does he hope to just keep Mary around forever?

[Alexis Ko]

You know, he starts bringing in reporters to view the grounds where Mary Lincoln spends her days and write these glowing articles about his care of the first widow. But the funny thing is, of course he can arrange the interviews, but it does not mean that she has to talk to them.

[Mike Duncan]

Okay, so that sounds awful. She's basically being treated as his proposal right now.

[Alexis Ko]

Yes, it is awful. And it's so awful that it actually starts to work in her favor. One of the reporters was from the Chicago Post in mail. And even though she, of course, refused to meet with him, it didn't stop him from printing a totally false story about her. They wrote that her hair had gone white and her dress was shabby. Was really something to behold. The thing is, the dates don't allow for that kind of change. That story was published within a week of the Kangaroo court, but it surprised readers. They were accustomed to stories about her extravagant taste in fine clothing. So they began, for the first time, to pity her, how far she had fallen.

[Mike Duncan]

But she's not gonna take this lying down, right? Like, she's, you know, people are beginning to pity her. But does she have any sort of plan for herself on how to get out of this situation that she's found herself in?

[Alexis Ko]

Yeah, she has. She has some ideas. She isn't waiting for a savior, but she's trying to cast someone in that role. And one of the people she's trying to cast in that role is Myra Bradwell, who was the first woman admitted to the Illinois bar. But the U.S. supreme Court blocked her license. They argued that a woman's sphere did not extend to the law. Still, she managed to do some things without it.

[Mike Duncan]

The supreme court literally stepped in and blocked her from getting the law license that she had gotten.

[Alexis Ko]

Well, it's a very masculine endeavor.

[Mike Duncan]

Wow. Okay, so how is she going to help Mary without having a law degree? Can she get into anything?

[Alexis Ko]

Well, here's the thing. She has a column. And a column can be more influential than any law degree under the right circumstances. The column was called women's rights, which would tank now, but was apparently quite popular back then. And she wrote a lot about how men could have women in their family committed without due process. There was one case in particular about a Calvinist minister who successfully incarcerated his wife in an asylum based solely on one medical examination, during which the doctor had done no more than taken her pulse.

[Mike Duncan]

Wow. I mean, Mary Lincoln just got committed by a bunch of dudes who had never even met her.

[Alexis Ko]

Many of them had not. So Myra wrote a ton about that case and got the laws changed. So it's really promising for Mary, thinking this is a high profile case. It has great potential for Myra. So she's invested. It looks good.

[Mike Duncan]

And what's her process?

[Alexis Ko]

Myra is writing. Obviously she's doing research about the case, but she's going to people in Lincoln's inner circle. We have only heard from the people in that inner circle who didn't like Mary, but there were plenty who did and who also felt terrible. About what was happening, because, remember, this has been all over the news. So she works Mary's most influential contacts. And within months, politicians and these, like, revered Civil War generals are voicing public support. They're giving quotes, and in some instances, they've been writing their own commentary and their own opinion pieces and. And other newspapers are noticing. So, like, the Chicago Times, whose motto was print the news and raise hell, took the issue on as its own.

[Mike Duncan]

Okay, so this is. This has become a real cost lab here. And there's justice is a coming down the mountain.

[Alexis Ko]

Yes, but that's what's happening out in the open. Mary is also working the back channels.

[Mike Duncan]

She.

[Alexis Ko]

She has enlisted her sister, Elizabeth Edwards of Springfield, Illinois, to write letters about what she knows because something happened before the trial. Robert Lincoln went to visit his Aunt Elizabeth in Springfield.

[Mike Duncan]

But wait, she wasn't at the trial. Right, because you said Mary had, like, nobody who was there in her corner.

[Alexis Ko]

No, she was not at the trial. Robert had visited his aunt for support before the trial, but she had refused. And she, for whatever reason, did not make it to Chicago. But that whole story was left out of the narrative for a very important reason. Aunt Elizabeth had offered an alternative. She wanted to care for Mary, for her sister, in her own home. But Robert had refused her offer because he felt threatened. She would still be high profile. His mother would still have financial independence.

