The Lincoln Family Church

When you're visiting the Lincoln home neighborhood, stop by the church which houses the original Lincoln family pew. The Lincolns purchased it for $50 when the congregation worshipped in a previous building, which is no longer standing. In that building, the pew was No. 20 on the left side, seventh row from the front. Mary Lincoln referred to this pew in a letter to Mrs. Samuel Melvin, a Springfield friend, whose husband was chairman of the church pew committee. She wrote from the White House on April 27, 1861, "I had intended requesting Mr Melvin to have given me a promise, that on our return to S- we would be able to secure our particular pew, to which I was very much attached, and which we occupied some ten years, may I hope that he will be able to do so." The Lincoln family began attending services in 1850 after the death of three-year-old Edward Lincoln. The pastor, Dr. James Smith, had conducted Eddie's funeral in the Lincoln home. Abraham Lincoln did not formally join the church, but his wife became a member on April 13, 1852. Their two-year-old son Thomas (Tad) was baptized in the church on April 4, 1855, and his funeral would be held there on July 17, 1871. The Scottish-born Dr. Smith had been installed as pastor on April 11, 1849. A former deist, he wrote an influential apologetic work, The Christian's Defense, published in 1843. He gave a copy to Lincoln who had seen it previously in his father-in-law's Kentucky home. Dr. Smith, an Old School Presbyterian, became a close friend of the Lincoln family. After Dr. Smith's resignation on October 19, 1856, the church called Dr. John H. Brown. In 1867 Dr. Brown married Mary Lincoln's widowed cousin, Elizabeth Todd Grimsley. First Presbyterian Church, the oldest church group in Springfield, was organized on January 30, 1828, at the home of Mary Lincoln's uncle, Dr. John Todd. The congregation built its first permanent structure at the corner of Third and Washington streets. The Lincoln family attended services at the second and larger building at that site. The church sold that building in 1871 and purchased its present structure the same year from the Third Presbyterian Church.