Fact and Fiction Files

 

Amazing Coincidences      Robert Todd Lincoln.

 

The oldest son of President Abraham Lincoln, Robert ( 1 August 1843 – 26 July 1926) and in fact the only child to survive to adulthood. He was in his own way a remarkable man himself.

 

A successful lawyer, businessman and politician he also served on the side e of the Union during the American Civil War. Rising to the rank of Captain he fought at the Battle of Appomattox Court House.  As a businessman her was chairman of the Pullman Company and as a politician he was Secretary of State for War and Minister to the United Kingdom.

 

It is, however, other events that really make him stand out.

 

In Jersy City, New Jersey, in 1863 /64 exact date not known, Robert was on a crowded platform and slipped into the gap between the platform and the moving train. He was pulled to safety, and from likely injury and possible death, just in time. He recognised his saviour immediately as the famous actor Edwin Booth. 

On the 14 April 1865 Edwin’s brother, John Wilkes Booth, would assassinate Robert’s father Abraham.

This only is enough to dine out on but there is more.

 

Following the shooting, Robert who was at the White House at the time, rushed to his fathers side upon hearing the news.

On the 2 July 1881 at the Baltimore and Potomac Railroad Station he was with,  as Secretary of State for War, President James Garfield when Charles J. Guiteau shot and ultimately killed him

 

Following on from these two unfortunate events on the 6 September 1901 Robert was in Buffalo,  New York . And was by the Temple of Music at the  Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, New York, when President McKinley, who was at the same location, was shot by Leon Czolgosz.

 

This makes him the only known person to have been there or nearby when three US presidents were assassinated.

 

No wonder after McKinley’s shotting he refused to attend Presidential functions and stated "There is a certain fatality about presidential functions when I am present".