Lincoln Family Tree
Lincoln Family Tree by Sydneyaring
Undated “Abram Lincoln Negroes” List
John D. Pennybacker Paternity Claim Settlement 1860
Sale Agreement for Tom 1858
Col. Abraham Lincoln 1848 Letter – “Black Men’s Shoes”
Enslavement at the Lincoln Homestead
The first Africans arrived in the colony of Virginia in 1619. Numbering about twenty, their legal status in the colony initially was ambiguous. However, by 1705, the colonial government created laws that established a race-based system of legal slavery which controlled the actions of enslaved people and passed enslavement onto the children of enslaved mothers. The population of enslaved Africans and African Americans grew rapidly; by 1790, they made up 39 percent of Virginia’s total population. Unfortunately, based on early scholarship of the Shenandoah Valley, there is a conception that enslaved African Americans did not make up any significant portion of the population of the Valley. Previous writers, such as Joseph Waddell and John Walter Wayland, incorrectly asserted that German and Scots-Irish people did not support enslavement, and since they had been the largest immigrant groups to settle in the Valley, there were limited numbers of enslaved people living in the Shenandoah Valley. This was categorically untrue; enslaved people made up approximately 25 percent of the Valley’s population by the start of the Civil War. Similarly, past scholarship also argued that enslaved people were well treated in the Valley and got along well with their slaveowners. [1]
More recent scholarship by authors such as Jonathan A. Noyalas and Edward Ayers has begun to delve into the complicated history of enslavement in the Shenandoah Valley and disprove these narratives. Because of biases in historic records, it can be hard to get a full picture of the experience of enslavement in the Valley. One of the only slave narratives from the Valley, The Narrative of Bethany Veney, A Slave Woman, is an invaluable source into what enslavement was like in Page County. Unfortunately, there are no written records from the enslaved people owned by the Lincoln family. However, stories of their lives can be pieced together using court records, letters, and economic records.
Henry
There are several appearances of a man named Henry in the Lincoln family records. Henry was one of Colonel Abraham Lincoln’s most valuable enslaved men. He appears on two undated lists of enslaved people; on one he is valued at $600 and the other at $625. There are no records which reveal when Abraham purchased Henry or his birthdate. However, it seems that Abraham allowed Henry some opportunities for self-sufficiency. In 1848, Abraham wrote a short note to an unidentified man asking that he send him a calfskin and leather for “black men’s shoes.” He also wrote that his “man Henry has some bark and sheep skins they belong to him and you will please pay him the money.” Furthermore, in a letter written by Abraham’s agent in Richmond, Jacob Shook in 1849, Jacob relays that the “wagons left, about 12’ oclock to day with the articles called for in [Abraham’s] letter. [He] sent the sales by Henry as well as the bills [he] purchased.” He goes on to mention that he “gave them no money, they having sold some flour on the road.” In addition to selling his own bark and sheepskins, it appears that Henry, and potentially other enslaved people, were producing and selling their own flour. Perhaps Jacob Shook assured Abraham that he had sent everything asked for and told him the time that the wagons left so that Abraham would know if anything went missing from the wagons. [2]
Henry was still enslaved by the Lincolns in 1851, when Abraham passed away. His will ordered that Henry and another enslaved man should be given to his wife Mary, with “their increase of the females, with permission.” Enslavement was a legal status in Virginia and after a law passed in 1662, any children born to an enslaved mother inherited her status as an enslaved person, a legal concept called partus sequitur ventrem. By giving Henry to Mary Lincoln, Abraham was giving her the wealth that would come from any children Henry would have. This demonstrates how the reproductive capabilities of enslaved people, particularly women, was used as a method to derive more wealth by slave owners. [3]
Squire
Squire was estimated to be around 50 years old in September 1841, which if accurate, would put his birthdate around the year 1791. Before coming to the Lincoln family, Squire was enslaved by Dorcas Robinson in Rockingham County. In her will dated 1811, Dorcas entrusted three enslaved people named Cate, James, and Squire to the children of her daughter Dorcas Lincoln, “in consideration of [the] natural love and affection” she had for her daughter. Squire remained enslaved by members of the Lincoln family from 1811-1841. In an undated list of the enslaved people owned by Col. Abraham Lincoln, Squire’s value is listed at $325.[4]
