Speaker 1: And we returned to our American stories. Up next, the
Speaker 1: story about a consequential year and a consequential man. Here's
Speaker 1: the late historian Charles Braslin Flood to tell the story
Speaker 1: of eighteen sixty four and Abraham Lincoln.
Speaker 2: On that New Year's Day of eighteen sixty four, the
Speaker 2: Civil War had been going on for thirty three months,
Speaker 2: on its way to being what is the bloodiest war
Speaker 2: in American history to date. In November of eighteen sixty four,
Speaker 2: there would be a presidential election that was going to
Speaker 2: be a referendum on the war. In hindsight, it's easy
Speaker 2: to say that, of course Lincoln was re elected and
Speaker 2: the North won the war, but there were an endless
Speaker 2: number of times during eighteen sixty four when it did
Speaker 2: not look that way. Please remember that military success or
Speaker 2: failure was inextricably linked with what would be Lincoln's political
Speaker 2: success or failure. Four days before the Baltimore political Convention
Speaker 2: in early June that nominated Lincoln to run for a
Speaker 2: second term, Ulysses S. Grant presided over a military disaster.
Speaker 2: His forces had been taking terrible casualties as they moved
Speaker 2: south against Roberty Lee through the battles of the Wilderness
Speaker 2: and Spotsylvania. Now he started one of the largest attacks
Speaker 2: of the war at a place in Virginia called Cold Harbor.
Speaker 2: Grant had one hundred and eight thousand men and threw
Speaker 2: them straight at Lee, whose fifty nine thousand men were
Speaker 2: well entrenched. In the first hour, and some say even
Speaker 2: within the first twenty minutes, seven thousand of Grant's men
Speaker 2: were killed or wounded. With the Union attack repulsed and
Speaker 2: nothing gained, but the bad news went on for many
Speaker 2: more weeks. At one point Grant had lost more than
Speaker 2: forty thousand men in thirty days, and that figure grew
Speaker 2: to his having lost sixty thousand men in forty five days,
Speaker 2: sixty thousand men dead and wounded to advance sixty miles.
Speaker 2: Also during that time, Juwbile Early once again erupted from
Speaker 2: the Shenandoah Valley. He led a massive raid that brought
Speaker 2: a force of twelve thousand men right to the edge
Speaker 2: of Washington's fortifications, five miles from the White House. Lincoln
Speaker 2: and Mary went out to Fort Stephens, the focal point
Speaker 2: of the attack. At one moment, the Confederate advance came
Speaker 2: to within one hundred and ten yards of the fort. Foolishly, Lincoln,
Speaker 2: wearing a stovepipe hat that made him a target seven
Speaker 2: feet high, climbed right up on the parapet in the open.
Speaker 2: Some Confederate snipers positioned a few hundred yards away started
Speaker 2: firing at him, missing him but wounding with a ricochet
Speaker 2: an officer who was standing just below the parapet. It's
Speaker 2: worth mentioning that this is the only time that an
Speaker 2: American president has been under enemy fire while serving in office.
Speaker 2: All of this news frightful Union casualties throughout northern Virginia
Speaker 2: and Confederate striking at the Capitol, was coupled with bad
Speaker 2: news from Georgia. As William To comes to Sherman slowly
Speaker 2: struggled towards Atlanta on the Southern Front. That coincided with
Speaker 2: half true rumors of peace feelers going back and forth
Speaker 2: between North and South. The Northern public was increasingly confused
Speaker 2: and disappointed in Lincoln and his administration. Much of the
Speaker 2: press was coming out against Lincoln. Even his own advisers
Speaker 2: were warning him that the tide is turning against us.
Speaker 2: The Union's economy was intertwined with all this speculation and
Speaker 2: gold in New York City indicated fears that the North
Speaker 2: financial structure might collapse. The national debt was at its highest,
Speaker 2: the public credit was at its lowest, and the Treasury
Speaker 2: was running out of money paying for a war that
Speaker 2: appeared to be at a stalemate. In foreign business dealings
Speaker 2: involving valuations of the dollar, it dropped to a new
Speaker 2: wartime low of thirty seven cents. Prosperous Republicans who wanted
Speaker 2: Lincoln to be reelected were nonetheless getting rid of Greenback's
Speaker 2: by buying land. They were doing that on the theory
Speaker 2: that land would still have value even if the Democrats
Speaker 2: were elected, and his decided to repudiate federal government securities
Speaker 2: right down to leaving the dollar worthless. On August twenty third,
Speaker 2: Lincoln involved himself in an extraordinary act that demonstrated his
Speaker 2: belief that he would lose the election. When the members
Speaker 2: of his cabinet assembled for one of their Tuesday afternoon meetings,
Speaker 2: they found Lincoln asking each of them to sign without
Speaker 2: knowing what it said the back of a folded over
Speaker 2: and sealed document, what Lincoln had written that morning, what
Speaker 2: they could not see, and what he was asking him
Speaker 2: to endorse. Sight unseen by placing their signatures on It
Speaker 2: was this statement this morning, as for some days past,
Speaker 2: it seems exceedingly unlikely that this administration will be re elected.
