Since 1976, people who looked at a portrait labeled as a drawing of President Abraham Lincoln’s wife – Mary Todd Lincoln – thought they were looking at the real deal. Not so.
The celebrated portrait hanging in the Illinois Governor’s Mansion for some 30-plus years is fraudulent. Descendents of President Abraham Lincoln were conned into buying the phony portrait for $2,000-to-$3,000 about a century ago.
The non-legitimacy of the portrait came to light recently when the curator of the Abraham Lincoln Library and Museum, James Comelius, was having the portrait restored after it was removed from the wall of the Governor’s Mansion which was being rehabbed.
As the restoration was taking place, portrait restorer Barry Bauman discovered that the alleged artist’s name, Francis Carpenter, was added to the portrait at a later date. That raised the initial suspicion about the authenticity of the portrait which wasn’t discovered when the state acquired the portrait in 1976.
As the story – now known to be nothing more than a lie – goes, the portrait was to be given to Abraham Lincoln by Mary Todd Lincoln, but the president was assassinated before Mary was able to give it to him. It turns out that this age-old story accompanying the portrait is not true at all, and furthermore, the woman in the photo isn’t even Lincoln’s wife. No one knows who the anonymous woman is.
The portrait will remain on display in the Abraham Museum in Springfield, Illinois until a decision is made about what will be done with it.
To read more about the Abraham Lincoln Library and Museum in Springfield, Illinois, please click here
CLICK HERE to read Scott’s National articles
Source: Chicago Tribune
Comments