The Real Lincoln, Published 1904

Charles L.C. Minor was a Confederate Veteran and principally an educator after the War between the States. He was selected to be the first President of the Virginia Agricultural and Mechanical College, now the Virginia Polytechnic Institute at Blacksburg, Virginia, were he was for eight years.

In his preface …

Charles L.C. Minor was a Confederate Veteran and principally an educator after the War between the States. He was selected to be the first President of the Virginia Agricultural and Mechanical College, now the Virginia Polytechnic Institute at Blacksburg, Virginia, were he was for eight years.

In his preface he gives the purpose of his book. “…but it is a duty to correct such misrepresentations, for the reason that they make claims for Lincoln entirely inconsistent with the concessions of grave defects in him that are made by his closest associates of his private life; by the most respectable and most eulogistic biographers and historians of his own day and of this day, at home and abroad, who have described his character and career, and equally inconsistent with the estimates of him by the greatest and closest associates of his public life, and by a very large part of the Northern and Western Republican leaders of his day. The fact that the evidence submitted comes from such witnesses, and such witnesses only, is the chief claim that this book has upon the interest and confidence of its readers, and attention is called to the extraordinary cogency of such evidence, and to the fact that not a word of testimony is offered out of the mass that might be offered from the eminent writers, speakers, statesmen and soldiers who took the Southern side.”

“In the Appendix will be found, in alphabetical order, the names of all witnesses whose evidence is submitted. Reference is invited to that Appendix, as each witness is reached by the reader, and especially in every case where the reader finds it hard to believe the evidence.”

On page 13 we learn, “In view of what this book presents, those who have learned to rate Lincoln highest can hardly refuse to modify their estimations of him, and it was the purpose to effect such a change in men’s minds, in the interest of truth, that the task was undertaken.”

If you are interested in learning the unvarnished truth about the 16th president then you should read this book.