At some point after this list was written, Squire became the property of Abraham’s brother, Jacob Lincoln Jr. On August 19th, 1841, Squire was the subject of a court of oyer and terminer case involving arson. Oyer and terminer courts were a type of criminal court formed specifically to try slaves accused of capital crimes until 1785, when they began trying enslaved people for all felonies. Capital crimes were any crimes committed which could result in the death penalty; this included crimes such as murder, attempted murder, rape or attempted rape, arson, poisoning, conspiracy or insurrection, and theft. These trials took place at county courthouses and were presided over by five justices of the peace with no jury. If given a guilty verdict, there was no legal opportunity for an enslaved person to appeal the court’s decision themselves. Because Virginia law required an enslaved person convicted of a capital crime to receive the death penalty, judges and justices of the peace were required to impose that sentence. In some instances, however, enslaved people had their sentences commuted. [5]
The case of each enslaved person sentenced to death by a court in Virginia was sent to the governor for review. Virginia law allowed the governor to use the power of executive clemency to “sell and transport condemned bondsmen,” rather than hang them, if they felt the case warranted it. Notes from the justices of the peace, defense counsel, or petitions from local community members in favor of commuting the sentence could be included in the trial record for the governor to consider. Factors such as an enslaved person’s youth, personality, whether they had or had not committed crimes before, and the harshness of the death sentence in contrast to the crime committed – particularly if the crime involved property – were just a few of the reasons that justices cited when asking governors for clemency. [6]
Squire was accused of “feloniously burning a barn” owned by Abraham Lincoln that was valued at $1000. He was found guilty by the court of oyer and terminer in Rockingham County and sentenced to hang for his crime on October 29, 1841. Prosecutions for arson rose sharply in Virginia in the antebellum period, particularly after 1831 when charges of murder or conspiracy and insurrection began to decline. Arson was one of the “most feared” crimes by white slave owners. While the court records do not reveal a motive behind Squire’s actions, burning property was one of the most overt ways that enslaved people could rebel against their enslavement. When Squire’s case was sent to the governor’s office, the justices of the peace “recommended [Squire]….to the clemency of the executive,” though their reasons for doing so were not recorded. The lieutenant governor granted clemency to Squire and “ordered that he be brought to the penitentiary for transportation.” Instead of being hanged, Squire was sent to the Penitentiary of Virginia, located in Richmond, on September 10, 1841. Unfortunately, there are no further records of what happened to Squire. Since he was recommended for transportation, it is most likely that he was sold somewhere outside of Virginia. [7]
[1] Cynthia A. Kierner, “‘Skillfull in Anie Country Worke’: Red, White, and Black in Colonial Virginia,” in Changing History: Virginia Women Through Four Centuries (Richmond: The Library of Virginia, 2013); Kelley Fanto Deetz, Bound to the Fire: How Virginia’s Enslaved Cooks Helped Invent American Cuisine (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2017); Jonathan A. Noyalas, Slavery and Freedom in the Shenandoah Valley During the Civil War Era (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2021).
[2] Undated list of enslaved people, Lincoln Society of Virginia; “Abram Lincoln Negroes,” Lincoln Society of Virginia, undated; Colonel Abraham Lincoln to Unknown, July 22, 1848, Lincoln Society of Virginia; Jacob Shook to Col. Abraham Lincoln, May 17, 1849, Lincoln Family Papers 1746 – 1939, Library of Congress Manuscript Division, MMC-0975, Accession no. 6065A.
[3] Abraham Lincoln, “Last Will of Abraham Lincoln,” May 14, 1851, Records of Rockingham County, Virginia, Circuit Court, Will Book A, 197; Brent Tarter, “Elizabeth Key (fl. 165-1660),” Encyclopedia Virginia, last updated November 8, 2022, Elizabeth Key (fl. 1655–1660) – Encyclopedia Virginia.
[4] Dorcas Robinson, “Dorcas Robinson Will,” April 7, 1811, In Waldo Lincoln’s History of the Lincoln Family, 205-206, https://archive.org/details/historyoflincoln00illinc/page/205/ mode/1up; “Abram Lincoln Negroes,” Lincoln Society of Virginia, undated.
[5] Philip J. Schwarz, Slave Laws in Virginia (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1996) 72 and 68; Daniel J. Flanigan, “Criminal Procedure in Slave Trials in the Antebellum South,” The Journal of Southern History 40, no. 4 (Nov 1974): 544, https://doi.org/10.2307/2206354.