[Mike Duncan]

Oh, Robert, you large adult son, you.

[Alexis Ko]

And then he goes and he makes it worse. He's obviously offering commentary himself, but he's not quoting experts or relying on testimony because, you know, it was garbage or explaining the law or anything that would be useful to his cause. Instead, he. He's attacking Myra. Myra Bradwell, who's well liked, who's respected for being. And he calls for this, a high priestess of a gang of spiritualists.

[Mike Duncan]

How is this all gonna work out for him?

[Alexis Ko]

It's not working. It's backfiring. He has to walk it back. So he needs to make some sort of grand gesture to the public and by extension, his mother, that would convince everyone that he's not a monster. So he agrees. He will send Mary to live with Elizabeth, hoping that the papers will just accept this as an act of love. But they did not. Everything was now obvious. There was no decent reason that Mary Lincoln should have been put through that ordeal. In her diary, she wrote, I was so cruelly persecuted by a bad son on whom I had bestowed the greater part of my all man.

[Mike Duncan]

I mean, if you're doing. If you're doing stuff that, like, starts to Drive out, like, a mother's love for you. You've. You've really stepped in it.

[Alexis Ko]

But you. You can see how palpably hurt she is. Also sort of saying, I would have given you anything you wanted if you had just asked for it. And she likes Springfield, but she's not comfortable. She just can't relax because she's almost like a caged bird. I mean, she is a caged bird. She has to be there. And so she's also taken to carrying a pistol, which did not, given the circumstances, strike the Edwards household as unreasonable or paranoid, which was a real change. Elizabeth's husband, Mr. Edwards, was a big fan of Mary's, and that was a nice change, too. He once said that she could, quote, make a bishop forget his prayers. I know. And what's also nice is he was a lawyer, and he agreed to represent Mary at her next hearing. He performed beautifully in court, and in short order, the jury voted in her favor.

[Mike Duncan]

Yeah, it's almost like if you're given adequate counsel and not just, like, thrown in front of a kangaroo court that has decided to conspire to already have a verdict in mind, that, you know, there's going to be a different outcome. So how did. How did this all go for Robert? Like, how did this all work out for him?

[Alexis Ko]

Not great. Not great. He did not run for office, and Mary wrote to him. About a month later, she was back in Springfield. She wrote, you have tried your game of robbery long enough. He didn't reply. And they didn't really communicate directly. It was through lawyers or extended family. The estrangement was a tremendous loss. On top of the public humiliation. She didn't have anyone, but it also left her room and these new opportunities to find intimacy and happiness in unexpected places. She grew very close to her nieces and nephews, and the press had never been kinder to her, which was really nice. And then her finances improved. The late Charles Sumner, famous for, among other things, being caned in Congress, had initially met resistance when he was a friend of the Lincolns and a friend of Mary's, had lobbied Congress to establish a pension in 1869. And back then, lawmakers had cited a lack of precedent, which was true. Mary was the first. First widow by assassination. But after they saw this ordeal with Robert play out in the papers and saw that she was truly alone, they voted on their own accord to retroactively increasing.

[Mike Duncan]

Okay, so now all is well. Right? We are. We are entering the. The happy ending phase of Mary Lincoln's life. She spent years being kind of vilified. And then it hit an acute crisis where she's like, front page scandal news. She's this crazy woman that needed to be locked up. And then the fever broke, and now it's sunshine for her and happiness, right? Tell me it's sunshine and happiness for Mary Lincoln.

[Alexis Ko]

It's not quite sunshine and happiness. America had finally come around to the first widow. And Mary thought about using that shift in public opinion to further Abraham Lincoln's legacy, you know, because he really needs the help, you know. But that meant that she would be high profile. And being high profile, she had found, put her at risk. She was still worried about Robert. And more than that, she was worried about herself. As long as Robert was around, he had a new baby and another on the way, and she was desperate to be a grandmother to them. She feared that Robert would use that against her. She knew that if he reached out, she would reconcile and then probably lose everything. So it was just too risky. It was it. She had to cut herself off at the source.

[Mike Duncan]

But she can't avoid him forever, can she Avoid him forever?

