Mr. Herndon gives John Hanks as his authority for this statement. But this is plainly an error, for, according to Mr. Lincoln himself, Hanks did not go on to New Orleans, but having a family and being likely to be detained from home longer than at first expected, turned back at St. Louis. Though there is reason for believing that Lincoln was deeply impressed on this trip by something he saw in a New Orleans slave market, and that he often referred to it, the story told above probably grew to its present proportions by much telling.[A]
[Footnote A: "No doubt the young Kentuckian was disgusted [with what he saw in the New Orleans slave auction]; but there is no proof that this was his first object lesson in human slavery, or that, as so often has been asserted, he turned to his companion and said, 'If I ever get a chance to hit slavery, I will hit it hard.' Such an expression from a flatboat-man would have been absurd."--_Personal Reminiscences of 1840-1890, by L.E. Chittenden._]
Mentor Graham was the New Salem school-master. He it was who assisted Lincoln in mastering Kirkham's grammar, and later gave him valuable assistance when Lincoln was learning the theory of surveying. He taught in a little log school-house on a hill south of the village, just across Green's Rocky Branch. Among his pupils was Ann Rutledge, and the school was often visited by Lincoln. In 1845, Mentor Graham was defendant in a lawsuit in which Lincoln and Herndon were attorneys for the plaintiff, Nancy Green. It appears from the declaration, written by Lincoln's own hand, that on October 28, 1844, Mentor Graham gave his note to Nancy Green for one hundred dollars, with John Owens and Andrew Beerup as sureties, payable twelve months after date. The note not being paid when due, suit was brought. That Lincoln, even as an attorney, should sue Mentor Graham may seem strange; but it is no surprise when it is explained that the plaintiff was the widow of Bowling Green--the woman who, with her husband, had comforted Lincoln in an hour of grief. Justice, too, in this case, was clearly on her side. The lawsuit seems never to have disturbed the friendly relations between Lincoln and Mentor Graham. The latter's admiration for the former was unbounded to the day of his death. Mentor Graham lived on his farm near the ruins of New Salem until 1860, when he removed to Petersburg. There he lived until 1885, when he removed to Greenview, Illinois. Later he went to South Dakota, where he died about 1892, at the ripe old age of ninety-odd years.]
