marriage

On the other hand Lincoln, according to Charles Strozier and David Donald, had trouble moving from the familiarity of all-male gatherings to intimacy with a woman. According to Strozier, both Speed and Lincoln “found solace in discussing their forebodings about sexuality—their intimate maleness substituted for the tantalizing and frightening closeness of women.” In Donald’s words, “(Lincoln) was worried about how to go about transforming the adored object of chaste passion into a bed partner.”²³ One measure of Lincoln’s uncertainty was his age when he married. He was thirty-three years old which is seven years older than the typical groom of this period. Most men in Springfield married at 24, and even those who had come to the city as bachelors were routinely married by 31.²⁴

Other historians cite Lincoln’s letters to his friend Joshua Speed as evidence of his uncertainty about marrying. In this interpretation only after Speed answered that he was more contented married than single did Lincoln become involved with Mary Todd again. Yet if we place the Lincoln courtship within its contemporary context, such inquiries emerge as routine occurrences.²⁵ What Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd did in delaying their marriage was such a commonplace episode that we don’t have to use it as a predictive factor for their future happiness together.

In fact the timing of the transition to marriage was the most controversial aspect of marrying, and especially young men often wrote their friends to inquire as to their evaluation of marriage. Abraham Lincoln was no different than Daniel Webster and Henry Channing and thousands of other American men when he sought counsel from a male friend about his experience. The real point here is that both Joshua Speed and Abraham Lincoln were nervous about marriage. For self-made men, the creation of their own family circle might inhibit the independence and autonomy they had so carefully crafted for themselves in a male environment in new urban settings. In the great dilemma of the 19th century facing middle-class males, was a manly life compatible with the domesticity imposed by this new cultural ideal of companionate marriage? And on the other hand, could they be true men of the republic who grounded their civic spirit in the creation of a family unless they married?²⁶

Much has been made of the suddenness of the Lincoln wedding. In the event’s classic symbol the cakes were still warm; the bridesmaids recruited the day of the wedding; and there were only thirty guests. The groom is reported to have said that he was going to hell—a sentiment that other grooms of the time frequently seconded as they anxiously contemplated an uncertain future state. Note here those pessimistic proverbs about