Relationship
Born near Henderson, Kentucky, Ann Mayes Rutledge was the third of ten children born to Mary Ann Miller Rutledge and James Rutledge. In 1829, her father, along with John M. Cameron, founded New Salem, Illinois. Many of the facts of her life are lost to history, but many historians believe that she was the first true love of Abraham Lincoln. The exact nature of the Lincoln-Rutledge relationship has been fiercely debated by historians and non-historians for over a century. It is fairly well established the two were at least friends.
The story goes that Rutledge was engaged to marry John MacNamar, a dubious character who left for New York and promised to marry her upon his return. Rutledge and Lincoln met after this and supposedly fell in love while MacNamar was away and she promised to marry Lincoln after MacNamar released her. For a time Rutledge and MacNamar exchanged letters, but his letters became more formal and "less ardent in turn" and eventually ceased completely. MacNamar never returned before her death.
In 1835, a wave of typhoid hit the town of New Salem. Ann Rutledge died at the age of 22 on August 25, 1835. This sad event left Lincoln severely depressed. Historian John Y. Simon reviewed the historiography of the subject and concluded, "Available evidence overwhelmingly indicates that Lincoln so loved Ann that her death plunged him into severe depression." An anonymous poem about suicide published locally exactly three years after her death is widely attributed to Lincoln. Many years later, after Lincoln's first election as President, Isaac Cogdal, Lincoln's old friend, ventured to ask whether it was true that Lincoln had fallen in love with Ann. "It is true- true indeed I did," Lincoln replied. "I loved the woman dearly and soundly: she was a handsome girl- would have made a good loving wife...I did honestly and truly love the girl and think often-often of her now."
Read more about this topic: Ann Rutledge
Famous quotes containing the word relationship:
“Friendship is by its very nature freer of deceit than any other relationship we can know because it is the bond least affected by striving for power, physical pleasure, or material profit, most liberated from any oath of duty or of constancy.”
—Francine Du Plesssix Gray (20th century)
“The relationship between mother and professional has not been a partnership in which both work together on behalf of the child, in which the expert helps the mother achieve her own goals for her child. Instead, professionals often behave as if they alone are advocates for the child; as if they are the guardians of the child’s needs; as if the mother left to her own devices will surely damage the child and only the professional can rescue him.”
—Elaine Heffner (20th century)
“It was a real treat when he’d read me Daisy Miller out loud. But we’d reached the point in our relationship when, in a straight choice between him and Henry James, I’d have taken Henry James any day even if Henry James were dead and not much of a one for the girls when living, either.”
—Angela Carter (1940–1992)