A Gettysburg Postscript: Charles Sumner, Don Quixote, the Library of Congress, and Michelle Krowl’s Very Cool Research Nugget!

File this under a very cool nugget of historical research by Michelle Krowl, who served as the moderator in my panel mentioned above in the Lincoln Forum article and is also the Civil War and Reconstruction Specialist for the Manuscript Division in the Library of Congress (she is shown below in the LOC). While reading The Great Abolitionist in preparation for The Lincoln Forum panel, Michelle saw that I had parenthetically mentioned that Charles Sumner borrowed Don Quixote from “the library” in preparation for his famous “The Crime Against Kansas” speech in May 1856. The controversial speech was the spark that led South Carolina Congressman Preston Brooks to beat Sumner with a cane to within an inch of his life on May 22, 1856 (I first wrote about that in my 2012 book, The Caning: The Assault That Drove America to Civil War). Michelle wondered if Sumner borrowed Don Quixote from the Library of Congress – a presumption that made sense since Sumner was in Washington D.C. from January of that year. And lo and behold – the records showed that he did exactly that! The document here is Sumner’s winter/spring 1856 borrowing record from the Library of Congress (see his name on the top right of the ledger). Look carefully and you’ll discover that Sumner checked the book out on January 23 of that year and returned it on February 4. It was well before his speech, but Sumner often researched speeches for months before delivering them. My thanks to Michelle for her intellectual curiosity and for finding Sumner’s LOC borrowing record!