[6] Flanigan, “Criminal Procedure in Slave Trials,” 544; Schwarz, Slave Laws in Virginia, 75-76.
[7] Jacob Lincoln, “Public Claim October 10, 1841,” Condemned slaves and free blacks executed or transported records, 1781-1865, Accession APA 756, Box 7, Folder 16 Library of Virginia, 2, http://rosetta.virginiamemory.com:1801/delivery/DeliveryManagerServlet?dps_pid=IE1181034; Schwarz, Slave Laws in Virginia, 7 and 88; Noyalas, Slavery and Freedom in the Shenandoah Valley, 21; A List of Slaves and Free Persons of Color Received in the Penitentiary of Virginia for Sale and Transportation from the 25th June 1816 to the 4th February 1842, 10, https://lva.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/permalink/01LVA_INST/br4o1h/alma9917846592105756.
Col. Abraham Lincoln (1799-1851)
Colonel Abraham Lincoln, son of Captain Jacob and Dorcas Lincoln, was born on March 15, 1799. In the first few years of his life, his parents built and moved into the Lincoln Homestead. Abraham was the last boy born to Jacob and Dorcas and he lived with them until after his father passed away in 1822. Abraham married Mary Homan on October 26, 1826, when he was 27 years old. Together they had four daughters from 1827-1837, and one who passed away as an infant. Abraham and Mary first lived together in a “substantial log structure” situated on land he had inherited from his farther near where Virginia John’s house burned down in 1791. In 1837, Abraham purchased the shares of the Lincoln Homestead owned by his sisters Elizabeth Chrisman and Abigail Coffman. Though a record of it has not survived, Abraham’s will also recorded that he purchased his sister Dorcas Strayer’s share from her husband John. [1]
In 1840, when Dorcas Lincoln passed away, Abraham and Mary moved into the Lincoln Homestead and began construction on the rear ell addition. Completed in 1841 or 1842, this structure was likely one of the areas on the property where enslaved people lived and worked; though there are no records which detail exactly which kinds of labor the Lincolns’ enslaved people did at the Homestead, it is highly probable that enslaved labor could have helped build the structure, since Abraham owned 16 enslaved people in 1840. [2]
Abraham ran a substantial farm on the Lincoln Homestead. In 1850, one year before his death, the cash value of the Lincoln Homestead was over $26,000. The Lincolns were growing wheat, corn, hay, rye, oats, potatoes, and barley. Additionally, they had significant amounts of livestock, including 70 cattle, 13 horses, 40 swine and 100 sheep. As did many other farmers in the Valley, Abraham sold his livestock and other products from the farm to various markets in Virginia, particularly Richmond. Abraham seems to have worked primarily with two men named Jacob and John Shook, regularly corresponding with them in the 1840s. In a letter sent from Richmond on August 24, 1849, Jacob Shook advised Abraham that “our beef market has been thinly supplied” and that “there have been no hogs in yet… [but he thought] those that come in tolerably early will get the best price.” Abraham also wrote to Samuel Hartley in Winchester to inquire about the price that flour would get in the market there: “Mr. A Lincoln….I have sent you the price [of flour] in July + Sept 1837.” Abraham also used products from the Homestead as payment for goods. In May 1850, Robert B. Winslow wrote to Abraham to inform him that the machine he had ordered would be ready for him on June 1st and “if [Abraham had] Bacon for sale, [he] may send about 200 lbs, hog round.” Under Abraham, the Lincoln Homestead continued to be a prolific farm. [3]
Kate Pennybacker, Abraham Lincoln’s granddaughter, described him as a “good businessman, of a jovial disposition, humorous and witty. He had a gift for dealing with people.” She also described Abraham as very afraid of fire; he had his fear of fire realized when his barn was burned down by an enslaved man named Squire. Abraham served as a Colonel in the 145th Virginia militia in Rockingham County from 1840 – 1850. In 1851, Abraham passed away at the age of 52. In his will, he divided his property between his wife Mary and his four daughters. Mary was given the Lincoln Homestead and the 200 acres originally belonging to Jacob Lincoln, as well as “the whole of [the] household and Kitchen furniture…. horses, four cows, and twenty hogs also one of my wagons.” Additionally, Abraham wished her to have his “slaves Kate and Jerry, Rachel, and her four children, Ben, George, Lucinda, and