Lincoln’s Last Christmas, 1864.
From what we can tell, it seems to have been a good one.
The year had brought more Union victories than defeats, and General Sherman’s march through Georgia to the sea had succeeded in cutting the South in two.
Sherman had captured the City of Savannah on December 21 and presented it to the President as a Christmas gift.
And the City of Washington had celebrated with a 300-gun salute.
A regiment of the 150th Pennsylvania Infantry, known as the “bucktails” for the deer tails attached to their hats, provided security for the Lincoln White House then.
1864 was the unit’s second Christmas encamped in canvas tents along the northern perimeter of the White House grounds, at the present-day location of Pennsylvania Avenue.
Lincoln was fresh off an election victory, and his second term would begin as the war was drawing to a close.
It held great promise.
He would be able to direct the coming post-war period of reconciliation and reconstruction, while continuing to pursue policies promoting the nation’s westward expansion.
And one day, whether as President or after his second term, Lincoln intended to see the West for himself.
“I have long desired to see California… and nothing would give me more pleasure than a visit to the Pacific shore...” Lincoln letter to Charles Maltby, March 21, 1865
First Lady Mary Lincoln, in her twenty-third year of marriage to the President, had recently returned from a Christmas shopping trip to Philadelphia.
She would oversee a Christmas Day reception for the members of the Cabinet and their wives.
Christmas decorations in the White House were not the ‘over-the-top’ variety of today, but garlands of evergreens are likely to have decorated White House mantels and chandeliers in the first-floor reception rooms.
It was also a tradition, then, to display a tabletop orange tower, held together with syrup, which was studded with cloves and decorated with cinnamon sticks. Its fruit-and-spice fragrance would fill a room.
The tradition of a decorated indoor Christmas tree, first made popular by Queen Victoria at Windsor Castle in 1850, had not yet taken hold in America, but it is known that the Lincolns hung Christmas stockings for their children.
In 1864, Lincoln’s oldest son, Robert, was a first-year law student at Harvard. He was embroiled in a protracted debate with his parents over his desire to enlist in the Union army, so that he could experience the Civil War before it was over.
The enlistment matter was sure to have come up during the 1864 Christmas holiday.
It was an argument that Robert would win.
Soon after Christmas, Lincoln would write to General Grant, over his wife’s objection, asking that Robert be permitted to join his personal staff as an aide.
Grant agreed; and the appointment would enable Robert to be present at Lee’s surrender at Appomattox, a story that Robert shared with his father at breakfast on the last day of Lincoln’s life.
We are told that a large Christmas dinner was served at the White House in 1864.
While we aren’t sure what Lincoln ate, many upscale American homes might then have served turkey, oysters, venison, glazed fruits, cakes, candies, eggnog and coffee.
But the White House cooks may have prepared some of Lincoln’s favorites, instead. His favorite entrée was chicken fricassee, a French dish of browned chicken served in a creamy mushroom and vegetable sauce.
Lincoln also liked corn cakes, made from whole corn, milk, a little sugar and flour.
Tad Lincoln, the President’s eleven-year-old son, invited several cold and hungry young newsboys in off the streets to join the Lincoln family for Christmas dinner in 1864; and the President is said to have welcomed them to the family table.
And what did Tad get in his Christmas stocking?
No record exists, but Tad’s favorite outing with his father was the four-block walk they took regularly up New York Avenue to the Stuntz Toy and Candy Store.
The store’s most popular display was the “penny counter,” where children could buy wrapped candies, such as licorice and taffy, and little toys, like a tin whistle, for one cent.
The proprietor, Joseph Stuntz, was a disabled former soldier in Napoleon’s army who made hand-carved and painted wooden soldiers.
These were Tad’s favorite toys.
He had a large collection of them that he used to stage elaborate battle reenactments in front of painted paper facades.
An admission ticket for Tad’s battle reenactments cost a penny. [Some of Tad’s paper tickets survive.]
In 1864, Lincoln was still mourning the loss of eleven-year-old Willie, who had died of typhoid fever two years earlier.
He had been the second little boy which Lincoln had lost.
Little Eddie, almost age four, had died while the family still lived in Springfield, before Lincoln had become president.
Tad, the last little boy left, must have received an abundance of Christmas toys.
Lincoln once said, “I want to give Tad all the toys I didn’t have, and all the toys I would have given to the boy who went away.”
******************************
I’ll see you tomorrow.
— Brenda
Share this post