Page:Handbook for Boys.djvu/357

336 'Lincoln was born February 12, 1809, in Hardin County, Kentucky. His parents had come to this then pioneer state from Virginia, and his grandfather, whose Christian name he bore, moved there as early as x78x, where, a few years later, he was killed by the Indians while trying to make a home in the forest. When Lincoln was eight years old, his people moved to the new state of Indiana about the time it came into the Union, and there he lived until he was twenty-one, when he went to Illinois, from which state, eventually, he was elected President.

In 1859, when he was beginning to gain some recognition as a national figure, he was asked to write a little sketch of his life, and in the letter enclosing it he said: "There is not much of it, for the reason, I suppose, there is not much of me."In this sketch, which is indeed brief, he tells us he was raised to farm work until he was twenty-two; that up to that time he had had little education; and when he became of age he did not know much beyond reading, writing, and ciphering to the "rule of three." He clerked for one year in a store and was elected and served as captain of the volunteers in the Black Hawk War; later on he ran for the state legislature (1832) and was defeated, though successful in the three succeeding elections. While in the state legislature, he studied law and later went to Springfield to practise it. The only other public office he makes note of is his election to the lower house of Congress for one term (1846). He returned to Springfield and took up more earnestly the study and practice of law; he entered with spirit into the political campaigns, and constantly was growing in public esteem. His public debates with Douglas (1858) made him a familiar figure throughout the state of Illinois, and his profound knowledge and masterful handling of questions debated, his convincing and unanswerable arguments, his clear grasp of the political situation, began to gain the attention of Eastern politicians, convincing them and the country at large that they bad a mighty force to reckon with in the prairie state of Illinois.

Although he lost the election to the United States Senate, and Douglas won, the campaign had pushed him to the front as a national figure, and paved the way for his presidential nomination.

In 1860, at the Republican convention assembled in Chicago, Abraham Lincoln was nominated for President. In November he was elected and March 4, 1861, he was inaugurated. His address at this time was an earnest plea for peace and