Mary Todd Lincoln Became a Laughingstock After Her Husband's ...
Apr 13, 2018Hours before, she had witnessed the point-blank assassination of her husband Abraham Lincoln at the nearby Ford’s Theatre; now, she had been banished from the president’s bedside by a furious Secretary of War Edward Stanton, who kicked her out of the room when she began to cry hysterically. Nearby, her husband was dying—but his wife of 23 years wouldn’t be there to see it. It was a stark preview of what awaited the First Lady after Lincoln’s death on April 15, 1965. Mary never saw her husband again. After his assassination, she struggled to survive—and became a laughingstock despite her precarious mental health. Today, we might see her erratic behavior as evidence of her possible bipolar disorder or as a sign of the trauma and loneliness she experienced during the chaotic days following her husband’s murder at the hands of actor and Confederate sympathizer John Wilkes Booth. But at the time, Mary’s behavior was seen as evidence that she was an improper woman. Mary Todd Lincoln had always had a hard time meeting the severe expectations for women of her era. Women, even famous wives, were expected to focus on the home and not seek attention or appear in public, but Mary loved the spotlight and had a knack for publicity. This created friction during her husband’s life, and after his death it would prove disastrous. The first whiff of trouble came in the form of Mary’s own reaction to her husband’s death. Though the era was known for its lavish displays of mourning, social custom also dictated that upper class women suppress their emotions in public. But Mary, who had also lost two of her sons in childhood and who is thought to have been bipolar, showed no restraint in her grief. Soon after Lincoln’s death, Washington was filled with rumors of the scenes Mrs. Lincoln was making within the White House. She terrified onlookers with her expressions of pain. Later, in a tell-all book about the days after the assassination, Mary’s servant, dressmaker, and confidante Elizabeth Hobbs Keckleyrecalled “th... (History)
