Lincoln’s Legacy: Historic Americana from the Life of Abraham Lincoln

Fragment of Brooks Brothers coat worn by President Lincoln at Ford's Theatre on 14 April 1865; approximately 2 x 3 in. (51 x 76 mm); Unexamined out of framed display, 20 x 16 1/2 in. (508 x 419 mm).

The frock coat Lincoln wore to Ford's Theatre on the night of 14 April 1865 was crafted by the New York-based haberdashery Brooks Brothers, originally for Lincoln's second inauguration. Lincoln was by then considered to be one of the company's most loyal customers.

Upon the completion of the President's autopsy on 15 April, Lincoln's coat, along with his other clothing and personal effects, were returned to Mary Lincoln. She then gifted the frock coat, overcoat, and pants to White House doorman Alphonse Donn. Donn had accompanied Lincoln's son, Tad, to Grover's Theatre to see Aladdin! or His Wonderful Lamp, on the night of the assassination. Over the ensuing years Donn is known to have clipped off pieces of the coat and gifted them to friends and others. In the 1920s the coat was offered at auction but did not sell. It stayed with the family until 1968, when it was gifted to Ford's Theatre in honor of its reopening.

This piece of the coat was first gifted to Lincoln's pastor, Reverend Phineas Densmore Gurley. Gurley was at President Lincoln's bedside in the Peterson House when he died on 15 April. Four days later Gurley delivered the funeral sermon for the late President at the White House. He said of the slain leader, "We admired and loved him on many accounts, for strong and various reasons. We admired his childlike simplicity, his freedom from guile and deceit, his staunch and sterling integrity, his kind and forgiving temper, his industry and patience, his persistent, self-sacrificing devotion to all the duties of his eminent position, from the least to the greatest; his readiness to hear and consider the cause of the poor and humble, the suffering and the oppressed; his charity toward those who questioned the correctness of his opinions and the wisdom of his policy; his wonderful skill in reconciling differences among the friends of the Union, leading them away from abstractions, and inducing them to work together and harmoniously for the common weal; his true and enlarged philanthropy, that knew no distinction of color or race, but regarded all men as brethren..."

A handwritten note from Gurley's daughter, Emma H. Gurley Adams, dated 5 February 1914, framed here with the coat fragment reads in full: "This piece of the coat, Abraham Lincoln wore the night of his Assassination, was given to my father, Rev'd., P.D. Gurley, D.D., who was Mr. Lincoln's Pastor, by Alphonso [sic] Donn, and [sic] employee, at the White House". This letter is additionally notarized by J. Chesney, notary public.

Provenance:

Mary Todd Lincoln

Alphonse Donn, White House doorman during the Lincoln administration, gift from above

Reverend Phineas Densmore Gurley (1816-1868), Chaplain of the United States Senate, gifted from above and thence to

Emma H. Gurley Adams (1859-1946), daughter of above

Louise Taper, Beverly Hills, California