Promissory Note from Thomas C. Cantrall to Abraham Lincoln, 29 November 18521
$660—
Springfield November 29, 1852One year after date I promise to pay Abraham Lincoln Six hundred and sixty dollars together with interest thereon at the rate of ten per cent per annum from date until paid for value received.2
Thomas Cantall<Page 2>
[ endorsement
]
01/06/1854
01/06/1854
Received Jany 6– 1854
Sixty six dollars the first years interest on the note.
Sixty six dollars the first years interest on the note.
[ endorsement
]
02/09/1855
02/09/1855
Received Feby 9– 1855
Thirty dollars of interest on the note,
Thirty dollars of interest on the note,
[ endorsement
]
12/19/1855
12/19/1855
Received Dec 19– 1855
One hundred and two dollars being full ballance of interest up to Novr[November] 29– 1855
One hundred and two dollars being full ballance of interest up to Novr[November] 29– 1855
[ endorsement
]
06/22/1858
06/22/1858
Received June 22 1858– of Charles S. Cantall Adm[Administrator] of Thomas Cantall, eight hundred and twentynine dollars & twenty four cents. in full ballance of principal & interest on this noteA. Lincoln
$829–24
1Neither Thomas C. Cantrall nor Abraham Lincoln wrote or signed this document. It is unclear who wrote the script.
2Harry E. Pratt, author of The Personal Finances of Abraham Lincoln, claims that, on November 28, 1851, Lincoln loaned Cantrall $600 under the conditions
that it be repaid within two years and was subject to an interest rate of ten percent
per year. Pratt also claims that, to secure this loan, Lincoln assumed a mortgage
on eighty acres of land that Cantrall owned in Menard County, Illinois and that Lincoln released this mortgage on the same day that this November 29, 1852
promissory note for $660 was created. The 1851 promissory note and mortgage document
Pratt refers to have not been located.
Also on November 29, 1852, Cantrall and his wife, Elizabeth W. Cantrall, mortgaged 160 acres of land in Menard County to Lincoln as security on the repayment of the
new debt. After a series of payments were made, the debt was finally cleared on June
22,1858, two years after Thomas C. Cantrall’s death. His brother, Charles S. Cantrall,
who was the administrator of his estate, made the final payment, and, on October 29,
1858, the deed on the land was released back to the Cantrall family.
Harry E. Pratt, The Personal Finances of Abraham Lincoln (Springfield, IL: Abraham Lincoln Association, 1943), 75; Gravestone, Canterbury
Cemetery, Cantrall, IL; Deed record, Document ID: 132080, Lincoln wrote mortgage for Cantrall et ux., Martha L. Benner and Cullom Davis et al., eds., The Law Practice of Abraham Lincoln: Complete Documentary Edition, 2d edition (Springfield: Illinois Historic Preservation Agency, 2009), http://www.lawpracticeofabrahamlincoln.org/Details.aspx?case=141313.
Handwritten Document, 2 page(s), Lincoln Collection, Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum (Springfield, IL).