(CIVIL WAR. LINCOLN, ABRAHAM)
Plaster cast from the original plaster life-mask of President Abraham Lincoln, taken in the White House, Washington, D.C., February 11, 1865, date of cast unknown. Inscribed at top of head: "A Lincoln Clark Mills 1865," rubbed.
Lincoln sat for two life-masks, one by sculptor Leonard Volk in April 1860 and the other by sculptor Clark Mills, taken two months before Lincoln's assassination. Mill's mask is the only Presidential life mask and the only one that portrays Lincoln's entire head, as Volk has left the back open. He achieved this by covering Lincoln's head with a cap, coating his beard and face with oil, applying a thin coat of plaster and, once dried, allowing it to fall off with a twitch of Lincoln's face. He then reassembled the broken pieces to yield a perfect likeness, which carefully captures clear details of his face and skin, showing the affects of his Presidency when compared to the younger Volk mask.
Lincoln's former secretary, John Hay, who owned a cast, wrote: "the nose is thin, and lengthened by the emaciation of the cheeks; the mouth is fixed like that of an archaic statue; a look as of one whom sorrow and care had done their worst without victory...the whole expression is of unspeakable sadness and all-sufficing strength. Yet the peace is not the dreadful peace of death; it is the peace that passeth understanding." ("Life in the White House in the Time of Lincoln," Century Illustrated Monthly, November 1890).
One copy of the mask is housed in the Smithsonian, given by Mills' son, Theodore Augustus Mills; The Carnegie Museum of Natural History, Pittsburgh, PA, has a copy, also from Theodore Mills; a Clark Mills mask sold at Christie's in 2009 for $35,000, was exhibited at the Newberry Library, Chicago, in 2010, and resold at Treadway Toomey in 2012 for $32,500. The present mask has not appeared at auction and has been in a private collection for generations. Inscription is faded; some light soiling at top of head and inside.
Approximately 11 x 8 x 7 1/2 inches.
Property from the Estate of Dolores Cole, Chicago, Illinois Collection of W. Knox Scottsdale, AZ.

Inscription is slightly worn; some light soiling at top of head and inside.