Isaac and [his] two men, [name burnt] and Henry.” The remainder of his enslaved people were “equally divided between [his daughters] according to the value of said Slaves.” His three unmarried daughters – Caroline, Josephine, and Dorcas Sarah – were each given an equal share of the rest of his land, while his married daughter Mary Elizabeth Maupin was given the land and the interest on the land where she was already living with her husband Dr. Richard S Maupin. Because Abraham did not have sons to pass his wealth on to, his daughters were able to inherit a significant amount of wealth and property, much of which passed through three generations of the Lincoln family. [4]
[1] John Wayland, The Lincolns in Virginia (Staunton: The McClure Company, Inc., 1946), 181; Joseph Chrisman and Joseph and Abigail Coffman, “Indenture between Joseph Chrisman and Joseph Coffman and Abigail his wife,” September 4, 1837, Lincoln Family Papers 1746 – 1939, Library of Congress Manuscript Division, MMC-0975, Accession no. 6065A; Abraham Lincoln, “Last Will of Abraham Lincoln,” May 14, 1851, Records of Rockingham County, Virginia, Circuit Court, Will Book A, 197. In his will, Jacob Lincoln gave the Homestead and the 200 acres it was on to Dorcas for the rest of her life and then wanted it to be sold and the profits divided between his daughters Elizabeth, Abigail, and Dorcas. The indenture was made by Elizabeth’s husband Joseph Chrisman because Elizabeth passed away in 1824, two years after Jacob died.
[2] United States Census Bureau. “United States Census, 1840, Virginia, United States.” Washington D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1840.
[3] United States Census Bureau, “United States Census Non-Population Schedules – Agriculture, 1850, Virginia,” Washington D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1850; Wayland, The Lincolns in Virginia, 185; Jacob Shook to Col. Abraham Lincoln, August 24, 1849, Lincoln Family Scrapbook, Lincoln Family Papers 1746 – 1939, Library of Congress Manuscript Division, MMC-0975; Samuel Hartley to Mr. A Lincoln, February 12, 1837, Lincoln Family Scrapbook, Lincoln Family Papers 1764 – 1939, Library of Congress Manuscript Division, MMC-0975; Robert B. Winslow to Abraham Linkin Esq., May 27, 1850, Lincoln Family Scrapbook, Lincoln Family Papers 1764 – 1939, Library of Congress Manuscript Division, MMC-0975.
[4] Wayland, The Lincolns in Virginia, 188; Abraham Lincoln, “Last Will of Abraham Lincoln,” May 14, 1851, Records of Rockingham County, Virginia, Circuit Court, Will Book A, 197.
President Abraham Lincoln and the Lincolns in Virginia
President Abraham Lincoln never met any of his family members living in Virginia or visited the Lincoln Homestead. His grandfather, also named Abraham, moved his family out of Virginia to the frontier of Kentucky in 1780. Unfortunately, the family moved directly into an ongoing conflict between European settlers and Shawnee groups over land. In 1786, Abraham Lincoln was killed by a Native American man in front of the President’s father, then only eight years old. As a result, Thomas Lincoln, and subsequently President Lincoln, became disconnected from their Virginia family.[1]
Perhaps because of this lack of knowledge, President Lincoln had a lot of interest in his family history and began reaching out to people for information in the 1840s. After being appointed to the House of Representatives, President Lincoln asked Governor James McDowell, then a Representative for Virginia, if he know of any Lincolns living in Virginia that he could write to and inquire about his family history. On March 24th, 1848, after receiving David Lincoln’s address from McDowell, the future President wrote David Lincoln – President Lincoln was David’s first cousin once removed – to inquire about his family history. He gave the details of his father and grandfather and asked if David could “ascertain whether [they] are not of the same family.”[2] David replied on March 30, but the letter has not survived. President Lincoln wrote back and asked David several more questions: “What was your grandfather’s christian name? Was he or not, a Quaker?…. Do you know anything of your family (or rather I may now say our family) farther back than your grandfather?”[3] Unfortunately, no further correspondence survives. Nevertheless, it is clear that President Lincoln was enthusiastic to learn about his family and recover some of the history which had been lost when his grandfather passed away.
