Note 3 — ABRAHAM LINCOLN.
Reading edition
Footnote 3:
(return)
William Cullen Bryant, who was in Illinois in 1832 at the time of the Black Hawk War, used to tell of meeting in his travels in the State a company of Illinois volunteers, commanded by a "raw youth" of "quaint and pleasant" speech, and of learning afterwards that this captain was Abraham Lincoln. As Lincoln's captaincy ended on May 27th, and Mr. Bryant did not reach Jacksonville, Illinois, until June 12th, and as the nearest point he came to the army was Pleasant Grove, eight miles from Pekin on the Illinois River, and that was at a time when the body of Rangers to which Lincoln belonged was fifty miles away on the rapids of the Illinois, it is evident that the "raw youth" could not have been Lincoln, much as one would like to believe that it was. See "Life of William Cullen Bryant," by Parke Godwin, vol. i. page 283. Also Prose of William Cullen Bryant, edited by Parke Godwin, vol. ii. page 20.