Mary Todd Lincoln (1818 - 1882)
Mary Todd with her husband Abraham Lincoln
December 13th 1818: Mary Todd Lincoln born
On this day in 1818, the future First Lady of the United States Mary Todd Lincoln was born in Lexington, Kentucky. Born to a prominent and wealthy family, Todd was fortunate enough to receive a good education. She moved to Springfield, Illinois, where she met the young politician and lawyer Abraham Lincoln. Her parents disapproved of Lincoln due to his poor background, but the couple married in November 1842. They went on to have four children - Robert, Edward, William, and Thomas. Mary staunchly supported her husband’s political career, even while members of her family supported the Confederacy during the Civil War that Lincoln’s election prompted. The First Lady was widely unliked in the White House and often accused of being mentally unstable, perhaps a result of the death of their son Edward in 1850 and William in 1862. She was sitting next to the President when he was shot dead by John Wilkes Booth in Ford’s Theatre on April 14th 1865. Mary Todd sunk even further into depression in 1871 when her youngest son Thomas died, which led her sole surviving son Robert to bring her to court on charges of insanity in 1875. The charges were successful and the former First Lady was committed to an insane asylum for a few months and rarely spoke to her son after the incident. After living abroad for a few years, Mary Todd returned to Illinois and died of a stroke in July 1882 aged 63.
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