Speaker 2: Then it will be my duty to so cooperate with
Speaker 2: the President elect as to save the Union between the
Speaker 2: election and the inauguration. And though he was pledging himself
Speaker 2: and his cabinet to make an orderly transition to what
Speaker 2: he thought was going to be McClellan and a democratic administration.
Speaker 2: So if anybody tells you that by eighteen sixty four
Speaker 2: Union victory or Lincoln's reelection was in the bag, I
Speaker 2: would respectfully refer them to Lincoln's own estimate of the situation.
Speaker 2: He remained determined to do everything he could. He backed
Speaker 2: Grant and his other generals to the hilt, but speaking
Speaker 2: to a radical Republican, he told the man, you think
Speaker 2: I don't know, I am going to be beaten what
Speaker 2: I do, and unless some great change takes place, badly beaten.
Speaker 2: A week after Lincoln said that, Sherman set a telegram
Speaker 2: north that read Atlanta is ours and fairly won. Everything
Speaker 2: changed there. It was the news bringing the hope that
Speaker 2: so many in the North had lost even the most
Speaker 2: ardent Confederates saw this as the enormous strategic victory that
Speaker 2: the Union had won. Atlanta, the south second most important
Speaker 2: city after Richmond, dead center in what had been Confederate territory,
Speaker 2: had fallen. There were still nine weeks until the election,
Speaker 2: but everything began to go Lincoln's way. He was re
Speaker 2: elected in an electoral college landslide, not so decisive in
Speaker 2: the popular vote, which came in with Lincoln winning by
Speaker 2: four hundred thousand out of four million cast. There was
Speaker 2: yet another exceedingly important factor in play, and I have
Speaker 2: to say that a number of studies I think have
Speaker 2: not given this quite enough attention. That was the military vote.
Speaker 2: Here you had close to a million young men from
Speaker 2: families of different political persuasions. Many of these soldiers were
Speaker 2: being shot at every day. No one could be sure
Speaker 2: that they would vote to continue a war in which
Speaker 2: so many of their comrades were being killed and maimed.
Speaker 2: It's worth noting that in the military vote, ballots cast
Speaker 2: by soldiers who knew they were continuing, they were voting
Speaker 2: to continue risking their lives. He triumphed by three to one,
Speaker 2: and on Christmas Day of eighteen sixty four, Lincoln read
Speaker 2: another telegram from Sherman which said, I beg to present
Speaker 2: you as a Christmas gift the city of Savannah with
Speaker 2: one hundred and fifty heavy guns and plenty of ammunition,
Speaker 2: and also about twenty five thousand bales of cotton. So
Speaker 2: as eighteen sixty four ended, the war was at last
Speaker 2: winding down in thirteen more weeks Roberty Lee, which surrendered
Speaker 2: a grant at Appomatox Courthouse. Seventeen days after that, Lee's
Speaker 2: West Point classmate Joseph E. Johnston, which surrendered the Confederacy's
Speaker 2: other sizable forces to Sherman in North Carolina. Between those
Speaker 2: two surrenders, John Wilkes Booth assassinated Abraham Lincoln in Washington
Speaker 2: on April fourteenth, eighteen sixty five. At the end of
Speaker 2: my book, I look ahead to those events of eighteen
Speaker 2: sixty five, but my detailed treatment ends where it began,
Speaker 2: with the White House New Year's Day reception of eighteen
Speaker 2: sixty five. And here again is the essential Lincoln, the
Speaker 2: ultimate politician who nevertheless transcended the political strife, the indispensable
Speaker 2: man who appeared in our nation's convulsive hour, the resolute
Speaker 2: figure who proved that character is destiny. At this reception,
Speaker 2: a nurse who served with the Union Army, Ada Smith,
Speaker 2: had come by herself to the White House to pass
Speaker 2: through the long receiving line and wish the President well.
Speaker 2: As she came through the door, she recognized a crippled
Speaker 2: lieutenant named Gosper, who had lost a leg and was
Speaker 2: hobbling forward on crutches as he made his way to
Speaker 2: the East Room in the fighting around Petersburg earlier in
Speaker 2: the year. Ada had been his nurse when he was
Speaker 2: brought in with his right leg shot off, and they
Speaker 2: became friends during the time she cared for him. They
Speaker 2: greeted each other and joined the line of hundreds that
Speaker 2: wound around the East room, waiting to shake hands with Lincoln,
Speaker 2: who had married beside him. From where he stood, Lincoln
Speaker 2: saw Gosper. He broke away from his place and came
Speaker 2: striding from the other side of the big East Room
Speaker 2: to greet him. He took Gosper's hand, and what Ada
Speaker 2: remembered as and I quote a voice unforgettable, said God
Speaker 2: bless you, my boy. As they left, Gosper said to her,
Speaker 2: I'd lose another leg for.
Speaker 1: A man like that, and a special thanks to Charles
Speaker 1: Braslin flood this audios from the US National Archives, and
Speaker 1: we thanked them for it. The story of eighteen sixty four,
Speaker 1: a consequential time for our nation when we were perhaps
Speaker 1: never more divided, and how Abraham Lincoln rose to the occasion.
Speaker 1: That story here on our American Stories