At noon, the courier made his appearance riding by the wood lane across the fields; and the instant he was seen we all realised that there was bad news.  The man was hurrying his pony and yet seemed to be very unwilling to reach the lines where his report must be made.  In this instance (as was, of course, not usually the case) the courier knew what was in his despatches.  The Division Adjutant stepped out on the porch of the headquarters with the paper in his hand, but he broke down before he could begin to read.  The Division Commander took the word and was able simply to announce:  “Lincoln is dead.”  The word “President” was not necessary and he sought in fact for the shortest word.  I never before had found myself in a mass of men overcome by emotion.  Ten thousand soldiers were sobbing together.  No survivor of the group can recall the sadness of that morning without again being touched by the wave of emotion which broke down the reserve and control of these war-worn veterans on learning that their great captain was dead.

The whole people had come to have with the President a relation similar to that which had grown up between the soldiers and their Commander-in-chief.  With the sympathy and love of the people to sustain him, Lincoln had over them an almost unlimited influence.  His capacity for toil, his sublime patience, his wonderful endurance, his great mind and heart, his out-reaching sympathies, his thoughtfulness for the needs and requirements of all, had bound him to his fellow-citizens by an attachment of genuine sentiment.  His appellation throughout the country had during the last year of the war become “Father Abraham.”  We may recall in the thought of this relation to the people the record of Washington.  The first President has come into history as the “Father of his Country,” but for Washington this role of father is something of historic development.  During Washington’s lifetime, or certainly at least during the years of his responsibilities as General and as President, there was no such general recognition of the leader and ruler as the father of his country.  He was dear to a small circle of intimates; he was held in respectful regard by a larger number of those with whom were carried on his responsibilities in the army, and later in the nation’s government.  To many good Americans, however, Washington represented for years an antagonistic principle of government.  He was regarded as an aristocrat and there were not a few political leaders, with groups of voters behind them, who dreaded, and doubtless honestly dreaded, that the influence of Washington might be utilised to build up in this country some fresh form of the monarchy that had been overthrown.  The years of the Presidency had to be completed and the bitter antagonisms of the seven years’ fighting and of the issues of the Constitution-building had to be outgrown, before the people were able to recognise as a whole the perfect integrity of purpose and consistency