PRAIRIE PAGES February 12, 2009

Lincoln delivers his farewell address in Springfield, Illinois, as he departs for Washington, D.C. to begin his presidency.

Volume 8 Number 1 Bicentennial Issue: Lincoln’s Years in Illinois 1830-1860

By Pete Harbison

GLOSSARY A BOY’S HARD LIFE The 100-mile trip by wagon stepmother, supported her after took two and a half weeks. Thomas Lincoln died, and was born on Thomas Lincoln purchased called her “Mother” for the –a disease February 12, 1809, in 160 acres near Little Pigeon rest of his life. causing weakness, Hodgenville, Kentucky, to Creek where he farmed for the v o m i t i n g , a n d Thomas Lincoln and Nancy next 14 years. While growing up in constipation; caused by Hanks. Abraham had an older , Abraham, like most eating dairy products sister, born in 1806, and a As an adult, Abraham children and teenagers of the (milk) or meat from younger brother, born in 1812, Lincoln claimed the Indiana time, worked very hard. cattle poisoned by who died in infancy. farm as the place where he Because he was tall and very certain plants “grew up.” It was also the strong, the young Lincoln soon Thomas Lincoln farmed place where his mother died in was doing the work of an widow–a woman frontier land for a living, as did 1818 from “milk sickness.” adult. Much of that work was whose husband has most settlers in Kentucky at The next year, Thomas Lincoln chopping down trees to clear died (a man whose that time, but by 1816, Thomas married Sarah Bush Johnston, the woods for fields and then wife has died is called Lincoln had lost three farms a widow with three children. building fences by splitting the a widower) because his legal claims to the She provided the care that logs into rails. In 1860 (in a property were uncertain. Abraham and his sister needed. reply to a request for an Frustrated, he decided to move Abraham had a good autobiography from John L. his family west into Indiana. relationship with his- Scripps of the Press 1 and Tribune) Lincoln described himself and his called “the winter of the deep snow.” The life at age eight in Indiana with these words: Lincoln clan decided that the more northern climate of Illinois was too harsh and decided to Abraham, though very young, was move back south. Thousands of other Illinois large of his age, and had an axe put settlers would make the same decision after into his hands at once; and from that experiencing the winter of 1830–1831. till within his twenty-third year he was almost constantly handling that On the return trip, the Lincolns met a most useful instrument—less, of group of settlers who talked them into staying February 12, 2009 course, in plowing and harvesting in Illinois in what is present-day Coles County. seasons. Once again, Thomas Lincoln started a farm. But, Abraham Lincoln, now 22 years old, knew

PAGES THE LINCOLNS MOVE TO ILLINOIS the time had come to put down his axe and start a new life away from his family and farming. In In the 1830s many extended family members 1831, he moved to the village of New Salem in lived and worked together. Very few farmers Sangamon County.

PRAIRIE lived alone at this time because it took so much GLOSSARY work to provide food, clothing, and shelter. The LINCOLN MOVES TO NEW SALEM men cleared trees, built cabins and fences, extended family–a family farmed, hunted, chopped wood for cooking and In 1831, only one out of forty people in that includes in one heating, and built furniture. Cooking, caring for Sangamon County lived in a town or village— household near relatives children and the old, and making clothes, most of the rest were farmers. But Lincoln (cousins, aunts, uncles, candles, soap, and all the other necessities to made the decision to move away from farming grandparents, nieces, survive were the chores usually done by the and find a new way to support himself. He nephews, etc.) in addition women. It was a difficult life; everyone in the settled in the little village of New Salem where to the parents and their family had to work very hard, and having many he lived and worked for the next six years. children (nuclear family) family members to help with all the work was very important. Lincoln chose New Salem because a homestead–a home and businessman, Denton Offutt, hired him to work the land used or farmed In March of 1830, the Lincolns moved on a flatboat crew going down the Sangamon, by the family living there again, this time traveling 200 miles west into Illinois, and Mississippi rivers to New Orleans. Illinois. Thirteen members of the extended Lincoln had made this journey once before, in clan–family family walked behind wagons loaded with all 1828, when he was nineteen years old. The two their belongings. They settled on uncleared land trips to New Orleans did more than provide along the Sangamon River near Decatur, and Lincoln with jobs. In New Orleans, he saw there the family worked to establish a new being practiced. homestead. Trees were felled to build a cabin and to clear land to plant crops. Their first year in Illinois was a memorable one. The winter was brutally cold and snowy and was later

