Hidden Message Found in Lincoln Pocket Watch

[Faygo Kid]

Source: Washington Post

For nearly 150 years, Abraham Lincoln's pocket watch has been rumored to carry a secret message, supposedly written by an Irish immigrant and watchmaker named Jonathan Dillon.

Dillon, working in a D.C. watch repair shop in 1861, told family members that he -- by incredible happenstance -- had been repairing Lincoln's watch when news came that Fort Sumter had been attacked in South Carolina. It was the opening salvo of what became the Civil War.

Dillon told his children (and, half a century later, a reporter for the New York Times) that he opened the watch's inner workings and scrawled his name, the date and a message for the ages: "The first gun is fired. Slavery is dead. Thank God we have a President who at least will try."

He then closed it up and sent it back to the White House. Lincoln never knew of the message. Dillon died in 1907. . .

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03/10/AR2009031001449.html?hpid=topnews

---

The Smithsonian just opened the watch today, so I figured it qualifies as Latest Breaking News. Fascinating story.

[babylonsister]

1. That is fascinating! Why'd it take them so long to open it? The

curiosity would kill me!

[Faygo Kid]

2. I'm guessing they just considered it a family legend, and forgot about it.

Looks like they were wrong. Sure would have liked to been there today when they opened it.

[Kittycat]

46. Did you read the article at the link?

They tell you why there. it's worth a read ;)

[Beetwasher]

3. Man, So Many Deep Layers Of Symbolism In This Story

That message from that point in time being discovered at this point in time. Truth is stranger and more incredible and sublime than fiction sometimes.

[intheflow]

53. You're right.

The synchronicity is striking.

[BlancheSplanchnik]

66. exactly what I was thinking ... Woa! n/t

[Seedersandleechers]

4. I thought for sure this post

was going to be a joke. Even in LBN.

[The Straight Story]

5. What, no treasure map? Nicolas Cage is gonne be bummed!

:rofl:

Awesome story!

[LiberalFighter]

25. You have to line the watch up during the equinox in the center of the DC pentagram.

[Demeter]

6. NPR Has the Tape On This

It was exciting to hear the watchmaker opening, and the great-grandson reading the message....

[Patiod]

77. The NPR piece was GREAT listening!!

Was so sure it would be a Geraldo and the Vault piece -- it was set up nicely so that the listener was surprised.

[cactusfractal]

7. WORKING LINK TO WaPo ARTICLE

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03/10/AR2009031001449.html?hpid=topnews

[Seedersandleechers]

Please correct the link...

Unless I'm blind.:hi:

[Faygo Kid]

9. Oops! My bad. Fixed.

D'oh!

[ohio2007]

8. well. Is it inscibed as advertised ? nt

[skooooo]

10. You know the republicans have to hate that...

...as much as they hate government.

[Ken Burch]

21. Yeah. How dare that bearded Northern agnostic interfere with "property rights".

:sarcasm:

[Frisbee]

11. Very cool story!!! n/t

[barbtries]

12. very cool story

after all this time. :)

[skyounkin]

13. What it actually says inside according

to the article

"Jonathan Dillon April 13, 1861. Fort Sumter was attacked by the rebels on the above date. Thank God we have a government."

Now what is really amazing is that on the other side of the watch against it's inner face was this message as well.

"DUCK!!"

(Okay, maybe I made up the last one.)

=D

[Faygo Kid]

17. "Duck!!" I like it.

Of course, I have an incurably juvenile sense of humor.

:hide:

[Vehl]

14. splendid!

this is really awesome!

[Qutzupalotl]

15. I can't help but think this is timely.

Thank God we have a president who at least will try.

[kstewart33]

19. You bet. It's a very timely statement of the times.

Obama is at least giving it everything he has. It's our responsibility to support him in every way that we can.

[bvar22]

16. 150 years from now...

...they open Obama's watch and find a message:

"For Profit Health Insurance is DEAD!
Thank God we have a president who tried."---bvar22
March 10, 2009

[intheflow]

55. You're fixing Obama's watch right as you heard this news?

ZOMG!! That's an amazing coincidence!!



:silly:

:hi:

[Catch22Dem]

18. The quote was wrong and did not reference slavery or Lincoln directly

Seems the old man's memory of the inscription wasn't exact when he recalled the story. Just thought I'd post the actual text found in the watch. (DUser skyounkn also noted the same thing.)

