President Lincoln, Mrs Bixby, Spielberg and the Truth

In 1864, President Abraham Lincoln wrote to express condolences to Mrs Lydia Bixby, a widow who was believed to have lost five sons during the American Civil War.  Lincoln's letter was printed in The Boston Evening Transcript. It went like this:

Dear Madam

I have been shown in the files of the War Department…that you are the mother of five sons who have died gloriously on the field of battle. I feel how weak and fruitless must be any word of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from tendering you the consolation that may be found in the thanks of the Republic they died to save. I pray that our Heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of freedom.

Yours very sincerely and respectfully

Abraham Lincoln

There is little Lincoln can say by way of consolation to a mother who has lost five children in the war, but it remains a deeply moving and poignant piece of writing.

It was the inspiration for Steven Spielberg’s 1998 movie, Saving Private Ryan. In a touching scene – one of the few that can reduce me to tears – it is read out by a Commanding Officer to justify the rescue of the remaining Ryan after the death of his two brothers following the Normandy invasions.  ‘We are going to get him the hell out of there’ he says. 

But it has been revealed that only two of Mrs Bixby's five sons actually died in battle.  One deserted the army, one was honorably discharged, and another deserted or died a prisoner of war. 

The authorship of the letter has also been debated by scholars. Most now believe it was not written by the President at all but instead by John Hay, one of the White House secretaries. Lincoln clearly signs it, but is unlikely to have composed it. 

Moreover, the original letter was destroyed by Mrs Bixby, who was a Confederate (Southern States) sympathizer and disliked President Lincoln, who represented the Union or Yankee Northern States.

In fact, a record of the letter only exists because Lincoln’s staff sent it to the newspaper as a marketing or publicity ploy, in an attempt to generate good will for the Civil War effort, and show Lincoln as a kind and generous man.

The letter is still beautifully written, and Spielberg’s film still astonishingly powerful (though it does nothing to correct the historical inaccuracy). Indeed both the letter and the film stand as lessons for our students that ‘fake news’ is actually quite an old thing, and not something new.

It reminds us not to believe everything we read, perhaps especially at the time of a Presidential election and in the time of Covid. It reminds us to remain intellectually sceptical when we are being emotionally manipulated.

It shows that we should not hesitate to question what we are told, and to look for evidence rather than automatically trust any claim to truth. 

You can watch the scene from Saving Private Ryan here. 

It is one of the finest sequences in cinema, starting with the amplified clatter of the typing pool, moving to an external view of an office, and from there to the sunlit pastures of rural America, where Mrs Ryan is doing the dishes. We see her collapse (in a brilliant wordless scene) as she learns the news of her sons’ deaths; then we segue into the military decision to launch a search for the remaining Ryan boy.

It is in the last scene (featuring a young Bryan Cranston from Breaking Bad) that the Army General reads out the letter from Mrs Bixby. It is enormously affecting. But, of course, totally untrue. Does it matter that the film is factually inaccurate? Or is the emotional impact it generates worth the peddling of fake information?

As a Hollywood Director once said, ‘If you want facts, go to the Discovery Channel’. And Mark Twain said, 'Never let the truth get in the way of a good story'.

But beyond film and art, in life and politics, truth does matter. Integrity continues to count. Ethics is a value we should prize highly and hold dear. Let us hope, going forwards, that the world’s leaders share that view and give a good example to today’s students as they prepare to be the leaders of tomorrow.     

Chris Greenhalgh
Principal and CEO