Papers Of Abraham Lincoln

Lundy, Benjamin C.

Born: 1826-04-04 Maryland

Died: 1861-09-14 Illinois

Benjamin C. Lundy was a physician, postmaster, and newspaper editor. The son of the abolitionist Benjamin Lundy, Lundy married Catherine Haines in 1850, with whom he had six children. The couple settled in Logansville, Ohio, where Benjamin practiced medicine. Benjamin also served as postmaster of Logansville from July to October 1850. They later moved to Putnam County, Illinois, settling in Magnolia, where Benjamin opened a medical practice and involved himself in local politics. In 1851, he became a partner in the firm of Coates, Kinney, & B. Clark Lundy, which owned the Bureau County Post. In May 1856, Benjamin represented Putnam County as the Anti-Nebraska Convention at Bloomington, and in September 1856, he attended a subsequent Anti-Nebraska meeting in Springfield. Moving into the Republican Party, Lundy edited the Hennepin Tribune, and in his editorials, he supported William H. Seward for president and Abraham Lincoln for vice-president in the presidential election of 1860. That year, he was practicing medicine in Magnolia and owned $800 in real estate and had a personal estate of $1,500. In January 1861, Lundy received appointment as postmaster of the Illinois House of Representatives. Lundy was a Quaker.

William Clinton Armstrong, The Lundy Family and their Descendants of Whatsoever Surname (New Brunswick, NJ: J. Heidingsfeld, 1902), 254-56, Benjamin C. Lundy to Abraham Lincoln; Abraham Lincoln to Benjamin C. Lundy; U.S. Census Office, Seventh Census of the United States (1850), Logan County, OH, 72; Record of Appointment of Postmasters, 1832-1971, NARA Microfilm Publication, M841, 145 rolls, Records of the Post Office Department, RG 28, 1843-1857, 15:303, National Archives Building, Washington, DC; Franklin William Scott, Newspapers and Periodicals of Illinois, 1814-1879, vol. 6 of Collections of the Illinois State Historical Library (Springfield: Illinois State Historical Library, 1910), 289; U.S. Census Office, Eighth Census of the United States (1860), Putnam County, IL, 137; Daily Illinois State Journal (Springfield), 30 May 1856, 2:2; 25 September 1856, 2:2; Daily Illinois State Register (Springfield), 10 January 1861, 2:4; U.S., Quaker Meeting Records, 1681-1935 (Lehi, UT: Ancestry.com Operations, 2014); Gravestone, Magnolia Cemetery, Magnolia, IL.