President Lincoln spent much of the week in telegraph office of the War Department looking at dispatches and following the action of the two opposing armies at Gettysburg. He spent each night on the couch near the telegraph operator with orders to be awakened if any dispatch came through. He looked painfully full of anxiety as he paced back and forth waiting very impatiently.
Finally he got the word from General Meade that General Lee has lost a full one-third of his army and would be unlikely to ever mount a major objective again. Meanwhile Meade seemed pleased that he had pushed Lee's army out of Pennsylvania, without realizing that Mr. Lincoln intended that he pursue the enemy and perhaps end the bloody war.
The president informed the press of the news from Gettysburg, saying the action was such "as to cover that Army (the Army of the Potomac) with the highest honor."
In the midst of the upheaval in Gettysburg, Mary Lincoln was seriously injured in a buggy accident on her way to visit the Soldier's Home. She hit her head and was cut quite severely when the buggy seat, which I observed may have been sabotaged to injure the president and his family, came lose and threw her and the driver onto the ground.
Mr. Lincoln, quite occupied, did at least assign a nurse to watch over her and sent a telegram to his son Robert, away at Harvard College, to come home to care for her.
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