Mary Lincoln
Significant Others
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Mary Lincoln's Life After the Assassination
Most of Mary Lincoln's time after the assassination seems to have been spent mourning her husband, fretting over his legacy and trying to ring money out of people. She fought with the city planners of Springfield who had constructed a central monument in which to house Lincoln's grave - even though it was almost finished by the time she got involved. When Congress finally agreed to her demands for a posthumous stipend, she immediately complained it was not enough. The night before her son put her on trial for insanity, she drank what she believed was a lethal dose of laudanum. It did not harm her because the pharmacist, having recognized her, omitted the toxin from the prescription. Ten years
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