When examining the Lincoln family that lived in Virginia, the contrast between the family and President Abraham Lincoln is striking. There is a popular public conception of President Lincoln as coming from a very humble background; he is perceived as having grown up in poverty and having lived in a log cabin for much of his early life. This stands in stark contrast when looking at the Lincoln family who lived in Virginia. Throughout their lives, the men and women of the Lincoln Homestead each owned hundreds of acres of land, lived in a large Federal-style home, and benefitted from the wealth and labor of enslaved people. Ironically, President Lincoln stripped his family of this wealth on January 1, 1863, when he freed all enslaved people in areas of rebellion during the Civil War. The loss of President Lincoln’s grandfather not only disconnected the family from their Virginia roots, it also greatly reduced their economic circumstances. By looking at the Lincolns in Virginia in comparison with the President, that familial loss becomes stark.
[1] Kenneth J. Winkle, The Young Eagle: The Rise of Abraham Lincoln (Dallas: Taylor Trade Publishing, 2001), 6-7.
[2] Abraham Lincoln to David Lincoln, March 24, 1848 Papers of Abraham Lincoln Digital Library, The Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, https://papersofabrahamlincoln.org/documents/D200471.
[3] Abraham Lincoln to David Lincoln, April 2, 1848 Papers of Abraham Lincoln Digital Library, The Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, https://papersofabrahamlincoln.org/documents/D200475. The grandfather that the President is asking about is Virginia John. The president was incorrect about John being a Quaker.
Mary Homan Lincoln and Mary Elizabeth Maupin
Mary Homan was born on October 24, 1802, to John and Mary (Robinson) Homan. On October 26, 1826, two days after her twenty-fourth birthday, Mary and Colonel Abraham Lincoln were married. The couple had four daughters from 1827 – 1837, and one who passed away as an infant. Abraham and Mary first lived in a log home on Virginia John’s land until 1840, when Mary’s mother-in-law Dorcas Lincoln passed away. At that time, they moved into the Lincoln Homestead and began building the rear ell addition, completed in either 1841 or 1842. Mary lived on the Homestead for over 30 years. Similarly to Dorcas, Mary would have been responsible for running the household while Abraham managed the farm and sale of the goods produced on the farm; she would have spent a lot of her time cooking, making cloth and clothing, tending to vegetable gardens, taking care of her children, and managing the household and enslaved people. Though this work was focused on the home, it was key to the “prosperity and comfort” of her family.[1]
Also, similarly to Dorcas, Mary outlived Abraham by about 23 years. During that time, she would have been the sole person managing the Homestead. Not only did she have to manage everything for herself, but she also had to do it throughout the Civil War. While other Southern women suddenly had to manage their farms and enslaved people by themselves for the first time, Mary already had ten years of practice. Women were an important part of the Confederacy’s war effort; they made clothes and other supplies for soldiers, nursed soldiers when they became sick or wounded, and often had to give up their goods to support the Confederacy. They also served an important ideological role in the war: women were “essential to the formulation and articulation of Confederate nationalism” and supported the “ideal that….Confederate women should inspire their husbands and sons with the courage to do battle, and then cheerfully send them off.” The Shenandoah Valley witnessed significant military action throughout the conflict, and Mary would have had to work hard to keep the farm running while also maintaining control of her enslaved people. [2]
In the 1860 census, Mary Elizabeth Maupin – Abraham and Mary’s oldest daughter – was living in the Homestead with her mother, as her husband had passed away five years previously. Mary and Mary Elizabeth both directly supported the Confederacy. Not only did each woman own at least ten enslaved people, but they provided support for the Confederate Army numerous times. From 1862 – 1864, Mary Lincoln received payment from the army for the sale of straw, corn, hay, and for allowing them to hire a “1-4 horse Wagon Team & Teamster for 3 days.” Similarly, Mary Elizabeth sold them corn, flour, hay, and allowed the Confederacy to pasture their horses on her land several times from 1862 – 1864. [3]
In 1864, the Lincoln Homestead itself became directly involved in the Civil War. General Sheridan of the Union Army began what is known today as “The Burning” from September 26th to October 8th. In an effort to both destroy the crops, livestock, and supplies and dissolve support for the Confederacy, Ulysses S. Grant ordered Sheridan to leave the Valley “a barren waste.” Before it was all over, Sheridan and his men had burned 2,000 barns, 70 mills, and killed thousands of livestock. There were limits, however, to what was allowed to be burned: houses, and the property of widows, single women, and orphans was ordered to be left alone. [4]
Despite these orders, when Sheridan’s men reached Linville Creek, Mary and Mary Elizabeth Maupin – both widows – had extensive property burned. Mary had a “total loss” of around $2,200 in damages due to the Burning. This included “350 bushels of wheat, 17 tons of hay and straw [etc.], 12 head of cattle & cows, one barn and corn crib, one carriage house.” Mary Elizabeth lost “670 bush. wheat, 100 bushels corn, 25 tons hay [and straw etc.], one barn” resulting in a “total loss” of $2,000. Unfortunately, it is not possible to know for sure why Sheridan’s men disobeyed their orders and burned the property of these two widows. It could be that they knew that there was a familial connection between the Lincoln Homestead and President Lincoln. Perhaps the soldiers recognized that the Homestead was being supported by numerous enslaved people freed by the Emancipation Proclamation. [5]
[1] Cynthia A. Kierner, “‘Skillfull in Anie Country Worke’: Red, White, and Black in Colonial Virginia,” in Changing History: Virginia Women Through Four Centuries (Richmond: The Library of Virginia, 2013), 30.
