What's in a name? A Lincoln circuit riding story

 

Abraham Lincoln maintained that the true "art" of storytelling was to fit the delivery to the audience. One part of that delivery - for which Lincoln was well known - was his ability to change the range, intonation, and pitch of his voice to fit the story.

When riding the Eighth Judicial Circuit, Lincoln often used that "art" to make complex points to a jury. Occasionally however, it came in handy for other reasons. A man named Stephenson, years later, remembered sitting in a courtroom in Bloomington, Illinois watching Lincoln on one of these 'occasions'. [1]

It seems Lincoln was defending a man who was accused of passing counterfeit money, and Lincoln's case was not going well.

Finally, the prosecutor called his chief witness to take the stand. When asked, the man stated his name - J. Parker Greene. When it was Lincoln's turn to cross-examine the witness, Lincoln ignored the entire testimony and immediately attacked the man's name.

Looking at the witness, Lincoln - according to Stephenson - drawled in a somewhat jesting - but suspicious way:

"Why J. Parker Greene? What does the J. stand for?"

"John," was the response.

Lincoln looked at the jury. "Why didn't the witness call himself John P. Greene? That was his name, wasn't it? Well, what was the reason he didn't want to be known by his right name? Did J. Parker Greene have anything to conceal, and if not, why did J. Parker Greene part his name that way?"

Stephenson recalled that although "the whole examination was farcical, there was something irresistibly funny in the varying tones and inflections of Lincoln's voice, as he questioned the changes in the man's name." 

But there was also something in Lincoln's way of intoning his questions that made the jury suspicious of the witness.

"To this day," Stephenson admitted, "I have never been able to rid my mind of the absurd impression that there was something not quite right about 'J. Parker Greene'."

This was another story from Abe Lincoln, Storyteller.

Mac 

Works Cited

[*] The statue shown at the beginning of this post is Lincoln the Lawyer by Lorado Taft. 

[1] Guelzo, Allen C. (1999). Abraham Lincoln: Redeemer President. Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans.