Though President Lincoln’s Cottage is not far off the beaten track, as it’s only about three miles from the White House, it is one of those little known and lesser visited sites in the Washington area.
While the cottage was not built for the 16th president, Lincoln occupied it occasionally and the structure became associated with him. It was originally built for 19th-century banker George W. Riggs in 1842. But less than 10 years later, in 1851, Gen. Winfield Scott prompted the Federal Government to purchase the cottage and surrounding 200-plus acres to receive wounded and disabled veterans of U.S. military service, especially those who fought in the Mexican-American War (1846–1848). The Civil War was still 10 years away when this decision was made, and the cottage became known as the Soldiers’ Home.
Because the cottage is situated on a hilltop, summer temperatures are slightly cooler than at the White House. Thus, President Lincoln alone or with family in tow spent days and weeks at the Soldiers’ Home. During the early days of the Civil War, when threat of a Confederate assault on the Capital was real, the Solders’ Home was a safer location than the prominent and recognizable White House.
“It was set amid shady hills that caught welcome breezes during Washington’s hot, humid months,” wrote John Cribb in the novel “Old Abe” (2020). “The house looked like a big rambling cottage in the English countryside, with a view of the Capitol dome and Smithsonian castle in the distance.”
Having grown up in a log cabin and known for unpretentious living, Lincoln appreciated the Gothic Revival-style, 10,000-square-foot cottage (a cottage due to its architectural style, not its size) as a retreat from the bustle and pomp at the presidential dwelling.
While still large, with a total of 34 rooms including hallways, Lincoln occupied only a fraction of the space. Its pebble-dash exterior, gingerbread trim, diamond-shaped window panes, and various peaks and finials along the roof line offered an inviting ambiance in contrast to the 55,000-square-foot, neoclassical, grand columned White House.
Poet Walt Whitman, who wrote “Oh Captain! My Captain!” as a tribute to Lincoln after his assassination, once described Lincoln as the President rode down Vermont Avenue in 1863 on his way from the Soldiers’ Cottage to the White House. It took Lincoln about 30 minutes by carriage to travel between the two. The poet wrote of Lincoln’s “dark brown face, with the deep-cut lines, the eyes, always to me with a deep latent sadness in the expression.”
Just 24 years ago the National Trust for Historic Preservation included the site on its list of the country’s 11 Most Endangered Places. When President Bill Clinton designated it a National Monument, the National Trust undertook the $15-million restoration effort to return the neglected cottage and surrounding landscape to its 19th-century state. It opened to the public in 2008. Today, Lincoln’s Cottage is part historic house and part gallery museum
While not as magnificent as the Lincoln Monument or as dramatic as Ford’s Theatre, Lincoln’s Cottage is worth a visit for Lincoln admirers and tourists alike, if for no other reason than to be in the space where Lincoln labored on the Emancipation Proclamation and fretted over weighty Civil War decisions.
Wrote Cribbs about the time Lincoln spent at the cottage in 1863 writing one of his most famous documents: “With painstaking deliberation, he was coming to the conclusion that emancipation was the only way left to go. He must change tactics or lose the game. … On the quiet, shady paths of the grounds at the Soldiers’ Home, he thought it through more as he walked with head down.”
One of the cottage’s back rooms holds a replica of Lincoln’s writing desk (the original sits in the White House) and the sleeping space where he spent fitful nights in solace and prayer over the plight of the Union.
“I think this is as important a room as any room in any place in American history,” commented Callie Hawkins, CEO and Executive Director of Lincoln’s Cottage in a Dec. 3, 2021 edition of Washingtonian.
