His little brother Tommy – An Abe Lincoln Story

 

In 1933, while clearing an old cemetery site on a small hill in Larue County, Kentucky, one of the workers from the Works Progress Administration (WPA) came upon a small stone buried just beneath the surface. The stone had some markings on it. Upon closer examination, it was determined the markings were the letters T and L chiseled into the stone.

Since the cemetery was located on the old Redmon family farm near Hodgenville, Kentucky and adjacent to it was Knob Creek, the farm where the Lincoln family lived from 1811 to 1816, historians at time reasoned the stone and the grave were probably connected to the Lincolns.

From pieces of cabinetry he made for neighbors, they determined that the style of the letters on the stone were an exact match for the T.L. that Thomas Lincoln often carved into his work. The stone marked the forgotten grave of the youngest son of Thomas and Nancy Lincoln and the little brother of Sarah and Abraham – Thomas Lincoln, Jr. They called him Tommy. [2]

Very little is known or even remembered about him.

This is the Knob Creek cabin where the Lincoln family was living when Tommy was born. (Photo courtesy of the National Park Service)

The only time Lincoln ever mentioned his little brother – at least in writing – was this tidbit of personal information he included in an autobiographical sketch that he wrote for John L. Scripps, a newspaper reporter, whom Lincoln asked to write his 1860 presidential campaign biography.

The present subject has no brother or sister of the whole or half blood. He had a sister, older than himself, who was grown and married, but died many years ago, leaving no child. Also a brother, younger than himself, who died in infancy.

- AUTOBIOGRAPHY WRITTEN FOR JOHN L. SCRIPPS [C. JUNE, 1860]

Carl Sandburg briefly mentioned Tommy (and rather morbidly embellished his death) in his Prairie Years volume:

Again there were quiet and anxious days in 1812 when another baby was on the way; again came neighbor helpers and Nancy gave birth to her third child. They named him Thomas, but he died a few days after, and Sarah and Abe saw, in a coffin their father made, the little cold still face and made their first acquaintance with the look of death . . .

- SANDBURG, CARL (1960). THE PRAIRIE YEARS – VOLUME I. NEW YORK, NY: HARCOURT, BRACE & COMPANY. P. 30.

Except for how long he lived and the coffin details, Sandburg made no mention of what caused Tommy’s death or where they buried him. Other biographers did the same, and Tommy’s gravesite remained unknown until 1933.

In 1959, a new, more modern tombstone for Tommy was donated by Boy Scout Post 15 of Des Moines, Iowa. The original gravestone – shown in the post-leading photo – is privately owned, and the site of Tommy’s grave with its new headstone is still located where it was found, but the old Redmon farm is not part of the National Park Service.

Perhaps the grave was forgotten, but the boy wasn’t. Lincoln named his fourth son Thomas Lincoln (but nicknamed him “Tad”). Some biographers attribute Tad’s name to his paternal grandfather, Thomas Lincoln. However, given his tumultuous relationship with his father, Abraham Lincoln probably named his son for the little brother he never got to know – Thomas “Tommy” Lincoln, Jr.

Food for thought.

Mac

Works Cited

[1] Roy P. Basler, ed., The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln (8 vols., New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1953). http://quod.lib.umich.edu/l/lincoln/.

[2] Benningfield, Edward (1982). Larue County, Kentucky cemeteries. Utica, KY: McDowell Publications.