Another son Robert Parker soon followed but didn't survive the past 14 months. Eliza became pregnant within a short amount of time after Mary Ann's birth, this time giving birth to a long-awaited son named Levi. Regardless, his lifestyle contradicted his beliefs: he was a slaveholder in an antislavery family in a slave state. Robert Todd freely discussed his dislike of slave selling and opposed efforts to open KY slave markets to out-of-state imports, and he believed slavery prevented Lexington from growing commercially. The anti-slavery ideology grew to match those of her father who supported the KY Colonization Society in its efforts to send the freed slave to Liberia. In earnest, Todd’s anti-slavery views developed very early in her life and she was extremely proud and pleased when she learned that Mammy Sally was integral in helping escaped slaves make it to the Ohio River. Mary was especially fond of the slave Mammy Sally. In his early years, he'd studied to be a lawyer and was later admitted to the Kentucky bar however, he never practiced law due to the fact there were already too many lawyers in Kentucky.Īlthough the Todd family rejected the idea of slavery, they owned one slave for every member of the family. Her father, a Whig politician, and storeowner, adequately provided for his family. At that time, Lexington was a rugged frontier town founded by a handful of men that included Mary Ann's grandfathers Robert Parker and Levi Todd, as well as her great uncles Robert and John Todd. The Todd family lived in a quaint two-story, nine-room L-shaped house on Short Street in Lexington, KY. Before Mary Ann was born, her eldest sister Elizabeth was born, followed by her sister Francis. Mary Ann Todd Lincoln was born the third child to Eliza Ann Parker Todd and Robert Smith Todd on December 13, 1818. If we examine her early years, her most impressionable years, we may find compassion for the woman who was the wife of the 16th president of the United States. During the Civil War, both North and South called her a traitor and rarely was a kind word printed about her by the press. Mary Todd suffered from depressive episodes and migraine headaches throughout her life and often squandered money on lavish gowns and frivolous accessories during the White House years in hopes of finding relief from the void deep within. By the time she was six, her life took a melancholy turn from which she never recovered. Mary Todd Lincoln, the most criticized and misunderstood first lady, experienced more than her share of tragedy during her lifetime.
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