Hi, I'm the History Guy. I have a degree in history and I love history and if you love
history too this is the channel for you. On April 9th 1865, General Robert E. Lee
surrendered the Army of Northern Virginia to Union General Ulysses S. Grant following the
defeat of the Confederate Army at the Battle of Appomattox Courthouse. The surrender documents
were actually signed in the parlor of a home owned by a man named Wilmer McLean and they
were witnessed by both Grant and Lee's staff. The last survivor among those witnesses lived
all the way until 1926, and by coincidence was a very famous person, one of the most important
statesmen of his day, this is him later in life. Don't recognize him? Maybe you recognize his dad.
Robert Todd Lincoln was Abraham Lincoln's firstborn son and the only one of Abraham
Lincoln's children to survive to adulthood. His younger brother Edward died of a fever just the
age of three. Robert grew up at a time when his father was practicing law on a circuit and thus
was traveling, gone most of the time, and so their relationship was distant not very close;
Robert once noted that his most vivid memories of his father growing up was Abraham packing
his saddlebags. By the time that Roberts father was elected President, Robert was
attending Harvard University. He described his father's being so busy that they scarcely had
ten minutes quiet time together during his entire presidency. Robert graduated Harvard
in 1864 and briefly attended law school there, but he felt compelled to join the
Union Army and share the risk that everybody else was taking. At first his mother resisted,
his little brother Willie had died in the White House of a fever in 1862, and his mother,
Mary Todd Lincoln, feared that she could not withstand another loss. But Robert eventually
prevailed and his father asked General Grant if Robert could be assigned to his staff. Robert
was made an assistant adjutant and given the rank of captain and that is why he was present
to witness Lee's surrender. Robert had traveled to Washington to visit his parents on April 15th,
and his parents invited him to go to the theater with them but he declined, he had been traveling
on horseback all day and needed a rest. And so Robert narrowly missed his father's assassination.
Robert moved with his mother and his younger brother Tad to Chicago and he continued his law
studies, he was admitted to the bar in 1867. In 1868 he married the daughter of a United
States Senator; they had three children. In 1876 Robert was elected town supervisor
of the town of South Chicago, a town that was eventually absorbed into the city of Chicago;
that was his only elected office of his career. In 1877 he was offered the position of Assistant
Secretary of State by President Rutherford B. Hayes but he declined, although he remained
active in Republican politics. And then in 1881, he accepted a cabinet appointment as Secretary of War
in the new cabinet of President James Garfield. He was with Garfield in the train station in July
of 1881 and witnessed Garfield's assassination. Robert continued to serve as Secretary of War
in the cabinet of President Chester A. Arthur where he was involved in many military reforms,
he left the position in 1885. And then in 1889, he was appointed to the important position of
Minister to the United Kingdom under President Benjamin Harrison where he served for four years.
When he returned to the United States he became General Counsel of the Pullman Palace Car Company,
the world famous maker of railway cars. And when the founder George Pullman died in 1897,
Robert was made president of the Pullman Car Company. He served in that position until 1911
when he left due to ill health but he stayed on as chairman of the board clear until 1922.
Despite his very accomplished life Robert Todd Lincoln has often remembered for three things,
the first was a coincidence. Somewhere in 1863 or 1864 Robert Todd Lincoln was riding a train
from New York City to Washington DC, and while in Jersey City, New Jersey, he was bumped off
a train platform landing in the dangerous spot between the platform and the train. A stranger
reached down and pulled him out and when Robert looked up he realized that his savior was the
most famous actor of the day, a man named Edwin Booth. Only later did Edwin Booth find
out that the young man that he had saved was President Lincoln's son and that, it is said,
to have offered Edwin Booth some solace as he was personally devastated when his younger brother,
John Wilkes Booth murdered President Lincoln. Second, in 1875 Robert had his mother, Mary Todd
Lincoln committed to an asylum, he was concerned about erratic behavior after the death of his
younger brother Tad at the age of 18. Mary was able to get some letters out to her attorney who
was able to convince Robert to let her leave the asylum and live with her sister but it included
some public embarrassment for Robert, and he and his mother never fully reconciled. And finally,
Robert Todd Lincoln is sometimes described as being somewhat unlucky because of his proximity
to three presidential assassinations. He just missed his father's assassination,
he was there when James A. Garfield was assassinated and he was just getting off
a train going to visit president William McKinley when McKinley was shot in 1901.
It is tragic that a man who lived such an accomplished life is remembered for coincidences,
he was there for three presidential assassinations because he was proximate to
power during a tumultuous time. But Robert Todd Lincoln lived an extraordinary life,
he was born poor and found great success and died very wealthy. He was an elder statesman,
he was a leader in his party who was suggested as a candidate for president or vice president many
times but always declined. He was the president of one of the largest corporations in the country,
he was frankly one of the most accomplished men of his era. His last public appearance was May 30th
of 1922 when he appeared with President Warren G. Harding and former president and Chief Justice
of the Supreme Court, William Howard Taft, at the dedication of the Lincoln Memorial. He passed away
in 1926 just a few days shy of his 83rd birthday. He was the last surviving member of the Garfield
and Arthur administration's and the last surviving witness to Lee's surrender. Robert Todd Lincoln
lived an amazing extraordinary accomplished life during one of the most dynamic periods
in American history and darn it, he deserves to be remembered as more than just his father's son.
I'm the History Guy. I hope you enjoyed this edition of my series 5 minutes of history,
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