Lincoln's Unknown Private Life: An Oral History by His Housekeeper Mariah Vance 1850-1860

Mariah Vance, an African American, worked for Abraham Lincoln as a domestic in Springfield, Illinois, from 1850 to 1860. In 1900, Adah Sutton, a white teenager, took systematic notes on Vance's by then often-repeated stories of life with the future President. Those notes form the basis for the work reviewed here. Its authenticity has been questioned, but its contents are scarcely earthshaking. Vance's most controversial assertion, that Lincoln was secretly baptized by a Baptist minister after his election as President, remains unverifiable. Other anecdotes describe details of the Lincolns' domestic economy, the strained relations between Lincoln and his wife, the rise of local attorney Lincoln to national political prominence. The whole adds up to a buff book, an interesting addition to the body of Lincolniana. Photos not seen by PW. (Oct.)