Mary Lincoln

Előszó

Foreword
SEVERAL years before his Lincoln the President (volumes I and II) was published in 1945, my husband, J. G. Randall, asked me to collaborate with him in two of its chapters: "The House on Eighth Street" and "Sifting the Ann Rutledge Evidence." As a result of this request I spent many months working in old letters and documents, getting as close to the Lincoln marriage as possible. The Herndon-Weik manuscripts had finally been opened to the public in 1942 and it was thus possible at last to investigate these private papers of William H. Hern-don, whose account of Mrs. Lincoln had been largely impressed upon the public mind.
In preparing a biography, as in a court trial, one examines all available evidence and weighs the reliability of those who give testimony. To find out about the Lincoln marriage it was necessary to go deeply into a study of Herndon, the most featured witness in the case of Mary Lincoln. It was my good fortune that, at the time I was working with Mr. Randall, his research assistant was David Donald, who was then engaged in the study which led later to the publication of his Lincoln's Herndon.
The long-end result of my collaboration with Mr. Randall in those two chapters (and in no other) was our conviction that Mary Lincoln needed a new trial before the court of historical investigation, that in view of much new material and new means of checking on some of the old "evidence" which had been accepted, judgment should be appealed.
This book is that new hearing in the case of Mary Lincoln. Its aim, however imperfectly accomplished, has been to go over the evidence, old and new, pro and con, to consider it afresh, and to come nearer the truth about Abraham Lincoln's wife.
But a biography should be more than a court trial; it should include portrayal of character. As far as lies within my power I have tried to restore, from tested historical material, the personality of Mary Lincoln.
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