Portrait Life of Lincoln

Just another biography of Lincoln? Not at all! The author of this book, Francis Trevelyan Miller, grabs our attention with his interesting if lengthy subtitle: “Told from Original Photographs taken with His Authority during the Great Crisis through which He Led His Country – Treasured among the 7000 Secret Service War Negatives in the Brady-Gardner Collection at Springfield, Massachusetts, and in Private Collections, valued at $150,000." The photos in the Brady-Gardner Collection were taken by the well-known Civil War era photographer Mathew Brady, his business partner Alexander Gardner, and their studio staff. They followed the Union armies onto the battlefields, taking photos of the action as well as of Lincoln, military leaders, and ordinary soldiers. They even provided photos of army camps to the Secret Service to look for possible Confederate spies. One set of the over 7000 Brady Studio negatives was purchased by Congress for $25,000 in 1875 (the previously mentioned Secret Service War Negatives). The Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery acquired a different set of more than 5000 Brady studio negatives in 1981.

The chapters in this book cover each aspect of Lincoln’s life and character and feature contemporary photographic portraits and views of significant places. This includes the first and last known photographs taken of the great man himself. The first portrait of Lincoln was taken in 1837 in Illinois at the beginning of his political career, and the last portrait was taken in Washington, DC just a few days before he was assassinated in April 1865. Portraits of his family members are also featured, including his beloved son Willie, who died of typhoid fever at the White House in 1862. One of the last sections of the book includes photographs of people and places connected to Lincoln's assassination.