LINCOLN IN NEW SALEM

Lincoln was a hard worker and through his work with an axe quickly became known as the “rail splitter”

Artist: Fletcher Ransom

2 Volume 8 Number 1 - Lincoln Bicentennial Issue: Lincoln’s Years in Illinois 1830-1860 Some historians believe his memory of One well-known story about Lincoln during what he saw there stayed with him for the rest his years in New Salem involved his wrestling of his life. Offutt got to know Lincoln better match with the tough leader of the Clary’s after this trip. He planned to open a general Grove Boys, Jack Armstrong. Because his boss, store in New Salem and hired Lincoln to be the Denton Offutt, had bragged that Lincoln was store clerk. smarter and stronger than any of the Clary’s Grove Boys, Jack Armstrong challenged Farmers in Illinois during the early 1800s Lincoln to a wrestling match to prove

February 12, 2009 were able to grow enough food to live on and otherwise. Even though Armstrong was not as have a little surplus. The surplus was used for big as Lincoln, he was an experienced fighter. trading. Before manufactured goods were As Lincoln started to get the better of available in Illinois, almost everything was Armstrong, all of the Clary’s Grove Boys PAGES made by hand: soap, candles, cloth, clothing, threatened to jump into the fight. Lincoln said shoes, furniture, and everything else a family he would fight all of them—one at a time. By needed in the home. The few items purchased showing that he was not afraid, Lincoln earned in stores were acquired by bartering one set of the respect of Jack Armstrong and the Clary’s PRAIRIE goods for another. For example, a farmer might Grove Boys. Lincoln and Armstrong became trade three pigs and twenty barrels of corn for a good friends. GLOSSARY new gun, gunpowder, shot, and a new skillet. This was called the barter system. Offutt Young Abraham was a popular member of surplus–extra; more planned to bring such goods to his store and the New Salem community. He was an than is needed or can have Lincoln take care of the trading and excellent storyteller and debater. Clerking in be used selling (to people who had cash). Both men Offutt’s store was a good job for meeting thought New Salem was a good location for people, and Lincoln quickly made many barter–to trade items this kind of business because so many new friends. Almost everyone in the area came to without the exchange settlers were moving into the area. know him during the next six years. Having of money many friends would help him later when he YOUNG MEN IN NEW SALEM started his military and political careers. shot–small lead or steel pellets used in a In the 1800s very few settlers in Illinois lived Working at the store also gave Lincoln time gun alone. In 1830 Sangamon County had 13,000 to study. Lincoln, like most children living and residents and the census shows that only 2 of working on subsistence farms in rural America board, boarded–to them lived alone. During his six years in New during the 1800s, had little chance to attend provide or to be Salem, Lincoln did not have his own home but school on a regular schedule. The total time he provided with regular lived with many different New Salem spent in school added up to about one year of meals and lodging: a homeowners. He traded or bartered his labor for formal education, but this did not keep him boarder is someone a place to sleep and meals. Lincoln, like other from learning. While he worked at Offutt’s who pays or works for “boys” without families, chopped wood, helped store, he continued to borrow books and food and a place to harvest crops, or split rails for fences to keep a practice mathematics. He was a very smart stay roof over his head. young man and improved himself by taking advantage of every learning opportunity that debate, debater–a Young men in their twenties were usually came his way. formal, organized called “boys” until they married and had discussion of two children. There were many more single men sides of an issue or than women on the frontier at this time, and question; a debater is finding a wife was not easy. Many times these s o m e o n e w h o boys referred to the adult men and women with participates in the whom they boarded as “Aunt” or “Uncle.” The discussion New Salem area had several groups of these young, unattached men—Clary’s Grove Boys, subsistence farm–a Island Grove Boys, Sangamon River Boys, and farm that provides the the Sand Ridge Boys—who were friends and bare minimum with did things together. The boys competed in little or no surplus for wrestling matches as well as running, jumping, sale or trade and horse-racing competitions.

Written by Peter C. Harbison, Illinois Historic Preservation Agency Edited by Laura Reyman ©Education Services, Illinois Historic Preservation Agency 3 Volume 8 Number 1 - Lincoln Bicentennial Issue: Lincoln’s Years in Illinois 1830-1860