LINCOLN'S LIE

A study of “fake news” and its suppression during the Civil War era.

On May 18, 1864, two newspapers in New York City published a presidential proclamation calling for a draft of 400,000 men and a day of fasting and prayer. Unfortunately for the gullible proprietors of the New York World and the Journal of Commerce, the proclamation was a forgery concocted by two journalists who hoped to profit from the expected rise in the price of gold subsequent to publication. In her latest, former George executive editor Mitchell provides the first book-length study of this incident. The author begins with a selection of useful background information—e.g., “While hated in Washington, the World, by the end of 1863, boasted three times the circulation of any other newspaper”—and she capably guides readers through the course of the controversy. Ultimately, President Abraham Lincoln shut down the World and Journal of Commerce for several days and imprisoned the main conspirator, a former New York Times reporter named Joseph Howard, for three months. Mitchell suggests that the hoax was based on a never-released presidential proclamation leaked by Mary Todd Lincoln, an intriguing proposition. However, the author undercuts her arguments with prose that features overlong quotations, odd repetition (“Howard caught his first glimpse of fifty-two-year-old Lincoln, who had just turned fifty-two that day”), and mistakes regarding names (George G. Meade, not “George C. Meade”), dates (the Lemmon Slave Case ruling was in 1860, not 1861), and other facts (the phrase “State of the Union” was not used until 1934) as well as temporal inaccuracies: If a New York City–based ship brings information “once a week to Europe,” how can it be a “ten-day journey” to Liverpool?

Entertaining at times, but readers seeking a scrupulous account of Lincoln’s relations with the press should look elsewhere.