In the ensuing autumn much sickness prevailed in the Pigeon Creek
settlement. It was thirty miles to the nearest doctor, and several
persons died, among them Nancy Hanks Lincoln, the mother of young
Abraham. The mechanical skill of Thomas was called upon to make the
coffins, the necessary lumber for which had to be cut with a whip-saw.
The death of Mrs. Lincoln was a serious loss to her husband and
children. Abraham's sister Sarah was only eleven years old, and the
tasks and cares of the little household were altogether too heavy for
her years and experience. Nevertheless, they struggled on bravely
through the winter and next summer, but in the autumn of 1819 Thomas
Lincoln went back to Kentucky and married Sally Bush Johnston, whom he
had known and, it is said, courted when she was merely Sally Bush.
Johnston, to whom she was married about the time Lincoln married Nancy
Hanks, had died, leaving her with three children. She came of a better
station in life than Thomas, and is represented as a woman of uncommon
energy and thrift, possessing excellent qualities both of head and
heart. The household goods which she brought to the Lincoln home in
Indiana filled a four-horse wagon. Not only were her own three children
well clothed and cared for, but she was able at once to provide little
Abraham and Sarah with home comforts to which they had been strangers
during the whole of their young lives.
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