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Lot 148
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Abraham Lincoln as Attorney for Plaintiff in Unusual Seduction Case
Abraham Lincoln as Attorney for Plaintiff in Unusual Seduction Case
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Description:

Lincoln Abraham

Abraham Lincoln as Attorney for Plaintiff in Unusual Seduction Case

Abraham Lincoln, endorsement on Asahel Gridley, Plea and Notice, filed in case of Dunn v. Carle, Champaign County Circuit Court, April 30, 1851. Includes joinder written and signed by Abraham Lincoln. 3 pp., 7.75" x 12.5".  Expected folds, very good.

Complete Transcript

"Albert G. Carle

Champaign Circuit

Court Apl Term 1851

Zephaniah Dunn

In Trespass

And the said defendant by Somers & Gridley his attorneys comes and defends the force and injury When &c and says that he is not guilty of the said supposed trespass as the plaintiff hath above thereof complained against him and of this he puts himself upon the Country &c.

Somers & Gridley

for Deft

[Joinder by Lincoln:]

And the plaintiff doth the like.

Lincoln, p.q.

[Notice:]

And the said plaintiff Zephaniah Dunn will take notice that upon the trial of this Cause The defendant will prove and insist upon and rely upon the following facts to wit. That previous to the Sixth day of March in the year of our lord one Thousand Eight Hundred and forty nine the Nancy Jane Dunn in the plaintiffs declaration mentioned was a person of loose carachter and conduct and that the said Nancy Jane Dunn hath been from the time last aforesaid and still is a person of loose carachter and unchaste conduct. Defendant will also prove that if any promise of Marriage was by him ever made to the Nancy Jane Dunn in the declaration mentioned by which she was seduced (if ever she was seduced) that before any breach of such promise (if any such promise was made) she the said Nancy Jane Dunn conducted herself in a lewd and lascivious manner towards and with divers male persons at the county and state aforesaid & did within the time aforesaid have illicit sexual intercourse with divers male persons to wit Samuel C. Crane John Geer, Joseph Mallory, George Poor and that the facts of such illicit sexual intercourse came to the knowledge of defendant only after the making of such promise of marriage (if any such promise ever was made) and before any breaches of the same by this defendant. Defendant will also prove that before the time of the committing of the said several supposed trespasses in the declaration mentioned she the said Nancy Jane Dunn in the declaration mentioned conducted herself in a lewd and lascivious manner towards and with divers male persons at the county and state aforesaid and did then & there have illicit sexual intercourse with divers male persons to wit with Samuel C. Crane, John Gere Simeon H. Busey, Hooper Morain, Elisha Harkness, & Harrison Blizzard, John Hayse & Henderson Curry, and with divers other male persons to wit at the county & state aforesaid".

In antebellum Illinois, the crime of bastardy was a serious charge. If a man was convicted of fathering an illegitimate child, he could be forced to pay as much as $50 annually for the support of the child for seven years. In addition, the father of the “seduced” woman could also bring suit for “seduction” and request compensation for the loss of his daughter’s labor while she was pregnant. By the late antebellum period, however, the courts had largely set aside the legal fiction of “loss of services” in seduction cases in favor of direct punitive action against men who seduced and abandoned young women.

While traveling the circuit in the spring of 1850, Abraham Lincoln became involved in a trio of cases arising from the pregnancy of the unmarried Nancy Jane Dunn. The oldest of Zephaniah and Lavinia Dunn’s nine children, Nancy Jane Dunn was twenty-one years old in 1849. After she gave birth in December 1849, Nancy Jane Dunn insisted that twenty-seven-year-old Albert G. Carle was the father of her child and that he had promised to marry her.

At the May 1850 term on the Champaign County Circuit Court, Nancy Jane Dunn sued Carle for a breach of his promise to marry her. She also informed the state’s attorney that Carle was the father of her child, and he indicted Carle on a charge of bastardy. In addition, Zephaniah Dunn sued Carle for seducing his daughter.

Abraham Lincoln and two local attorneys represented Nancy Jane Dunn and her father in each of the three cases, while Carle retained William D. Somers, James W. Somers, Asahel Gridley, and Kirby Benedict to represent him. The court settled the breach of marriage contract case quickly in the spring of 1850. A jury heard the evidence, but then Nancy Jane Dunn either agreed to a dismissal or decided not to pursue the case further. The court ordered a nonsuit and ordered Dunn to pay the court costs. In the other two cases—bastardy and seduction—Carle requested a continuance to the next term of court. Again in October 1850, Carle obtained a continuance to the spring of 1851.

In the April 1851 term of the court, Carle pleaded not guilty to both the bastardy and seduction charges. The cases had excited “a great deal of interest” in the county. As the lawyers argued the case before him, Judge David Davis composed a letter to his wife at home in Bloomington, Illinois. Lincoln “in his opening speech to the Jury,” Davis wrote, “bore down savagely on the Defdt. who is now married, & who has been using extraordinary exertions to procure testimony, to prove that the woman had permitted the embrace of other men.” The notice part of this document reflects Carle’s assertions on this point. Although the trial might last until midnight, Davis was determined “to sit it out tonight.” By the end of the letter, Davis could write, “It is now nearly 10 Oclk, & Lincoln to make his Closing Speech.” After deliberation the jury declared, “We the Jury find that Albert G. Carle the Defendant is the real father of the Bastard child of the said Nancy Jane Dunn.” The court ordered Carle to pay $50 per year for the support of the child from December 1849.

Davis had planned to close the spring session of the term on Friday night, but both Zephaniah Dunn and Carle “insisted on a trial in the seduction suit.” Davis continued the term until Saturday so there would be time to seat a jury and hear witnesses. This document is Carle’s plea in the seduction case. The pleading process continued until one side affirmed a fact that the other side denied. Lincoln wrote a joinder on this document, so that the case could go to trial. Both the defendant and the plaintiff “put themselves upon the country,” meaning that they appealed to a jury to decide the matter between them.

According to Davis, Carle’s witnesses questioned Nancy Jane Dunn’s virtue and “blacken her character desperately.” After the trial began, Davis “felt sorry for her father.” “I suppose,” he continued, “he thought her virtuous.” Davis lamented sarcastically to his wife, “The evidence disclosed a beautiful State of morals among the young men and young girls of this Grove.” The jury found Carle guilty and awarded Zephaniah Dunn $180.41 in damages. However, Dunn remitted, or gave back, the damages in exchange for a promise from Carle that he would not seek custody of the child.

This item comes with a Certificate from John Reznikoff, a premier authenticator for both major 3rd party authentication services, PSA and JSA (James Spence Authentications), as well as numerous auction houses.

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