Did Lincoln like cocaine?
QUESTION Was U.S. president Abraham Lincoln a cocaine addict?
ABRAHAM LINCOLN (1809 to 1865) was famously abstemious, so it is highly unlikely that he was a cocaine user, despite the fact it was legal at the time.
While a member of congress, he was once criticised by a friend for declining to taste rare wines provided by their host.
Lincoln replied: ‘i meant no disrespect, but i promised my precious mother only a few days before she died that i would never use anything intoxicating as a beverage, and i consider the promise as binding today as it was the day i gave it.’
he understood the difference between its use — as in medicines — and abuse.
he kept an account at the corneau & Diller Drug Store (pharmacy) in his home town of Springfield, illinois, where he began his political career.
From 1855 to 1861, records show Lincoln bought brandy and liniment containing hemlock and laudanum, among many other medical preparations.
it came as a surprise, therefore, when historian henry E. Pratt, writing in his Personal Finances of Abraham Lincoln in 1943, claimed that, on october 12, 1860, Lincoln bought a bottle of cocaine for 50 cents.
Pundits have noted it was a month before the presidential election. Lincoln would have been exhausted from the rigours of the campaign and the challenges of his busy law practice. Perhaps he needed a boost.
not to mention Lincoln’s well-known battles with depression.
however, subsequent examination by ronald K. Siegel, author of intoxication: The Universal Drive For mind-Altering Substances, showed that Lincoln had, in fact, bought a substance called cocoaine.
Siegel writes: ‘This spelling was sometimes used for coca-extract products, such as coca wine, and cocaine-based local anaesthetic preparations [which were far less potent than refined cocaine].
‘but it was also the trade name for a coconut oil hair product sold in 50-cent bottles and manufactured by the Joseph burnett company in boston.’
it seems likely Lincoln’s purchase of cocoaine was for his hair, not for his energy levels. The following week, he began growing a beard and, the next month, he became the 16th U.S. president.
Maxine Colley, Manchester.
QUESTION Octopuses have three hearts. Do they all perform the same function?
An Octopus has three hearts, nine brains and blue blood. A systemic heart circulates blood around the body, while two branchial hearts pump it through each of the two gills.
The nervous system includes a central brain and a large ganglion at the base of each arm that controls movement.
octopus blood contains the copper-rich protein hemocyanin, which is more efficient than haemoglobin for oxygen transport at very low temperatures and low oxygen concentrations.
David Willis, Southampton.
QUESTION Was the Taiping Rebellion in China led by a would-be messiah?
This rebellion was the world’s bloodiest civil war. Lasting for 14 years, from 1850 to 1864, it nearly destroyed the powerful Qing dynasty and resulted in the death of an estimated 20 million people.
The conflict began as a religiously motivated uprising, which descended into anarchy.
it began under the leadership of hong Xiuquan (1814 to 1864), a failed civil service examination candidate who had a series of visions and proclaimed himself the son of God, the younger brother of Jesus christ, sent to reform china.
Together with his protege, Feng Yunshan, hong organised a new religious group, the God Worshippers’ Society (baishangdi hui), among the impoverished peasants of Guangxi province.
in January 1851, hong proclaimed his new dynasty, calling it the Taiping Tianguo (heavenly Kingdom of Great Peace), and took the title of heavenly King. it was run as a cult-like group: there was equality between men and women, all property was to be held in common and there was to be an equal distribution of land, according to a primitive form of communism.
The rebels swept through southern china and, in 1853, seized nanjing. Attempts to take northern china were unsuccessful, and the Taiping were eventually snuffed out in 1864.
by then, the rebellion had devastated 16 provinces and destroyed more than 600 cities. Maggie Lee, London N12.
QUESTION Five brothers, the Baldock-Apps, were killed in action in World War I. Was this a record for one family?
FURTHER to the answer telling a remarkable story of a family’s survival among the carnage of World War i, my father was one of six brothers, five of whom served in combat during the war and all of whom survived.
George was in the medical corps and survived a shipwreck while returning to the UK from Salonika for leave.
James, who had emigrated to Australia in 1908, was a medic in the Australian Army and served in France.
Jack, my father, was in the buffs and served in the Somme. A shrapnel wound made him unfit for further service.
charles, who had emigrated to Australia in 1911, was in the Australian infantry. he served in France and suffered a minor gunshot wound to the hand.
Tom, a motorcycle dispatch rider in the middlesex regiment, was awarded the military medal for bravery.
The sixth son, howard, was medically unfit for service. he ran the family farm while his brothers were at war.
John Gosden, Aylesford, Kent.
IS THERE a question to which you have always wanted to know the answer? Or do you know the answer to a question raised here? Send your questions and answers to: Charles Legge, Answers To Correspondents, Daily Mail, 2 Derry Street, London, W8 5TT; fax them to 01952 780111 or email them to charles.legge@dailymail.co.uk. A selection will be published but we are not able to enter into individual correspondence.