A 1915 film about Abraham Lincoln and life in America during the Civil War, The Heart Of Lincoln had been declared lost by the Library of Congress before it was recently rediscovered in New York.
Historic Films GreenportA still from The Heart of Lincoln, with Francis Ford, seated near the center of the table, as Abraham Lincoln.
The 1915 silent film The Heart of Lincoln has long been listed by the Library of Congress as one of the 7,000 pre-sound movies that’s been lost to history. But thanks to a sharp-eyed intern at the Historic Films Archive in Greenport, New York, this “lost” film has been found — and it’s in surprisingly good condition.
After the film was discovered in a box of decades-old donations, the Historic Films Archive was able to clean off the reels and digitize the footage. Now, The Heart of Lincoln can be preserved and seen for generations to come.
The Chance Discovery Of A Lost Silent Film About Abraham Lincoln At A New York Film Archive
Historic Films GreenportFrancis Ford as Lincoln in The Heart of Lincoln.
As reported by local media on Long Island, film student Dan Martin, who was working as an intern at the Historic Films Archive, made the discovery while looking through boxes of old donations. The boxes were decades old, and most of what had been recovered from them was too damaged to salvage.
But one reel stood out.
“He came into my office with this little stack of six reels,” Joe Lauro, the co-founder and owner of Historic Films recalled. “And he goes, ‘Joe, I think we have something really special here.'”
Historic Films GreenportA scene from The Heart of Lincoln showing the surrender of Confederate general Robert E. Lee.
It was indeed special: a copy of the 1915 silent film The Heart of Lincoln, a film which, like many silent films, was assumed to be lost to time. This was the case despite the fact that it was directed by, and starred, Francis Ford, a noted filmmaker who was also the brother of fellow director John Ford, winner of six Academy Awards.
According to Lauro, most films from the pre-sound era were simply “ephemera” which the studios didn’t preserve after they were shown. But the The Heart Of Lincoln was in remarkably good condition.
“It’s not something that someone is going to make millions of dollars off of but it fills in a piece of the history of American cinema,” Lauro told All That’s Interesting. “Because 70 percent of all the films made during the silent film era are lost, lost forever. Occasionally a film like this turns up and then a piece of that puzzle gets filled in.”
Preserving The Heart Of Lincoln For Future Generations
The Heart of Lincoln tells the story of Abraham Lincoln, as well as the larger story of the American Civil War. Aiming to show the difficult decisions faced by the president, one of its storylines concerns a young Union soldier who deserted to visit his dying mother — and then faced execution.
Historic Films GreenportA dialogue card from The Heart of Lincoln.
“Lincoln had to sign the death warrant,” Lauro explained. “And the film portrays how difficult it was for him to do that, because he saw each one of these situations as an individual tragedy. He realized what was going on with these soldiers in this war. This is the way that he was portrayed by the Ford brothers. Ultimately, he refuses to sign it – that is the heart of Lincoln.”
Released just 50 years after the Civil War ended, the film thus told a story that many Americans would have inherently recognized. Even those who did not live through the Civil War would have recognized the tragedy of the conflict, one in which an estimated 600,000 Americans died.
Public DomainAbraham Lincoln with General George B. McClellan at Antietam, Maryland on October 3, 1862.
The Heart Of Lincoln was a passion project for Ford, an American history buff and and one of Hollywood’s first generation of filmmakers. In addition to The Heart of Lincoln he and his brother John also produced thematically-similar films like When Lincoln Paid (1913), The Battle of Bull Run (1913), The Heart of Maryland (1915), and Young Mr. Lincoln (1939).
As such, The Heart of Lincoln is both a valuable piece of film history and American history, a rare artifact from the silent film era, and a fascinating look at how the Civil War was viewed just 50 years after it ended.
“[Y]ou get to see the way people looked back then, the way they dressed, the way they approached certain acting things, how they portrayed people like Lincoln,” Lauro told All That’s Interesting. “So they’re all important historically and they’re all important in filling in the gaps for American cinema.”
And now that the film has been found decades after it was supposedly lost, the Historic Films Archive is determined to preserve it for future generations. They’ve restored it to 4k resolution and Lauro hopes to add a score as well. That way, this long-lost film — forgotten for decades in a box — can be restored to its former glory.
“Maybe in the next year we’ll have it done,” Lauro told All That’s Interesting, “and have it properly released for the next Lincoln birthday [in] 2026.”
After reading about the chance discovery of a long-lost 1915 silent film about Abraham Lincoln, read about the rumors claiming that Abraham Lincoln might have been Black. Then, learn the lesser-known story of Lincoln’s wrestling career.
