Lincoln, the unknown

LINCOLN THE UNKNOWN • 25only light they had was from the fireplace or from hog fat.know from accurate descriptions of other cabins on the frontierwhat the womanless Lincoln cabin must have been like. Itsmelled. It was infested with fleas, crawling with vermin.After a year of this squalor even old Tom Lincoln couldstand it no longer; he decided to get a new wife who wouldWeclean up.Thirteen years before he had proposed to a woman in Kentuckynamed Sarah Bush. She had refused him then and marriedthe jailer of Hardin County, but the jailer had since died andleft her with three children and some debts. Tom Lincoln feltthat the time was auspicious now for renewing his proposal; sohe went to the creek, washed up, scrubbed his grimy hands andface with sand, strapped on his sword, and started back throughthe deep, dark woods to Kentucky.When he reached Elizabethtown he bought another pair ofsilk suspenders, and marched whistling down the street.That was in 1819. Things were happening, and people weretalking of progress. A steamship had crossed the AtlanticOcean!