She was considered his political partner. She helped him with his speeches and his views on what is right. Mary had most of his ideas and she knew if she had him people would listen. If it wasn’t for her, many historians say, Abe would’ve never became president. If Abe never became president the United States would not be the same right now. Abe did win the election in 1860, which meant Mary was the first lady, she loved the attention.
Soon after Abe became president, the Civil War began; April 12, 1861. During this time Abe was preoccupied for obvious reasons and Mary started to get very bored. So she started to do things to keep her busy like redecorate the White House, she would host parties at the White House and she would also go and visit hospitals with the wounded soldiers. Throughout the war, many of Mary’s relatives and friends had died in the war. Around the same time her favorite son, William, passed away. All of this made her stop functioning altogether. She quit throwing the parties and shut everybody out of the White House. She stayed in bed for weeks, heartsick. She was officially going “crazy” as some say today. A few years later another event occurred that just topped it all off for Mary, Abe was assassinated right in front of her. She barely held onto her sanity as a widow. She dressed in black and was depressed for the rest of her life. Since she didn’t have Abe anymore she was running out of money. She had to sell a lot of her clothes and jewelry, she even ended up asking her rich friends to help her out once in