Today, a recently erected sign in the Sand Creek Recreational Area marks the portion of the Paris-Springfield road traveled by the Lincoln family’s horse-and-oxen drawn wagons. And a bronze monument, situated in front of Jimmy Ryan’s Restaurant at the corner of Main and Main in downtown Decatur, designates the old courthouse structure’s exact location.

Decatur hosts numerous Lincoln sites — some well known and identified by distinctive Daughters of the Revolution bronze markers, and others relatively unfamiliar.

“Significant things happened in Abraham Lincoln’s life in Decatur and Macon County,” says Sandi Trezzo, head of Decatur Public Library’s adult services division. “Lincoln slept here; he had friends here; and he was here on business.”

Decatur also played a significant role in Lincoln’s political launch. Diagonally from the first courthouse monument, a statue depicting the 21-year-old with his bare foot on a large stump commemorates Lincoln’s first political speech in 1830. Dubbed the Stump Speech, his oratory on navigation of the Sangamon River bested two candidates for the legislature and caught the attention of area politicians.

Lincoln’s family settled on what is now the Lincoln Trail and Homestead State Park, ten miles west of Decatur via Route 36. Their log cabin was on a bluff above the Sangamon River. Lincoln split rails for his father’s ten acres, and also cut 3,000 rails for Macon County Sheriff William Warnick. Lincoln even traded 1,000 rails for enough homespun brown material to make trousers.

Life in Illinois took its toll. Lincoln’s family suffered with ague in late summer, and they borrowed corn from neighbors to survive the winter. One time, Lincoln broke through the ice when crossing the Sangamon to reach the Warnicks. But rather than return home, he finished the two and a half mile trip, frosting his feet. Lincoln remained with the Warnicks for
three weeks, reading the sheriff’s Illinois Statutes while his feet healed.

Although Lincoln left Decatur in March 1831, his contact with the city continued through 1861. When he became an attorney in 1837, Lincoln’s practice covered the Eighth Judicial Circuit. A marker at the James Millikin Mansion commemorates the road he traveled here.

Lincoln argued three cases in the log cabin courthouse, now standing at the Macon County Historical Society and Museum Complex. The Lincoln Library, a collection of reference books and newspapers, is available for research at the complex. An impressive 9-by-22 foot mural called “As the Sowing, the Reaping” from the old Stephen Decatur High School occupies the front wall.

The Birks Museum in Millikin University’s Gorin Hall owns an 1851 letter written by an exasperated Lincoln, urging his client to provide information for his case. Bronze casts of Lincoln’s hands and a replica of Lincoln’s death mask also are displayed.

The rebirth of Lincoln’s political career began in Decatur on February 22, 1856. Newspaper editors opposing the Kansas-Nebraska Act met at the Cassell House, later remodeled as the old St. Nicholas Hotel. Their resolutions served as a blueprint for the new Republican Party. Lincoln spoke at the meeting, and later emerged as a party leader.

Four years later, Decatur hosted the Illinois Republican convention. With no building adequate for the delegations or spectators, a 70-by-100 foot circus tent was erected and dubbed, “The Wigwam.” Lincoln was frontrunner as Vice Presidential candidate until Richard Oglesby turned the Convention upside down. Creating a slogan that appealed to ordinary men, he asked John Hanks to carry two rails from a fence Lincoln and Hanks once made into “The Wigwam.” Their banner, “Abe Lincoln, The Rail Splitter Candidate for President of 1860” resulted in an endorsement for Lincoln, and the celebration nearly wrecked the tent. A modest plaque, attached to the parking lot railing of the First National Bank of Decatur, marks this historic event. Later that year Oglesby’s slogan led to Lincoln’s nomination at the Republican National Convention in Chicago — and, ultimately, the presidency.

Because Lincoln’s friend was elected governor in 1865, Illinois was the first to ratify the 13th Amendment banning slavery. Arriving in the Capitol in April 1865, a fatigued Oglesby declined Lincoln’s invitation to join him at the Ford Theater and made an appointment for the next day. After Lincoln was shot, Oglesby stayed with him until he died. Oglesby accompanied the body to Springfield, and lead the association constructing Lincoln’s Tomb.

Richard Oglesby lived at 421 W. William Street. Now on the National Register of Historic Places, the Oglesby Mansion is open the last Sunday afternoon of the month. The Mansion contains books, furniture, and clothing donated by Oglesby’s family, and some rooms are decorated as Oglesby left them.

“They’re really irreplaceable,” says Trezzo of Decatur’s artifacts. “Interest in Lincoln hasn’t waned at all.”

Freelance writer Vicki Cox is the author of five children’s biographies and an anthology of features entitled, “Rising Stars and Ozark Constellations.”

This article originally appeared in the October / November 2003 issue of Decatur Magazine.
It may not be reproduced or redistributed in whole or in part without the publisher's consent.
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