The Lincoln Mailbag: America Writes to the President, 1861-1865

1865

1865 "The latest photograph of President Lincoln," in the words of its caption , turned out also to be the last. It was taken on the White House balcony by Henry F. Warren on Mar. 6, 1865, just two days after Lincoln 's second inaugural. Six weeks later Lincoln was dead. Photograph courtesy of author. A "Last Warning" - in Verse Declare 0 Lord what is the due Of Lincoln and his bloody crew The laural [sic] crown and golden rod He hopes to gain but what says God No murderer of Human Kind In heaven a place will ever find The highest power Creation Knows Accords sweet mercy to its foes While Justice guards the Throne above It's always mixed with peace and Love And man advanced to place and Power Should in the dark avenging hour Never Humanity discard In executing Justice hard Justice and Mercy both disdain To own a place in Lincolns reign Tis Savage malice Hellish pride And lust of Conquest that divide The heart of Lincoln worst of Men This world ever saw or will again The sounds of grief and woe he hears Are musick in the Tyrant's ears Insatiable he still remains a Million slain on hostile plains Fleets to Oceans bottom sunk With blood have made the Tyrant drunk And still he rages in his ire Cities consigned to sword and fire The people driven from their Homes And desert wastes are forces to roam The canopy of Heaven "what woe" Is all the Tent these wretches know Those plains of late rich harvests crowned And every comfort there were found The plains so rich, and in the Shade Content a paradice [sic] had made I 199 Like Eden's garden late they were A Wilderness they now appear But can this state of things endure Has God ordained the humble poor Should still groan neath the Tyrans [sic] power No. there's a limit, there's an hour In his Inscrutible decree When we'll be asked-what, weak as we Art thou decended [sic] to the grave Could power and wealth from Death not save o what can power and wealth then do Since Death has seized even you Rejoice 0 Land since Lincoln's dead His sword they have buried with his head A monument may mark the spot In which his hated bones do Rot Or with the funeral of an ass From City drawn his corps[e] may pass Thrown on the moore in Open day To vultures and to dogs, a prey With curses 'on whose guilty shade A paradise a desert made We leave the carcass now to rot Be it in grave or be it not Suffice the bloody dog no more Can glut his lust in human gore His bow now broke from his left hand His avows too at God's command Are broken useless on the land His progress brought to a full stand His name is no more a terror found To those who live upon the ground His sin upon his bones shall lie Till the Arch Angel from the Sky Shall summon all the dead to appear Before the Judge's Face severeThe Lord has said thou shalt not Kill And also that thou shalt not steal But Lincoln's slain a million men A fallen Dynasty, to sustain 200 And that he might his ends attain To plunder He did not disdain Divine and Human laws by him Were set aside; this Tyrant grim Has seized on Railroads all do know To pour his Legions on the Foe All private property; the whole O'er which the State had no controul [sic] Houses machinery and Lands Are grasped by his rapacious hands The hope of Families, whose tears And cries alike the Tyrant Hears With Heart more hard than any Stone And ears like the deaf adder grown Nor did the Tyrants rage stop here Many were forces [sic] to shed the tear Wives deprived of their chief Stay Husbands and Fathers torn away Sons torn from weeping mothers side Are led to swell the Crimson tide Their life blood shed upon the plain Or else a prisoner to remain Doomed to wear the foeman's chain Few few will whole return again At first the Tyrant's Legions drilled Arid led by men in war well Skilled In numbers they did far exceed...