[2] Jennifer R. Loux, “‘A Constant State of Hopes and Fears’: Women in the Secession Crisis, Civil War, and Reconstruction,” in Changing History: Virginia Women Through Four Centuries (Richmond: The Library of Virginia, 2013), 141, 147, and 149-155.
[3] United States Census Bureau, “United States Census, 1860, Virginia, United States,” Washington D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1860; United States Census Bureau, “United States Census Slave Schedule, 1860, Virginia,” Washington D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1860; “Mary Lincoln,” US, Confederate Citizens File, 1861 – 1865, Virginia, The National Archives, 1-19, https://www.fold3.com/file/42156931; “Mary E. Maupin,” US, Confederate Citizens File, 1861 – 1865, Virginia, The National Archives, 1-31, https://www.fold3.com/file/43807988. Dr. Richard S. Maupin passed away in 1855. It seems likely that Mary Elizabeth and her children lived with Mary Lincoln throughout the Civil War. Mary Elizabeth Maupin remarried John D. Pennybacker in August 1865. Mary Lincoln owned 10 enslaved people and Mary Elizabeth owned 12. Mary Elizabeth appears to have owned enslaved people with her children, as she is listed as “Elizabeth Maupin + 2 others.”
[4] “The Burning,” National Park Service, last modified January 30, 2023, https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/the-burning-shenandoah-valley-in-flames.htm.
[5] “We continue the publication of the list of damages sustained by citizens of Linvill’s Creek,” Rockingham Register, February 10, 1865, 2, https://www.newspapers.com/ima ge/909930950/; John L. Heatwole, The Burning: Sheridan in the Shenandoah Valley (Charlottesville: Rockbridge Publishing, 1998), 164.
Dorcas Robinson Lincoln (1764-1840)
Dorcas Lincoln was born on March 15, 1764, in Rockingham County to David and Dorcas Robinson. She married Captain Jacob Lincoln at the age of 17 on August 29, 1780. Together they had eleven children from 1781-1803. Dorcas would have been heavily involved in the running of her household, which in turn would have influenced how the family farm functioned. While women in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries were relegated to controlling the domestic sphere, as their husbands participated in business and public activities, they played a key role that “enhanced the prosperity and comfort” of the household. Women grew vegetable gardens, tended to poultry, and made cloth in addition to their housekeeping, child rearing, sewing, and embroidery. Virginian women helped produce goods such as different types of cloth, vegetables, eggs, and cheese that would have otherwise needed to be purchased; women’s domestic efforts “diminished their family’s expenditures…and thereby benefitted the family economy.” Women who owned enslaved people, however, benefited greatly from the aid of forced labor. Dorcas Lincoln was one of these women and she benefited from enslaved labor for the majority of her life. [1]
Following her husband’s death in February 1822, Dorcas lived for eighteen years as a widow and head of the Homestead. Jacob willed her the land “on which [they lived] with all the Appurtenances thereunto belonging Together with all the Household and Kitchen furniture.” Furthermore, he wished her to have “one Mare call’d the Dice mare and three cows of her choice,” as well as “[his] Yellow girl Jane & her two children…. [and] Allso one Negroe Man Named Jerry, son of Kate.” This meant that Dorcas managed the household, the livestock, the farm, and the enslaved people for eighteen years as the sole mistress of the Homestead. Since Dorcas was 58 when Jacob passed away, it is highly likely that her enslaved people helped support her until her death at the age of 86. Colonel Abraham, her son, could also have aided her since he was living on the adjoining property. [2]
