Arts & Entertainment

Abraham Lincoln’s Stained Gloves From Night of His Assassination Among Items Up for Auction in Chicago

A pair of stained gloves tucked in Abraham Lincoln’s pocket when he was assassinated are among a collection of items owned by the Lincoln Presidential Foundation that will be auctioned off in Chicago on Wednesday.

The auction house Freeman’s and Hindman will hold the auction, which will be presented both in-person and online, from its Chicago location in the West Loop. The items being auctioned off Wednesday are expected to bring in more than $4 million, according to the auction house.

The “Lincoln’s Legacy” collection up for auction features 144 items chronicling Lincoln’s personal and political life, from manuscripts and artifacts from his time as a lawyer in Illinois to his presidential campaign, leading the country during the Civil War and his ultimate assassination.

Item highlights include:

— A pair of stained leather gloves carried by Lincoln at Ford’s Theatre the night of his assassination on April 14, 1865. Estimate: $800,000 - $1.2 million.

— A double-sided “sum book” page with the earliest known example of Lincoln’s writing from when he was about 15 years old. A short verse reads: “Abraham Lincoln is my name / And with my pen I wrote / the same / I wrote in both hast and speed / and left it here for fools / to read.” Estimate: $300,000 - $400,000.

— A cuff button with the initial ‘L’ removed from Lincoln’s wrist by Dr. Charles Sabin Taft as he searched for the president’s pulse after he was shot. Estimate: $200,000 - $300,000.

— Lincoln’s “Bass-Ackwards” manuscript, a tongue-twister about a fishing expedition gone awry that serves as an example of Lincoln’s frontier humor. Estimate: $200,000 - $300,000.

— The Adams Handbill, Lincoln’s anonymous political handbill that is the only known surviving copy of Lincoln’s first printed work. Estimate: $200,000 - $300,000.

Joshua McCracken, associate cataloguer and department coordinator for books and manuscripts at Freeman’s and Hindman, talks on May 19, 2025, about one of the items up for auction from a collection chronicling Abraham Lincoln’s personal and political life. (Eunice Alpasan / WTTW News)

The Springfield-based Lincoln Presidential Foundation is selling the items to help pay off a loan it took out in order to acquire a broader Lincolniana collection, according to the Illinois Times.

The items serve as a reminder that Lincoln was “just a normal person,” according to Joshua McCracken, associate cataloguer and department coordinator for books and manuscripts at Freeman’s and Hindman.

“For all the mythology that has grown around Abraham Lincoln in the years since his death, … this was somebody who was really the sum of the people around him, the people who loved him, who he loved,” McCracken said. “They took this kid who under any other circumstances would have been destined for a life of hard labor on a farm. They took this kid and uplifted him and inspired him to become something more and we live with that legacy every day.”

Freeman’s and Hindman is holding a public exhibition of the collection leading up to its auction at its Chicago location at 1550 W. Carroll Ave. The last day to view the items is Tuesday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Contact Eunice Alpasan: [email protected]

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