Missing Links, Vol. 3, No. 38 SUCCESSFUL LINKS: WRESTLING WITH LINCOLN by Joyce Loflin <[email protected]> Alonzo THOMPSON is my grandfather, his father, William Cornell Thompson, would be my great-grandfather, and his father, my great-great-grandfather, would have been born in the 1830s, so it would be his father, Lorenzo Dow Thompson, of St. Clair County, Illinois, who was probably born about 1810. On page 29 of "Honor's Voice," by Douglas L. Wilson, it says: "...a report exists that purports to feature Lincoln's own account, albeit at second hand, of his other famous wrestling match, which took place during the Black Hawk War. In 1904 Colonel Risdon Moore, a professor of mathematics at McKendree College, published his recollection of a conversation he had with Abraham Lincoln in 1860, in which the presidential candidate described his match with Lorenzo Dow Thompson, the champion of St. Clair County company that was contesting Lincoln's own company for the right to a particular campground at the rendezvous of volunteer militia near Beardstown, Illinois. "Moore remembered Lincoln's account as follows: 'Gentlemen, I felt of Mr. Thompson, the St. Clair champion, and told my boys I could throw him, and they could bet what they pleased. You see, I had never been thrown, or dusted, as the phrase then was, and, I believe, Thompson said the same to the St. Clair boys, that they might bet their bottom dollar that he could down me. You may think a wrestle, or wrastle, as we called such contests of skill and strength, was a small matter, but I tell you the whole army was out to see it. We took holds, his choice first, a side hold. I then realized from his grip for the first time, that he was a powerful man and that I would have no easy job. The struggle was a severe one, but after many passes and efforts he threw me. My boys yelled out 'a dog fall,' which meant then a drawn battle, but I told my boys it was fair, and then said to Thompson, 'now it's your turn to go down,' as it was my hold then, Indian Hug. We took our holds again and after the fiercest struggle of the kind I ever had, he threw me again, almost as easily at my hold as at his own. My men raised another protest, but I again told them it was a fair down. Why, gentlemen, that man could throw a grizzly bear.' " On page 48 and 49 of the same book it again mentions "...his [Lincoln's] only defeat came, as we have seen when he met a man, some said the only man, who could throw him: Lorenzo Dow Thompson of St. Clair County. Another book, "Abraham Lincoln: The War Years," by Carl Sandburg, only mentions Thompson on page 158. "... men in all parts of Illinois tried him out. The Clary's Grove Boys said no man in the army could throw him (Lincoln). This reached the ears of a wrestler named Thompson, who had friends. "A championship match was arranged, and Lincoln's friends bet money, hats, whisky [sic], knives, blankets, and tomahawks. On the day of the match, as the two wrestlers tussled in their first feel-outs of each other, Lincoln turned to his friends and said, 'Boys, this is the most powerful man I ever had hold of.' "For a while Lincoln held him off; then Thompson got the 'crotch holdt' on him, and he went under, fairly thrown. The match was for the best two out of three falls. In the second grapple, Lincoln went to the ground pulling Thompson down with him. It looked like a 'dog fall' [and] the boys from Clary's Grove swarmed around; an all-round fight seemed next on the program of the day's events, when Lincoln raised his head over the crowd ... and in the silence that followed, he said: 'Boys, give up your bets. If this man hasn't thrown me fairly, he could.' . . . At a later time Lincoln told friends about Thompson: 'I never had been thrown in a wrestling match until the man from that company did it. He could have thrown a grizzly bear.' " Isn't that a fun thing to learn? Now how do I check it out to see if this Lorenzo Dow Thompson is really my ancestor? [Editor's note: A check with Illinois State Archives, which has indexes to soldiers serving in the Blackhawk War, et al, and with the National Archives for military records and any pension application files may further identify the Lorenzo Dow Thompson who served from St. Clair County, Illinois. Additionally, search Illinois census records, as well as land and marriage records of St. Clair County. If you're lucky there will be only one man of this name, but if there is more than one, you'll need to identify each by where they lived (determining townships is valuable), ages, wife or wives' names, birth places, etc.] * * * * * [email protected] 216 Beach Park Lane Cape Canaveral, FL 32920-5003 Home of The *HARRISON* Repository & *MY FAMILY* http://moon.ouhsc.edu/rbonner/harintro.htm My Family WWW: http://moon.ouhsc.edu/rbonner/index.htm LINDSAY & HARRISON Surnames & CSA-HISTORY Roots Mail List GENCONNECT: http://cgi.rootsweb.com/~genbbs/indx/FamAssoc.html Data Managed by beautiful daughter Becky Bass Bonner and me, Josephine Lindsay Bass