|
|
|
Reviews
| The Lincolns in the White House: Four Years that Shattered a Family. By Jerrold M. Packard. (New York: St. Martin's Press, 2005. Pp. 298, illus., notes, bib., index. $26.95.)
|
|
This narrative history begins exactly on the day Abraham Lincoln and his family moved into the White House: March 4, 1861. James A. Buchanan was happy to depart, and his niece, Harriet Lane, graciously saw to it that a meal awaited the new tenants and their guests. Otherwise, the mansion badly needed cleaning, staffing, restocking, and redecorating. In good time, Mary Lincoln turned her talents and energy to these essential tasks. While keeping track of the major political and military events of Lincoln's presidency, Jerrold M. Packard concerns himself chiefly with the physical and mental health of the family. He gives considerable if unsettling attention to the dreadful sanitary conditions, resultant illnesses, accidents, and deaths that added to the immense stress and anxiety under which the first family lived. By the time a distraught Mary Lincoln departed—she kept Andrew Johnson from moving in for the better part of two months—she was virtually disabled by grief, much as she had been for several weeks following the death of son Willie in 1862. The narrative then continues to complete the sad tale of Mary, who lost her beloved Tad in 1868, and became hopelessly estranged from her surviving son Robert shortly thereafter. Shattered indeed! |
1
|
|
Those who have read widely in biographies of Abraham and Mary Lincoln will know all the sad events detailed in this book. It should find an audience among those who enjoy good books but are not connoisseurs of books about Lincoln and the Civil War. Packard evidently relies on secondary sources, in which he has read widely, with admirable discernment. He remembers to interject the occasional happy moment or circumstance among the various sad events and situations that are his chief concern. He brings Robert Todd Lincoln into focus rather more than the usual Lincoln biographer, even to the extent of sketching his later life, and, very briefly, the lives of his children. He mentions an event remote from the White House, yet apt as a sad comparison: in 1864, Jefferson and Varina Davis lost their five-year-old son Joe, who broke his neck falling off a porch rail. |
2
|
|
Mary Lincoln is naturally central to this book. Packard details the usual bad spells and odd behaviors, but also credits Mary for her frequent good deeds and loyalty to her husband. The result is a balanced treatment of an often unbalanced woman. |
3
|
|
|
Content in the History Cooperative database is intended for personal, noncommercial use only. You may not reproduce, publish, distribute, transmit, participate in the transfer or sale of, modify, create derivative works from, display, or in any way exploit the History Cooperative database in whole or in part without the written permission of the copyright holder.
|