OCRed data provided
for searching only. june 1888 715
610. John Moore Fisk (WHH interview)
Feby 18th '87 On Saturday Evening I was called out to write the will of Benj Bancroft1 and at the house of Bancroft I found an old friend of Lincoln, whose name is Fisk: he told me the following story which is correct. A man by the name of Pollard Simmons was a good friend of Lincoln in 18346.2 Jno Calhoun was the surveyor of Sangamon County was The Candle box Calhoun3 and a democrat in 18346. Simmons loved Lincoln, who was very poor at that time, and he tried to get Lincoln in some business: he applied to Calhoun as the friend of Lincoln to give him a deputyship in the Surveying business. Calhoun as Simmons remembers it gave Lincoln a deputyship. Simmons got on his horse and went on the hunt of Lincoln whom he found in the woods mauling rails. Simmons Said Lincoln I've got you a job and to which Lincoln replied Pollard, I thank you for your trouble, but now let me ask you a question Do I have to give up any of my principles for this job. If I have to surrender any thought or principle to get it I wouldn't touch it with a ten foot pole? No, you do not Lincoln, said Pollard Simmons, and to which Lincoln replied Ill accept the ofce and now I thank you and my superior for it
LC: HW3357
611. Richard M. Lawrence (WHH interview)
June 23d 88
Mr. Lawrence, a merchant of Williamsville in this County gives me this incident of Lincoln. Lawrence was at the lecture and heard it and saw and heard Lincoln. About the year 1857 an accomplished lady came to this city to lecture to read and to receite ne things from best authors. She was a ne reader &c. At Myers hall on the north side of the square this woman was to Lecture or recite or whatever you call it: her subject one of them was the recital of the piece Nothing to Wear.1 She was reading nely and all was attention and silence in the hall. Lincoln seemed wrapt up in the piece was all attention. In some turn of the piece when all was dead silence Lincoln burst out with a loud ha ha a kind of deep satisfaction expressed in the ha ha a kind of heavenly feeling at the turn of something in the piece. Lincoln felt glorious and forgot for the moment in his deep feeling where he was and what he was doing. The ha ha was the deep and honest Expression of an honest soul red by the triumph of the right.2 The audience was large & was at the time wrapt up in the piece and when Lin
1.
Benjamin Bancroft, a neighbor of WHH.
2.
Pollard Simmons lived in New Salem and was later a miller in Mason County.
3.
A reference to an electoral fraud in Kansas Territory.
1. See William Allen Butler, Nothing to Wear (New York, 1857).
2. Marginal note: an honest & sincere Expression of joy at the victory of the good.
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