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324CIVIL WAR HISTORY Despite its length, this study effectively demonstrates Cushing's qualities as a commander of men and as an authentic hero of the Civil War. David E. Meerse New York City Dear Mr. Lincoln: Letters to the President. Edited by Harold Hölzer. (New York: Addison-Wesley, 1993. Pp. xix, 380. $26.95.) This is a delightful book. Harold Hölzer, a widely published Lincoln scholar at New York City's Metropolitan Museum of Art, has compiled a charming sampling of letters written to Lincoln during his presidency. Folks across the North (and occasionally from the South) poured out their feelings to the beleaguered president. Great men and women wrote, of course, but Hölzer draws mainly from the outpourings of the plain people. They rightly divined in Lincoln someone who was both like them and yet a man for the ages. The president, said one of his private secretaries, elicited "communications from the trustful and sincere" (19). They wrote to tell Lincoln how to manage the government or conduct the war—be firm, most said, though one urged him early on to "make peas" now (67). Most of the writers were job seekers; the most inventive made his request quoting passages from Shakespeare and the Bible. Lunatics wrote: one urged "Resign your seat to me" and he and God would convert the capítol into a "Lunatic Asylum" to house all secessionists (61). Wags sent brief missives: "Yesterday I worked hard all day, and wore out my boots. Please send me a new pair by mail" (no). Lincoln heard from the helpful and the crackpots—an inventor made sandals sure to cure soldier's sore feet; another had perfected "Felt, Union, Ventilated, traveling overshoes" (191). Others offered "magnetic balms" to cure virtually everything, or sure-fire remedies for constipation. Some were windy correspondents; most got directly to the point. Relatives of a captured deserter inquired: "Is John Gallagher to be shotAnswer please" (9 1 ). He was not shot, but he deserted again. But the cranks and cowards were outnumbered by humble folks who merely wanted to do something for their country and president. Gifts and offers flowed in daily. A ninety-year-old woman sent a pair of knitted socks; the mail brought a gold watch, a hand-carved cane, a pair of American eagles, $868.00 from a repentant thief, and various dribs and drabs of money to help the war effort. Henry Clay's son made a present of his father's snuff box. (Lincoln was glad to have it; Clay was his idol.) The president's hard-working assistants, John Nicolay and John Hay, who handled the avalanche of letters, wisely deflected the sending of a "mammoth ox" named for General Grant. The volumes of presents increased dramatically as the 1864 election neared. One can hear America singing in many of these letters. Early in the war, an anonymous friend of freedom admonished Lincoln to remind the nation about the slaves and their suffering. Lincoln was never to forget his high calling and BOOK REVIEWS325 that he stood "on the hearts of widows and orphans and childless mothers to be, and the voice of their wailing goes up to God this day" ( 1 55). On the eve of the presidential election of 1 864, when Lincoln worried about his chances against the Democratic nominee, the popular Gen. George McClellan, a citizen reassured "Uncle Abe" that he was not to worry: "The frauds and conspiracies of Copperheadism will avail not" (135). Lincoln, of course, saw very few of the thousands of letters that came his way, but the man for the ages left them for history. That would make Lincoln smile. Bruce Clayton Allegheny College Strained Sisterhood: Gender and Class in the Boston Female Anti-Slavery Society . By Debra Gold Hansen. (Amherst: The University of Massachusetts Press, 1993. Pp. xi, 231. $30.00.) The first major study ofany local antislavery society, this analysis ofthe Boston Female Anti-Slavery Society presents a profile of the group's members and attributes divisions in the group to class differences. Hansen is not the first to see socioeconomic differences dividing abolitionists. But in contrast to Nancy Hewitt (Women's...

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