"Jonathan Dillon April 13, 1861. Fort Sumter was attacked by the rebels on the above date. Thank God we have a government."

What an incredible story though.

[skygazer]

Great story and that's a beautiful watch

I love pocket watches - they have an elegance to them and that's a gorgeous one.

[Bread and Circus]

20. Same can be said for Obama: At least we have a President willing to try

[Raine]

22. So COOL

and to find out now, even COOLER! B-)

[GregW]

23. I'd be pissed if a mechanic scrawled something on my car engine

while he was working on it.

:shrug:

[Faygo Kid]

24. But if the inscription was found 148 years later, how cool would that be?

Like Woody Allen's 200-year-old VW in "Sleeper."

Which started right up.

[knitter4democracy]

29. I'd think that was cool.

Then again, I'm a word dork.

[rasputin1952]

26. As a lover of history, I find this incredible...

I had seen it earlier, w/the correct inscription, on the news.

How much more is out there that we know nothing of?

Items are still found in The Cornfield at Antietam, and other sites. It is rumored that the gas station that Billy Joel's "Uptown Girl" was filmed at on Manhattan is over the graves of 12 of Washington's men.

In Belgium a few years back, a couple stumbled across some iron sticking out of the ground. Further inspection showed them to be bayonets, and an archaeological team was brought in. They found the bodies of French soldiers in a trench that had collapsed on them just before they were to "go over the top". No one knew who they were or where they were for well over 80 years.

The gold coin was recovered from the Captain of CSS Hunley, as were the bodies of those who manned the doomed submarine.

The derringer John Wiles Booth used to shoot Lincoln laid on the floor of the box for hours, before someone decided to retrieve it.

History sneaks up on us from time to time...and it generally is a shock. This one was excellent shock.

What else is in our possessions that bring such things to light? What is inside dusty boxes not opened and long forgotten?

[rug]

27. You'll appreciate this story about the flag that cradled Lincoln's head at Ford's Theatre.

http://www.riverreporter.com/issues/09-02-12/arts2-lincolnflag.html

http://www.zwire.com/site/printerFriendly.cfm?brd=2259&dept_id=455154&newsid=19459725

[rasputin1952]

30. Thank You!!! Amazing story, and another artifact uncovered...

and being a former Medical Plt Sgt in the Army, I too would have grabbed the first thing I could, although not so much as a "cushion" for the head, but rather to stauch the bleeding.

Jackie Kennedy's pink dress and pill-box hat are out there somewhere w/JFK's blood and brain matter in it. Jackie refused to change into something else after the tragedy, stating," I want them to see what they have done".



I just did a quick Google search, but didn't find out where it is.

At 1237, JFK was pronounced dead, Jackie wore the pink suit until well past midnight, at a minimum, until AF1 took off, to take JFK to Bethesda.

[AnneD]

76. The suit belonged to her sister Lee.....

I think she still had the hat on when she scrambled to the front of the car. I am sure the hat was securely pinned to her hair so she had to be aware of taking it off-even if in shock.

[bdamomma]

75. thanks for sharing that, I am very nostalgic when it comes to history.

[rasputin1952]

82. As a lover of history, especially those little moments that few

seem to think are "noteworthy", the "little" things.

On Lincoln, at one time during the war when the Confederates were advancing upon DC, Lincoln mounted a berm to get a better view...within the range of fire of Confederate arms. An officer said, "get down you damned fool", then realized the was yelling at the PotUS.

In another moment in history, Lincoln took a bullet to his famous stovepipe hat from a sniper on his way to a Soldiers Home; he took in stride, not even spurring his horse on.

Lincoln loved having his picture taken and was a regular at the galleries in DC. The last "official" photo of Lincoln is the famous, "broken glass" pic, which Lincoln took the the WH feeling it was a harbinger of some imminent disaster in which he would have been a part...little did he know.

In an interesting twist regarding the Lincoln family, Robert Lincoln was saved from slipping under a train...at the last moment, a brother of John Wilkes Booth grabbed his coat and pulled him back.

At Shiloh, more men died from smoke inhalation and being burned to death after the brush caught fire, than did from small arms and cannon fire. Most were wounded, and there was no way to get to them to pull them out.

