Looking back at Lincoln: On May 5, 1864

Its a little hard to imagine in this day and age. Its hard to imagine that anyone would send - to the president - a pair of hand-knitted socks; even harder to imagine an era when the president, this particular president anyway, would likely wear them. Harder still to imagine that this president would sit down in the midst of a Civil War and write a personal note of gratitude. Oh for the days when the country was less crowded.

It still amazes and impresses me that Mr. Lincoln always took time to converse with the 'regular people;' the aged, the poor, the ordinary citizens. Of course that is one of the peculiar traits that Mr. Lincoln brought with him to the White House -- he thought of himself as one of the regular people, and never lost that self-image. From all accounts (by his personal secretaries John Hay and John Nicolay,) he never even referred to himself directly as the president. The humility was real: and undoubtedly the source of his great patience.

On this day in 1865, Mr. Lincoln wrote to an octogenarian Massachusetts woman who had sent him a pair of hand-knitted socks. In the midst of war, sleepless hours at the telegraph office, lines of petitioners, meetings with his cabinet, and growing anxiety over daily fighting in the Wilderness, Lincoln apparently found time to write her an appreciative reply:

Executive Mansion,
Washington, May 5, 1864.

Mrs. Abner Bartlett

My dear Madam.

I have received the very excellent pair of socks of your own knitting, which you did me the honor to send. I accept them as a very comfortable article to wear; but more gratefully as an evidence, of the patriotic devotion which, at your advanced age, you bear to our great and just cause.

May God give you yet many happy days. Yours truly

A. LINCOLN

I wonder what Mr. Obama would do if he were to receive a pair of hand-knitted socks from a little old lady in Massachusetts?