Lincoln, the unknown

242 • LINCOLN THE UNKNOWNTrue, a great many things were stolen from the White Houseduring the reign of the "rosy empress," but the fault was hardlyhers. She made mistakes, of course: one of the first things shedid was to discharge the steward and a number of the otheremployees, saying she was going to superintend the place herself,and put it on an economical basis.She tried it, and the servants purloined almost everythingexcept the door-knobs and the kitchen stove. The "WashingtonStar" for March 9,1861, records that many of the guests whoattended the first White House reception lost their overcoatsand evening wraps. It wasn't long before even the White Housefurnishings were being carted away.Fifty packing-boxes and a score of trunks! What was in them?Trash, for the most part: useless gifts, statuary, worthless picturesand books, wax wreaths, deer-heads, and a lot of oldclothes and hats hopelessly outmoded—things she had wornback in Springfield years before."She had a passion," says Mrs. Keckley, "for hoarding oldthings."While she was packing, her son Robert, recently graduatedfrom Harvard, advised her to put a match to the old trumpery.When she scorned the idea, he said:"I hope to heaven that the car that carries these boxes toChicago catches fire and burns up all your old plunder."The morning Mrs. Lincoln drove away from the White House,"there was scarcely a friend to tell her good-by," records Mrs.Keckley. "The silence was almost painful."Even Andrew Johnson, the new President, failed to bid herfarewell. In fact, he never even wrote her a line of sympathyafter the assassination. He knew that she despised him, and hereciprocated her feelings.Absurd as it seems now in the light of history, Mrs. Lincolnfirmly believed then that Andrew Johnson had been back of theplot to assassinate Lincoln.With her two sons, Tad and Robert, Lincoln's widow traveledto Chicago, stopped for a week at the Tremont House, foundit too expensive, and moved to some "small, plainly-furnished"rooms at a summer resort called Hyde Park.Sobbing because she couldn't afford better living quarters,she refused to see or even correspond with any of her former