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When I recently traveled to visit historic sites from Abraham Lincoln’s life, I was utterly fascinated. I learned about his hardscrabble childhood, his amazing parenting style, his somewhat tumultuous marriage, and his bouts with depression.
I quickly realized I’m not the only person to be a little obsessed with Lincoln: Over 15,000 books have been written about him, more than any other person in world history -- with the exception of Jesus Himself.
One of the most interesting things I learned was about Lincoln's relationships with his neighbors.
It turns out that some of Lincoln’s near neighbors and probable friends were a Black family of activists, at least one of whom was a conductor on the Underground Railroad.
Lincoln’s neighborhood was incredibly diverse, much more so than you might expect for 1800s Springfield, Illinois. Large groups of Irish, German, and Portuguese immigrants brought a mix of languages and cultural traditions. And of the 203 African-Americans living in the city in 1860, many were homeowners.
Two of these free Black men were Jameson Jenkins and James Blanks. These men had married sisters, Elizabeth and Martha Ann Pelham (also rendered Pellum), and the two couples lived on the same property in two small houses with an adjoining wall.
It just so happens that their property was five lots away from the Lincolns. Evidence suggests a friendship between the Jenkins and Blanks family and the Lincolns.
Jameson Jenkins was a drayman, or wagon driver, who transported goods. Doesn't that seem an ideal profession for secretly helping enslaved people flee bondage? Jenkins probably thought so too.
At least one news report from 1850 reveals that Jenkins successfully transported escaped enslaved people north to Bloomington, Illinois. But we can only imagine how many other people he assisted without catching the attention of the local news.
This particular incident became newsworthy because Jenkins allowed his own reputation to be dragged through the mud to ensure the enslaved people’s escape:
We only know the barest facts about this incident, but it gives us an idea of the kind of man Jenkins was. His courage and quick wits must have made him an interesting person to get to know. Indeed, the historical record strongly suggests a friendship between him and Lincoln.
Jenkins was the last neighbor Lincoln spent time with before leaving Springfield to begin his presidency. In fact, it was Jenkins who gave the Lincoln family a ride to the train station.
While we know Jenkins and Lincoln had some sort of relationship, we don’t know what friendship existed between Lincoln and Jenkins’ brother-in-law, James Blanks, although it’s reasonable to assume they were friendly acquaintances at least.
Like Jenkins, Blanks was also an advocate for freedom through activism:
It’s fascinating to speculate about this family of courageous activists who lived just down the block from Abraham Lincoln. How close a friendship did they have?
We do know that Lincoln was close friends with an elderly woman, Jane Pelham (also rendered Pellum), who lived with the Blanks and Jenkins family. Since she shares the wives’ maiden last names, she was probably a relative of theirs. It’s possible that she was their mother, making Jenkins and Blanks her sons-in-law.
As an elderly woman with a gift for storytelling, Pelham possessed a veritable treasure trove of oral history, which fascinated a man as curious as Lincoln. She was born in 1787 in Virginia, so her memories dated back nearly to the time of the American Revolution. (Both she and Jenkins were born into slavery but were free by the time Lincoln knew them.)
We know that Lincoln called her “Aunt Jane” and loved to sit and talk with her, taking in the many stories she told so well, as this hilarious anecdote confirms:
While we know that Lincoln was friends with Pelham and Jenkins, did he know that Jenkins was a conductor on the Underground Railroad?
We may never know, but I can't stop wondering about the influence this incredible family had on our 16th president. When he brought about an end to slavery, did he think of his friends, Jameson Jenkins and Jane Pelham?