One last thing, just a small thing in the grand scheme of things...when the Army of Northern Virginia, under Lee went to Appomattox to surrender their arms, Brevet MG Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain presided over the event. He had his Corps line either side of the road the beaten Confederates were coming down, and brought them to "Present Arms", a serious showing of respect in the military. The Confederates did not "slog down the road of surrender", as many had begun to, rather they knew they had the respect of those they fought against. It may seem like a small thing, but that showing of respect made it a lot easier and better for all involved. With Lincoln's assassination though, the South was in for a horrid Reconstruction/Occupation. Livestock and human populations did not return to antebellum levels until...incredibly, 1933, 68 years after the war ended, 13 years after women got to vote.

[PassingFair]

72. Ack! I teared up!

I am a history weenie.

Especially for Lincoln.

[struggle4progress]

28. Photo (USAT)

http://blogs.usatoday.com.nyud.net:8090/photos/uncategorized/2009/03/10/lincolnwatchxblog_3.jpg
Hidden inscription revealed on Lincoln's watch
... In his recollection, he inscribed: "The first gun is fired. Slavery is dead. Thank God we have a President who at least will try" ... Dillon's remembrance wasn't perfect. The Associated Press details the actual message: "April 13 - 1861," the first line reads, "Fort Sumpter (sic) was attacked by the rebels on the above date. J Dillon." The second part repeats same date, states the location as Washington and says, "Thank God we have a government" ...
http://blogs.usatoday.com/ondeadline/2009/03/hidden-inscript.html

[rasputin1952]

31. A presence of mind for the moment in time...

a watchmaker adds to the history of the nation. This just seems so...appropriate. Thanks for the pic/link...:hi:

[Ian David]

34. That's actually a secret treasure map to the gold of the Freemasons.

See: "National Treasure Three"

[Faygo Kid]

36. Thanks for the pic; it didn't come through, hopefully this one will.

Not because I posted this originally do I think it's cool. It's cool on its own:

[struggle4progress]

38. I used a caching service instead of hotlinking, so it's in the cache and comes up about

as fast as a hotlink, provided a number of people have looked at it recently; otherwise, the cache has to reload it and it takes a bit longer to appear

[dalaigh lllama]

40. Funny they say nothing about that "Jeff Davis" inscription

wonder if that was etched there by the other guy in 1864 -- a rebel sympathizer?

[ToolTex]

43. Not Jeff Davis, but...

from the second page of the Washington Post article, it says about the other inscription:

"Someone else added the name "LE Grofs" and "1864" to the brass plate, meaning at least one other person had seen it."

[dalaigh lllama]

51. see the picture Faygo Kid posted in #36 above here?

Doesn't that look like "Jeff Davis" etched on there? I thought it odd they didn't mention that part in the article -- I wondered if that LE Grofs dude did that.

[Faygo Kid]

68. You're right. It DOES say Jeff Davis.

Even more to this story, it appears.

[struggle4progress]

60. Timeless Lincoln Memento Is Revealed

By ROBIN POGREBIN
Published: March 10, 2009

Douglas Stiles, a lawyer from Waukegan, Ill., discovered an April 1906 article in The New York Times in which Mr. Dillon described making the engraving ... An immigrant from Waterford, Ireland, he told The Times, “I was the only Union sympathizer working in the shop” ... The back of the watch movement also bears two other inscriptions: “LE Grofs Sept 1864 Wash DC,” probably engraved by another repairer, and what appears to be “Jeff Davis.” Whether the latter was intended as a retort by another watchmaker to Dillon’s pro-Union sentiments is unknown ... ttp://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/11/arts/design/11linc.html?8dpc

[Tarc]

71. They did mention it on page 2 of the WPost link

[chimpyisstillsatan]

41. why does it say Jeff Davis?

If this is pro-Union?

[dalaigh lllama]

52. Glad I'm not the only one wondering about that

my completely-based-on-thin-air theory is that the guy who added his signature in 1864 must have been a rebel sympathizer and he did it. What do you think?

[intheflow]

57. I think it was written by whoever L.E. Grof was,

in 1864. It looks like the same handwriting to me. My guess is that the watch went in for repair again and this time a Southern sympathizer working at a DC watch shop added it. You could read Dillon's original inscription as being pro-rebel; he doesn't specify which government he's thanking God for. Perhaps that's how the second watch repairer read it. That's where I'd start if I were the Smithsonian historians investigating: who worked at that watch shop in 1864?

[MindPilot]

65. Wow! A political discussion forum inside a watch.

Maybe the other name was one of the mods.

Skinner, were any of your family watchmakers?

