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Important scrapbook from the personal collection of Abraham Jonas (1801-1864), a Jewish lawyer from Quincy, Illinois, a state legislator of Illinois and Kentucky, and a valued friend of Abraham Lincoln. The scrapbook, 9.25˝ x 12˝ x 2˝, quarter-bound with green marbled boards, contains approximately 120 total pages of newspaper clippings, manuscript telegraphs, printed General Orders, and the occasional engraving, photograph, and hand-colored map, publications covering from 1846-1863, with the majority dated to 1860-1863, arranged in mostly chronological order.
Beyond its Lincolnian connection, what makes this scrapbook all the more unique is its balanced attention to both sides of the Civil War. Four of Jonas’s sons, including future U.S. Senator Benjamin F. Jonas, fought for the Confederacy, while two others fought for the Union. This conflict of parental love is honored by the items preserved in this album, which includes ample clipped articles from both Northern and Southern newspapers relating to the Civil War. Featured news items discuss public opinion/morale; the tenor of contemporary political discourse; historical views and precedents; the state of hospitals and prisons; military engagements such as Fort Sumter, Battle of Wilson's Creek, Great Bethel Affair, Fort Donelson, Battle of Shiloh, Capture of New Orleans, Battle of Cross Keys, Battle of Corinth, Battle of Pea Ridge, Second Battle of Bull Run, Battle of Baton Rouge, and the Battle of Gettysburg; and the sundry actions and thoughts of leaders like Abraham Lincoln, William H. Seward, Stephen A. Douglas, Jefferson Davis, Judah P. Benjamin, Joseph Holt, and innumerable generals from both sides. Scattered manuscript captions in an unknown hand appear throughout. In overall very good condition, with wear to the partially detached covers, damage to the spine, and staining throughout.
Accompanied by the Spring 2023 issue of The Governor's Post, the magazine of the Historical Society of Quincy and Adams County, Illinois, containing an article by Beth Young entitled, ‘Abraham Jonas…Lincoln's Dear Friend’ (pp. 8-10), and a four-page print-out of the ‘Report of Brig. Gen. B.M. Prentiss…Battle of Pittsburgh Landing, or Shiloh, Tenn.,’ which describes battle movements during the Battle of Shiloh, when Confederate brother Julian and Union brother Edward are believed to have been 460 feet apart on the battlefield.
Abraham Jonas emigrated to the United States from England in 1819, thus belonging to the first 500 Jewish families in the United States. Jonas was the first permanent Jewish resident of Quincy, Illinois, after he relocated there about 1838, and was also one of the founding members of the Congregation B'nai Israel, the first Jewish temple west of the Alleghenies. During his lifetime, Jonas served in both the Kentucky and Illinois legislature, belonged to the Freemasons, and served as Postmaster of Quincy for two terms, in 1849-1853 and 1861-1864.
Jonas is important in his own right because he was one of the earliest Jewish immigrants to America, but he is also remembered as being one of Abraham Lincoln's closest friends. The two shared many similarities: practice of the law, political affiliation (first Whig, then Republican), and then, of course, their adopted home state of Illinois. Jonas personally arranged the Lincoln-Douglas debate that was held in Quincy in October 1858. Lincoln showed many kindnesses to the Jonas family in acknowledgment of his and Jonas’s close friendship. Abraham Jonas's oldest son, a Confederate officer named Charles Henry Jonas (1832-1910), was granted temporary leave from a Union prison to be at his father's deathbed in July 1863. Following Jonas’s death, Lincoln appointed his daughter, Annie, and later his widow, to take over as Postmaster of Quincy.
The Jonas Family was fractured by political and military divisions. Of the six sons born to Jonas and his second wife Louisa Block (1809-1867), four served in the Confederate Army in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Arkansas units, and a fifth possibly served both the Union and the Confederacy. The fifth eldest son, Edward L. Jonas (1844-1918), served in an Illinois regiment and is believed to have faced off against older brother Julian J. Jonas (1836-1872) during the Battle of Shiloh. Their sister Anna ‘Annie’ Jonas (1841-1926) was a faithful volunteer of the Union soldier's aid group, the Needle Pickets. Abraham Jonas lost contact with his Confederate sons, and the division of his family caused him considerable grief.
