An Independence Day Speech by President Lincoln Marking this Holiday and Union Victory at Gettysburg on July 3, 1863.

On July 7, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln delivered a speech to mark the Independence Day holiday during the civil war (1861-1865). Lincoln was not just marking this holiday but the Union victory at Gettysburg on July 3, just days prior. Lincoln jubilantly observed to laughter and applause that “on the fourth [of July] the enemies of the declaration that all men are created equal had to turn tail and run.” 

"Hancock at Gettysburg," painted by Thure de Thulstrup, showing Pickett's Charge.

Lincoln gave a more somber remembrance of this great battle four months later.

"Fellow Citizens:

I am very glad to see you to-night. But yet I will not say I thank you for this call. But I do most sincerely thank Almighty God for the occasion on which you have called. [Cheers.] How long ago is it? Eighty odd years since, upon the Fourth day of July, for the first time in the world, a union body of representatives was assembled to declare as a self-evident truth that all men were created equal. [Cheers.]

That was the birthday of the United States of America. Since then the fourth day of July has had several very peculiar recognitions. The two most distinguished men who framed and supported that paper, including the particular declaration I have mentioned, Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, the one having framed it, and the other sustained it most ably in debate, the only two of the fifty-five or fifty-six who signed it, I believe, who were ever President of the United States, precisely fifty years after they put their hands to that paper it pleased the Almighty God to take away from this stage of action on the Fourth of July. This extraordinary coincidence we can understand to be a dispensation of the Almighty Ruler of Events.

Another of our Presidents, five years afterwards, was called from this stage of existence on the same day of the month, and now on this Fourth of July just past, when a gigantic rebellion has risen in the land, precisely at the bottom of which is an effort to overthrow that principle “that all men are created equal,” we have a surrender of one of their most powerful positions and powerful armies forced upon them on that very day. [Cheers.] And I see in the succession of battles in Pennsylvania, which continued three days, so rapidly following each other as to be justly called one great battle, fought on the first, second and third of July; on the fourth the enemies of the declaration that all men are created equal had to turn tail and run. [Laughter and applause.]

Gentlemen, this is a glorious theme and a glorious occasion for a speech, but I am not prepared to make one worthy of the theme and worthy of the occasion. [Cries of “go on,” and applause.] I would like to speak in all praise that is due to the many brave officers and soldiers who have fought in the cause of the Union and liberties of this country from the beginning of this war, not on occasions of success, but upon the more trying occasions of the want of success. I say I would like to speak in praise of these men, particularizing their deeds, but I am unprepared. I should dislike to mention the name of a single officer, lest in doing so I wrong some other one whose name may not occur to me. [Cheers.]

Recent events bring up certain names, gallantly prominent, but I do not want to particularly name them at the expense of others, who are as justly entitled to our gratitude as they. I therefore do not upon this occasion name a single man. And now I have said about as much as I ought to say in this impromptu manner, and if you please, I’ll take the music."

Abraham Lincoln, photographed by Alexander Gardner on November 8, 1863, 11 days before the Gettysburg Address.

Lincoln was the first of three U. S. Presidents to give an Independence Day speech during wartime. The other two were President Woodrow Wilson on July 4, 1918, and President Harry S. Truman on July 4, 1951.

The Gettysburg Address

On November 19, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln delivered a short, 271 word, speech at the close of ceremonies dedicating the battlefield cemetery at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, even though he was very, very ill. Honoring a request to offer a few remarks, Lincoln memorialized the Union dead and highlighted the redemptive power of their sacrifice. Placing the common soldier at the center of the struggle for equality, Lincoln reminded his listeners of the higher purpose for which blood was shed.

ADDITIONAL READING

Abraham Lincoln Came Near Death from smallpox.

The Four Draft Versions of Lincoln's Gettysburg Address.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Abraham Lincoln stayed at the Old Hotel and Tavern in Fullersburg Illinois, in 1858.

The Hotel & Tavern was located on Ogden Avenue , East of York Rd. (then Walker Road) and West of Elm, in what is now Hinsdale, Illinois. Hinsdale was first called Brush Hill, then renamed Fullersburg for the Ben Fuller family in 1851.

The main east-west road through the Brush Hill settlement was improved as early as the 1840s, and it became known as a "turnpike" with toll gates at intervals to help defray the cost of improvements and maintenance. These tollgates lingered on through the era of the plank road bubble.

A second tavern (and Inn) was built in Brush Hill on the north side of the road, a little east of the Cass Street intersection. It was called the Grand Pacific, and later as the Fullersburg Tavern (finally known as the "Old Hotel and Tavern"). It is said the Inn & Tavern was built in 1835 by relatives of Ulysses S. Grant. The fact that two Inns & Taverns are required in such a small town is ample evidence of the density of the horse-drawn and oxen-drawn traffic that must have passed through.

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Because the Naperville Road (Ogden Avenue) was the main trail west from Chicago, it was the first road to be covered with wooden planks by the South Western Plank Road Company, and consequently called the Southwestern Plank Road. The road was completed in 1850 and extended from Bull's Head Tavern at Ogden and Madison in Chicago, to Brush Hill (later Fullersburg, Illinois). 

The Southwestern Plank Road was a one-lane road, eight feet wide and constructed of planks three inches thick. A tollgate was located at Joliet and Ogden

 

           TOLL

10¢ - Single Horse & Rider. 

37¢ - Two Horse Team.

25¢ - Carriage, Buggy or Cart Pulled By One Horse. 

45¢ - Cart Pulled By Two Horses or Oxen.  

04¢ - Head of Cattle. 

03¢ - Head of Sheep. 

The plank road was later connected to another plank road at Fullersburg.

Many notable people passed through Fullersburg, which was incorporated as a village in 1851, including Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas.

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Abraham Lincoln visited Fullersburg while campaigning for the Illinois House of Representatives in 1854. The exact date is not known, but it likely occurred sometime between June and November of that year.

Lincoln stayed at the Old Hotel and Tavern, later known as the "Fullersburg House," on September 14-15, 1858, as part of his campaign for the U.S. Senate against Stephen Douglas. William "Uncle Billy" Green, the hotel owner, was a strong Lincoln supporter. Lincoln was on his way to a Republican rally in Macomb, Illinois.

While there is no documented record of Lincoln giving a formal speech at the hotel or elsewhere in Fullersburg, it's possible he had informal conversations or interactions with townspeople during his stay.

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Some sources claim that Lincoln gave a speech on the afternoon of September 15 at Fullersburg's town square.

By 1860, Fullersburg had become one of the leading communities of DuPage County. Its buildings included 15 to 20 houses, two hotels, three taverns, a post office, a blacksmith shop, a school, a cemetery, and a grist mill.

It is a fact that Fullersburg was one station on the underground railroad offering slaves refuge and transfer, and John S. Coe was the man, or at least he was one of those who served as a station master.

By 1874, when an atlas of the county and its principal towns were published, Fullersburg had emerged from the frontier and acquired the aspects of a residential village. 

The Old Hotel and Tavern was converted into an Antique store between World War I and World War II. Eventually, it was torn down.

Though Brush Hill was never incorporated in its own name, the area is historically significant to the development of Hinsdale and Oak Brook, Illinois.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.