Dorcas’ will was written on February 22, 1837, about three years before her death. She made several disbursements of property and money to her children and grandchildren. The will shows that Dorcas had amassed a good amount of wealth – in land, belongings, and enslaved people – during her life. In particular, Dorcas made sure to provide for her grandchildren whose parents had passed away; John Chrisman, the son of her daughter Elizabeth, received $50 while Caroline and Josephine Evans, daughters of Hannah Lincoln Evans, each received $100, a cow, and “one good bed.” Dorcas also requested that Colonel Abraham, her son, take $100 out of her estate to pay for a gravestone for her son John who had passed away in 1815 and for “keeping up the enclosure around the grave yard on his land.” Included in the property to be sold was her enslaved property, with the exception of “one old Negro Woman named Kate,” who was to be given to her daughter, Dorcas Strayer. It is possible that this is the same Kate who was gifted to Dorcas by her father. [3]
Little over a month before her death, Dorcas made an alteration to her will; she changed her mind about how she wanted her enslaved people to be divided up. While Kate was still going to Dorcas Strayer, she expressed that “On mature reflection” the rest of her enslaved people should go to her family members, rather than be sold at auction. Her granddaughter Caroline Evans Hammon was to receive a nine-year-old girl named Mary on the condition that “[Caroline’s] husband pay a debt [Dorcas owed to] Adam Allen for leather.” Dorcas gave Josephine Evans “one Negroe Girl named Margaret” and allowed Colonel Abraham to have his choice of two enslaved people from those who were left. Dorcas wished for the rest of her enslaved people to go to three of her children: David, Jacob Jr., and Rebekah Dyer. While it is impossible to know what exactly made Dorcas change her mind, it seems likely that she decided that it would be more beneficial for her family members to inherit her enslaved property and the continued economic benefits that would come from their forced labor. [4]
[1] Waldo Lincoln, History of the Lincoln Family: An Account of the Descendants of Samuel Lincoln of Hingham, Massachusetts, 1637 – 1920 (Worcester, Massachusetts: Commonwealth Press, 1923), 205, https://archive.org/details/historyoflincoln 00illinc/page/205/mode/1up; Cynthia A. Kierner, “‘Skillfull in Anie Country Worke’: Red, White, and Black in Colonial Virginia,” in Changing History: Virginia Women Through Four Centuries (Richmond: The Library of Virginia, 2013), 30-32. The first record of the Lincolns owning enslaved people is in 1785 from David Robinson’s will. However, Dorcas’ parents were both slaveowners, so it seems likely that she grew up around enslaved people as well. Nevertheless, as a Lincoln, Dorcas owned enslaved people for 55 years.
[2] Jacob Lincoln, “Copy of Last Will of Jacob Lincoln,” February 7, 1822, Lincoln Family Papers 1746 – 1939, Library of Congress Manuscript Division, MMC-0975, Accession no. 6065A. Colonel Abraham inherited the land which originally belonged to Virginia John, his grandfather, in his father’s will. Abraham and his family lived on the property until Dorcas passed away, when they moved into the Lincoln Homestead.
[3] Dorcas Lincoln, “Copy of Last Will of Dorcas Lincoln,” February 22, 1837, Lincoln Family Papers 1746 – 1939, Library of Congress Manuscript Division, MMC-0975, Accession no. 6065A. There are numerous mentions of the name Kate throughout Lincoln Family records. There are also different spellings, including Caty, Cate, and Kate. It is hard to know if these records are referring to the same women or more than one woman. It seems likely that the family owned more than one woman or girl with the name Kate. Dorcas Lincoln willed the “old..Woman named Kate” to Dorcas Strayer, but her son Abraham later willed another woman named Kate to his widow Mary Lincoln.
[4] Dorcas Lincoln, “Copy of Declaration Made Before Sam Coffman and Jacob Moyers,” December 21, 1839, Lincoln Family Papers 1746 – 1939, Library of Congress Manuscript Division, MMC-0975, Accession no. 6065A.