[Alexis Ko]

She can if she moves abroad. So in 1876, she declares rather dramatically, I go in exile alone. And she settles in this small commune in southwest France. And it was known for, like, temperate climate and natural warm springs. It was the kind of thing that people, you know, went to the continent for. It took about 20 minutes to get across the small town by foot. But it wasn't provincial. It was a place that wealthy Europeans frequented. And there were fashionable casinos and invitation only social clubs. So Mary, who spoke French, remained abroad for six years, six pretty happy years. And then her arthritis started acting up and her eyesight weakened. She couldn't really walk those wide boulevards and admire the colorful dresses. So she didn't have much time left. Living abroad didn't make sense. Her fear of Robert didn't make sense. But what seemed very clear to her is that she didn't have a lot of time left. So even if he harbored these acrimonious plans against her, he wouldn't be able to enact them before she died. So she goes to Springfield and he comes right away to see her. And not only does he come to see her right away, but he brings one of her granddaughters. And she's excited to see him again and is really grateful for the time that they have together.

[Mike Duncan]

So they did get to spend some time together.

[Alexis Ko]

At the end, she dies a few months later. She was buried next to Lincoln, wearing the ring he had proposed to her with that he'd had engraved love is eternal. And that was true for husband and wife and as it turns out, for mother and son. Because though, as you said, it seemed like he might even be turning a mother's love, he hadn't. Years before they reconciled, Mary had asked Myra Bradwell to prepare a will, and she left Robert the entirety of her estate. It was worth roughly 1.6 million today.

[Mike Duncan]

Wow. And that's when they're still not speaking to each other.

[Alexis Ko]

That's when he had her locked up.

[Mike Duncan]

Yeah. It sure feels like Robert could have gotten whatever it is that he wanted out of all of this simply by going about it like, a different way.

[Alexis Ko]

Yes. He could have gone about it a very different way. It's a. It's incredibly sad. It's a. It's sad to read as a historian, obviously, everything is. In hindsight, it's quite easy to participate in coulda, woulda, should haves, but my goodness, it's a real lesson for us. Don't put away your mother.

[Mike Duncan]

No, don't put away your mother.

[Alexis Ko]

She's going to give you the money anyway.

[Mike Duncan]

Yeah. Or you just ask her to go live with her sister in Springfield.

[Alexis Ko]

Like, it's embarrassing me.

[Mike Duncan]

Have some conversations with your mother about these things. And then, of course, the, you know, like, it's. It's not like Mary Lincoln looms large at this moment in, like, the American historical imagination, besides just being Lincoln's widow. And what that means is, like, one of the few things that I think people do kind of know about or if they know anything, is like, oh, Mary Lincoln kind of crazy. Right. That's, I think, the first thing that leaps to anyone's mind if you know even a few things about her. It's like one of the two or three first things.

[Alexis Ko]

You know, It's a really sad story, but I hope that we try to remember her for the eccentric, mercurial delight that she was and for the partnership she provided. Lincoln, this is like one of these fights I feel like I'll be fighting forever. But I think it. It speaks to a larger problem, obviously, in society that we call women crazy a little too easily.

[Mike Duncan]

Right. Like any. Anytime, there's a bit of personality that starts to come out of anyone who's not supposed to have a personality. Like a first white, Like a. Like a first lady. Yeah. Then it's just, well, she's crazy.

[Alexis Ko]

Okay. So what we learned, we learned it's Mary Lincoln, not Mary Todd Lincoln. She wasn't crazy. She was colorful. Just ask your parents for money. Don't put them away. Or at least start. Start with a conversation. Don't call women crazy. Anything else?

[Mike Duncan]

Yeah. If you want to run for office, just have a conversation with her.

[Alexis Ko]

Just run for office, man. Just do it on your own.

[Mike Duncan]

Yeah. You do not have to drag your own mother through the mud.

[Alexis Ko]

These are lessons we can all take to heart. You take us out.

[Mike Duncan]

That was the Duncan & Company show. I was Mike Duncan, she was Alexis Ko. She still is Alexis Ko, and I still am Mike Duncan, and that was our show.