[parasim]

73. Ha! I was thinking exactly the same thing.

and if you look real close, I think it says, IBTL... hehe

[struggle4progress]

61. See my #60 above: there was only one union sympathizer in the shop

[babylonsister]

48. Thanks, and cool.

Very fun to read about history, maybe so far removed.

And AP vs. recollection-I'll go with recollection anytime!

[EFerrari]

32. Great story! Thank you.

[enigmatic]

33. wow

Thanks for this:thumbsup:

[Faygo Kid]

35. Amazing that it came on the same day as the last photo taken of Lincoln was discovered.

He never truly leaves us, does he?



http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=101663935

[enigmatic]

37. Holy crap!

What an amazing story...

[intheflow]

58. Cool!

[FourScore]

39. Cool story. n/t

[Historic NY]

42. I've got a couple of 1740-60's watches that have..

engraving in them from those that repair or oiled them..its amazing that they could print stuff so small in such a little space. Usually one see's the date and the repair persons name.

[Politicalboi]

44. After all the looting

That went on after Lincoln got shot I'm surprised it's still around. The gun that shot Lincoln was left in the balcony and some man picked it up and I think he gave it to a reporter. And the flags were stolen too.

[chollybocker]

45. Hidden Message: "The play at the Ford is not very good; go see a minstrel show instead."

[No Elephants]

67. Minstrel shows amuse you, Cholly?

[smiley]

47. sounds like a conspiracy to me....

When's this going to the dungeon?

[Kablooie]

49. They just found a new portrait of *Shakespeare* yesterday too!

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5i3FdaszTd0lfsYydo2DfACGMsFsgD96QJ8QG0

LONDON (AP) — Scholars studying the life and times of William Shakespeare unveiled a portrait Monday believed to be the only authentic image of the Bard painted during his lifetime.

Experts at the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust believe the painting was used as the basis for the enduring engraving of Shakespeare that graces the cover of the First Folio collection of his plays.

[Pacifist Patriot]

69. As I am a huge fan of both men's work....

I cannot count the goose bumps. I was in Stratford last fall and only wish they had identified the portrait and placed it at the Birthplace Trust sooner!

[pengillian101]

50. What a great piece of history, nearly forgotten.

"That's Lincoln's watch," he said, after putting it down, "and my ancestor put graffiti on it!"

:-)

[colsohlibgal]

54. Tres Cool!

What a fascinating story, history from way back in the long ago come to life.

I would imagine there would almost certainly be more cryptic historical messages hidden away around the world.

[Name removed]

56. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[intheflow]

59. The article reads like

watching an episode of the History Detectives! :thumbsup:

[1776Forever]

62. Could it be that someone else had put Jeff. Davis on it later to protest in secrecy?

The article states:

"Jeff. Davis the president of the Confederacy, is also etched on a different part of the brass plate, in different handwriting. It remains unexplained. And someone added the name "LE Grofs" and "1864."

......

We may never know but it might have been LE Grofs who put that on in 1864?

Interesting. It is almost like blogging of today.

:shrug:

[Kindigger]

63. Genealogists get busy

That name 'Grofs' is actually Gross, what looks like 'fs' is an archaic way of writing double S.

On my short search, I've found quite a few of them who died in the Civil War.

OTOH it could also be lé Gross. There appears to be an accent over the E.


Update again: There's a Louis Gross, age 18, living in Washington, DC in 1860:

Household of a Charles Klotze, restaurant keeper. He's listed as a bartender.

[radfringe]

64. actual etched quote:

Split into three different sections to get around the tiny gears was this razor-thin etching:

"Jonathan Dillon April 13-1861. Fort Sumpter was attacked by the rebels on the above date thank God we have a government." He added "Washington" and his name again.

considering the NOPer party of today, was the Republican party of yesteryear, and the NOPers today want to shrink government small enough to be drowned in a bathtub - I find "...thank God we have a government..." amusing.

[meegbear]

70. So what happens if you wind it backwards?

[bdamomma]

74. wow what a great story.

and boy can you relate to this comment:

"Thank God we have a President who at least will try."

[meowomon]

78. What a Find

A time capsule. History is alive.

[AllyCat]

79. What a great story! Thanks for that.

[hugo_from_TN]

80. "Avoid musical comedies"

[burning rain]

81. Interesting tale...

no doubt though there'll be those Americans who wish the note shed light on human interest stuff like Lincoln's marriage and whether he was gay.