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Millard Fillmore Writes Heartbreaking Letter to his Brother About the Death of his Wife
Millard Fillmore Writes Heartbreaking Letter to his Brother About the Death of his Wife
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Fillmore Millard

Millard Fillmore Writes Heartbreaking Letter to his Brother About the Death of his Wife

 

Millard Fillmore, autograph letter signed, to Charles Fillmore, April 3, 1853, Buffalo, New York, 5.25" x 8.25", 1 p. Expected paper folds, scattered professional restoration along some folds and corners, one affecting Fillmore's signature, else very good to near fine condition.

 

In this sorrowful letter, former President Millard Fillmore informs his youngest brother in St. Paul, Minnesota that the former First Lady has died. Millard Fillmore met Abigail Powers (1798-1853) in Buffalo, New York, where he was studying law. Her father had died shortly after she was born, and her mother educated her using her father's extensive library. After finishing school, she became a teacher. Millard and Abigail married in February 1826 and had two children over the next six years.

 

As First Lady from July 1850 to March 1853, Abigail Fillmore developed a White House library and advised her husband on political matters. At the outdoor inaugural ceremonies for President Franklin Pierce in March 1853, Abigail Fillmore caught a cold, which developed into bronchitis and then pneumonia. She died just 26 days after leaving the Executive Mansion, at the Willard Hotel in Washington. Five years later, Millard Fillmore remarried.

 

"Buffalo, April 3. 1853.
My Dear Brother Charles
My Dear wife is no more. She died at Washington on the 30th ult. and we left with her remains the next day for this place, and arrived here night before last, and she was buried yesterday. Her disease was inflammation of the lungs arising from a sever[e] cold, taken about the 6th of March, which soon terminated in a dropsy of the lungs. She bore all her sufferings with uncomplaining fortitude, and at last expired without a struggle or a groan. The rest of my family are here, and as well as could be expected, but we are all saddened with grief.
Truly your affectionate Brother
Millard Fillmore".

 

Millard Fillmore (1800-1874) was born in a log cabin in western New York. Largely self-taught, he later read law with several lawyers before being admitted to the bar in 1823. He represented New York as a Whig in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1833 to 1835 and again from 1837 to 1843. He returned to his law practice, and in 1846, helped found the University of Buffalo and became its first chancellor. While Fillmore served as state comptroller in 1848, the Whig Party selected him as the vice-presidential running mate for Mexican War hero Zachary Taylor. When the Whigs won the election, Fillmore became vice president in March 1849. As vice president, he presided over the Senate during the contentious debates over the Compromise of 1850, which Fillmore favored. When President Taylor died suddenly on July 9, 1850, Fillmore became the 13th President of the United States. Although the Compromise of 1850, as proposed in a single bill by Senator Henry Clay of Kentucky, failed to gain enough support to pass, Senator Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois pushed through the provisions as five separate bills, and President Fillmore signed them as they reached him. His support of the Fugitive Slave Act part of the Compromise made him unpopular with many northern Whigs. In 1852, Fillmore lost the Whig nomination to Mexican War hero Winfield Scott, whom Democrat Franklin Pierce easily defeated in the general election. Fillmore's wife died just weeks after Pierce became president, and Fillmore returned to New York, where a year later, his only daughter died. After spending a year in Europe and the Middle East, Fillmore was the presidential candidate for the American Party in 1856. He garnered more than 21 percent of the popular vote but won only the state of Maryland in the Electoral College. Although he supported Stephen Douglas, the northern Democratic candidate in the election of 1860, like Douglas, Fillmore was a strong supporter of the Union and supported Lincoln's efforts to preserve it.

 


Charles D. Fillmore (1817-1854) was the eighth of nine children born to Nathaniel and Phoebe Fillmore in western New York. His oldest brother was President Millard Fillmore. In 1840, he married Julia Etta Green, and they had at least three children. He was a brick mason and moved in 1852 to St. Paul, Minnesota, where he died of cholera or dysentery in July 1854.

 


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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