Description:

Lincoln Robert



Robert Todd Lincoln’s Riggs National Bank Wallet from Holzer Collection

 

This wallet embossed with “Riggs National Bank” said to have belonged to Robert Todd Lincoln was owned by prominent Lincolniana Collector Harold Holzer.

 

Wallet embossed “Riggs National Bank,” c. 1900s-1910s.  3" x 4.75".

 

Historical Background


Robert Todd Lincoln (1843-1926) was the oldest son of Abraham and Mary Lincoln and the only of their four sons to live past the age of 19. After his father’s death, Robert Todd Lincoln supported his mother and younger brother Tad, but Tad’s death in 1871 left their mother devastated. In 1875, he arranged to have her committed to a private psychiatric hospital in Batavia, Illinois, but after several months there, she arranged to go and live with her sister in Springfield. She never fully reconciled with her son.

 

Meanwhile, Harvard-educated Robert Todd Lincoln completed his legal studies in Chicago and began a thriving law practice in 1867. He also became active in Republican politics. He served as Secretary of War from 1881 to 1885, under Presidents James A. Garfield and his successor Chester A. Arthur. From 1889 to 1893, he was the U.S. Minister to the United Kingdom in the administration of Benjamin Harrison.

 

The Riggs Bank in Washington handled the personal financial affairs of many U.S. Presidents from Martin Van Buren to Richard Nixon. Begun by Corcoran and Riggs in 1840, the bank became the most important bank in Washington for most of its history. When Corcoran retired in 1854, it became “Riggs & Company” and handled President Abraham Lincoln’s finances during his presidency. It became “Riggs National Bank” in 1896 when it accepted a government charter. Robert Todd Lincoln had an account with Riggs National Bank in the early twentieth century.

 

Provenance: This piece is from the collection of Harold Holzer (b. 1949), a prominent Lincoln scholar and collector of Lincolniana. He is the author or editor of fifty-two books, most on Abraham Lincoln, and specializes in representations of Lincoln in visual culture. Holzer was senior vice president for public affairs at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York from 1992 to 2015 and served as co-chair of the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission from 2000 to 2010.

 

 


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