Papers Of Abraham Lincoln

Lyman Trumbull to Abraham Lincoln, 24 August [1858]1
Alton, Aug. 24, 1857.Dear Lincoln,
I have just read & am delighted with the debate at Ottawa– In manner, temper, spirit, eloquence & every thing else you have obtained a complete triumph over the little pittefogger,2 for really that is all he is– It seems to me that the debate at Ottawa ought to be able sufficient to decide the contest with all intelligent men, & it ought

<Page 2>
to be read by every man in the state–3 Things here look quite as favorably as I expected– I am to speak here to-morrow evening, & Blair & Brown of St Louis have promised to come up to the meeting–4 Do not fail to be at Springfield on the 28^th– I think it all important you should be there even at the omission of some appointment, if you cannot otherwise do so–5 A reaction has commenced against Douglas– He lost friends by coming to Edwardsville 6
Very truly YoursLyman Trumbull

<Page 3>

[Envelope]
ALTON I[ll.]
AUG[AUGUST] 25L. Trumbul[l]
U.S. S.Hon. A. LincolnCare Hon. Th^os J. TurnerFreeport, Illinois

1Lyman Trumbull wrote and signed this letter. Although he wrote “1857” in the dateline, the content of the letter clearly indicates that he wrote it in 1858. Trumbull also wrote Abraham Lincoln’s name and address on the envelope shown in the third image.

2A pettifogger is a disreputable lawyer who is known to be petty and use underhanded methods to achieve their goals.
“Pettifogger,” Merriam-Webster.com, Merriam-Webster, 18 July 2025, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/played%20out#h1.

3At the time of this letter, Abraham Lincoln was the Illinois Republican Party’s candidate for the U.S. Senate. He was running against Democratic incumbent Stephen A. Douglas. See the 1858 Illinois Republican Convention. For the first part of the election campaign of 1858, Lincoln had often followed Douglas on the trail, delivering speeches either later in the evening after Douglas finished, or the next day. Douglas eventually agreed to a series of debates with Lincoln, which became the famous Lincoln-Douglas Debates. The first of these debates was held in Ottawa, Illinois, on August 21. Republicans both within Illinois and outside Illinois praised Lincoln’s performance in the Ottawa debate, although some thought he needed to attack Douglas more rather than just defend his and the Republican Party’s positions.
Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008), 1:458, 482-85, 495-96; Allen C. Guelzo, “Houses Divided: Lincoln, Douglas, and the Political Landscape of 1858,” The Journal of American History 94 (September 2007), 404-5; David Davis to Abraham Lincoln; Joseph Medill to Abraham Lincoln.

4Because members of the Illinois General Assembly voted for and elected the state’s representatives in the U.S. Senate, Lincoln, Douglas, Trumbull, and other political leaders canvassed the state throughout the summer and fall of 1858, delivering speeches in support of candidates for the General Assembly in their respective parties. Trumbull delivered a public address in Alton, Illinois, on August 25. Francis P. Blair, Jr. attended this rally and also delivered a speech. Blair, who was a Democrat but against the Lecompton Constitution, had, in the summer of 1858, publicly voiced his support for Lincoln to replace Douglas as Illinois’s U.S. senator.
Public attention was focused on Blair and B. Gratz Brown at the time due to a third party publicizing the content of a letter Blair wrote Brown in the winter of 1857. In the letter, Blair discussed a meeting with Douglas during which Douglas declared his intention to join the Republican Party in 1860. Although he later denied it, following his split with President James Buchanan over the Lecompton Constitution, Douglas courted political support for his senatorial reelection campaign among members of the Republican Party, at times even intimating that he was finished with the Democratic Party.
Allen C. Guelzo, “Houses Divided: Lincoln, Douglas, and the Political Landscape of 1858,” 392, 394; Alton Daily Courier (IL), 27 August 1858, 2:2; 28 August 1858, 2:1; Norma L. Peterson, Freedom and Franchise: The Political Career of B. Gratz Brown (Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1965), 84; Daily Illinois State Journal (Springfield), 23 September 1858, 3:2; Chicago Daily Press and Tribune (IL), 24 September 1858, 1:1; Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life, 1:445-48.

5Trumbull was scheduled to speak in Springfield, Illinois, the evening of August 28. A convention for Sangamon County Republicans and former Whigs and members of the American Party was scheduled for earlier that day. Trumbull delivered an address before the audience of the county convention, during which he exhausted himself and was then unable to deliver his scheduled evening address. Lincoln did not attend either event. He was traveling to Peoria, Illinois, that day, en route to deliver an address in Tremont, Illinois, on August 30.
The Lincoln Log: A Daily Chronology of the Life of Abraham Lincoln, 28 August 1858, https://www.thelincolnlog.org/Results.aspx?type=CalendarDay&day=1858-08-28; 29 August 1858, https://www.thelincolnlog.org/Results.aspx?type=CalendarDay&day=1858-08-29; 30 August 1858, https://www.thelincolnlog.org/Results.aspx?type=CalendarDay&day=1858-08-30; Daily Illinois State Journal (Springfield), 28 August 1858, 3:1; 29 August 1858, 3:1.

6Lincoln and Trumbull exchanged at least seven other letters related to the election of 1858.
Douglas delivered a speech in Edwardsville, Illinois, on August 6. Copies of the speech do not appear to be extant. However, in a letter to Lincoln, John Trible wrote that, in the speech, Douglas compared members of the American Party to “army worms” and that “a great many were sorely offended” by the comparison. Former members of the American Party were an important source of votes for both Democrats and Republicans in the state and federal elections of 1858, and both parties worked throughout the campaign season to garner their support.

In the end, in Illinois’s local elections of 1858, Republicans won a majority of all votes cast in the state, but pro-Douglas Democrats retained control of the Illinois General Assembly and Douglas won reelection to the U.S. Senate. Through the campaign, however, and in particular through his participation in the Lincoln-Douglas Debates, Lincoln gained recognition as well as standing within the national Republican Party.
Lyman Trumbull to Abraham Lincoln; Abraham Lincoln to Lyman Trumbull; Lyman Trumbull to Abraham Lincoln; Lyman Trumbull to Abraham Lincoln; Lyman Trumbull to Abraham Lincoln; Abraham Lincoln to Lyman Trumbull; Lyman Trumbull to Abraham Lincoln; The Weekly Chicago Times (IL), 19 August 1858, 4:1; Stephen Hansen and Paul Nygard, “Stephen A. Douglas, the Know-Nothings, and the Democratic Party in Illinois, 1854-1858,” Illinois Historical Journal 87 (Summer 1994), 121-23; Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life, 1:556-57; Allen C. Guelzo, “Houses Divided: Lincoln, Douglas, and the Political Landscape of 1858,” 414.