{{Short description|American lawyer, businessman, and politician (1791–1849)}} {{Use mdy dates|date=July 2023}} {{Infobox officeholder | image = Robert_Smith_Todd_daguerreotype.jpg | caption = Undated daguerreotype of Todd | office = Member of the Kentucky Senate<br>for Fayette County | term_start = 1848 | term_end = 1849 | birth_date = {{birth date|1791|02|25}} | birth_place = Lexington, Kentucky, U.S. | death_date = {{death date and age|1849|07|17|1791|02|25}} | death_place = Liberty Heights, Kentucky, U.S. | alma_mater = Transylvania College | party = Whig | parents = Levi Todd<br>Jane Briggs Todd | spouse = {{plainlist| *{{marriage|Elizabeth Parker|November 13, 1812|1825|reason=died}} *{{marriage|Elizabeth Humphreys|November 1, 1826}} }} | children = 16, including Mary | relations = John Todd (uncle)<br>Robert Todd (uncle) | allegiance = United States | branch = United States Army | unit = 5th Kentucky Regiment | rank = Private<br>Captain | service_years = 1811–1815 | battles = {{tree list}} *War of 1812 **Battle of Frenchtown **Battle of the Thames {{tree list/end}} }} '''Robert Smith Todd''' (February 25, 1791 – July 17, 1849) was an American lawyer, soldier, banker, businessman and politician. He was the father of First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln.
==Early life== Todd was born on February 25, 1791, in Lexington, a year before Kentucky became a state. He was the third of six sons born to Gen. Levi Todd (1756–1807) and Jane (née Briggs) Todd (1761–1800).<ref name="Baker1989">{{cite book |last1=Baker |first1=Jean H. |title=Mary Todd Lincoln: A Biography |date=1989 |publisher=W. W. Norton & Company |isbn=9780393305869 |pages=3, 8, 12, 26, 35 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GdK-xgX0FgQC&pg=PA375 |accessdate=March 9, 2019 |language=en}}</ref> A year after his mother's death in 1800, his father remarried to Jane Holmes. Among the eleven children his father had between his two wives, was sister Jane Todd, who married congressman Daniel Breck.<ref name="Green1889"/>
A source of much family pride, his father fought in the American Revolutionary War under the command of Brigadier General George Rogers Clark. After the War, his father and his uncles, John and Robert Todd, helped found present-day Lexington and became leading landowners and prominent statesmen in the state of Kentucky prior to its admission into the United States in 1792. Through his brother, Dr. John Todd, he was the uncle of U.S. Representative and Union General John Blair Smith Todd.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Clift |first1=Garrett Glenn |title=Remember the Raisin! Kentucky and Kentuckians in the Battles and Massacre at Frenchtown, Michigan Territory, in the War of 1812 |date=2009 |publisher=Genealogical Publishing Com |page=130 |isbn=9780806345208 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1A3k7Wqaq0wC&pg=PA130 |quote="Dr. John Todd ... His brother, Robert S. Todd, was the father of Mary Todd, wife of Abraham Lincoln. ... Dr. John and Elizabeth Smith Todd had six children: John Blair Smith Todd ..."}}</ref>
When only fourteen years old, Todd began attending Transylvania College in Lexington, graduating four years later when he was eighteen.<ref name="Baker1989"/>
==Career== Todd studied law, first by apprenticing in the office of Thomas Bodley, the clerk of Fayette County (and a cousin by marriage of his first wife, Eliza), and second with prominent jurist George Bibb, the chief justice of the Kentucky Court of Appeals (later a U.S. Senator and U.S. Secretary of the Treasury in the 1840s).<ref name="Baker1989"/> He was admitted to the bar on September 28, 1811, however, Todd never practiced, instead, choosing to go into business.<ref name="Baker1989"/>
===Military service=== Even before what became known as the War of 1812 started, Todd was active in a militia company that eventually merged into the Lexington light artillery of the 5th Kentucky Regiment. In the winter of 1811 to 1812, he asked to be recommended for a commission from Senator Henry Clay through Parker family members.<ref name="Baker1989"/> In July 1812, when the 5th Kentucky Regiment left Lexington, it contained Robert, three of his brothers, and eight Todd cousins. Initially, Todd himself did not receive his officer commission, although his two older brothers did, so along with his younger brother Samuel, he enlisted as a private. Before he could leave Ohio though, he caught pneumonia and had to stay there to recover. After recovering (and during which time he returned home to marry Eliza Parker), he went to the Front and fought in the Battle of Frenchtown in Michigan in January 1813 and later, the Battle of the Thames (where Tecumseh died) in the fall of 1813.<ref name="Baker1989"/> Before the War ended, he was promoted to captain.<ref name="McClure's1898">{{cite book |title=McClure's Magazine |date=1898 |publisher=S. S. McClure, Limited |page=477 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wI9JAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA477 |accessdate=March 10, 2019 |language=en}}</ref>
===Business and politics=== After the War ended, Todd began running a dry goods store with his partner, Bird Smith, and frequently traveled to New Orleans to buy French brandies, Dutch gin, and green coffee, which they sold in Lexington and Todd used to entertain many prominent friends with at his home.<ref name="Baker1989"/> He later became a partner in a cotton factory in Fayette County and by 1835, he served as president of the Lexington branch of the Bank of Kentucky.<ref name="mtlhouse"/> In 1827, he was appointed a trustee to his alma mater, Transylvania University, alongside Henry Clay and Charles A. Wickliffe.<ref name="Baker1989"/>
A close friend of John J. Crittenden,{{refn|group=lower-alpha|Robert's cousin, John Harris Todd (1795–1824), a son of Supreme Court Justice Thomas Todd, was married to Maria Knox Innes (a daughter of Harry Innes). After John Harris Todd's death in 1824, Maria married Robert's close friend, and fellow widower, John J. Crittenden in 1826, two weeks after Robert's second marriage. Crittenden was the Secretary of State of Kentucky in the 1830s and later, after Todd's death, he served as Governor of Kentucky, U.S. Attorney General, a U.S. Representative and a U.S. Senator.<ref name="Baker1989"/>}} he was also involved in local politics as a justice of the peace and sheriff.<ref name="mtlhouse"/> Todd spent over twenty years working as the clerk of the Kentucky House of Representatives in Frankfort, Kentucky, before he was later elected as a Whig to the state assembly (for three terms<ref name="Green1889"/>) then to a single term in the Kentucky Senate in 1848.<ref name="Watson2007">{{cite book |last1=Watson |first1=Robert W. |title=White House Studies Compendium |date=2007 |publisher=Nova Publishers |isbn=9781600215339 |page=335 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mFDl3fo9iEQC&pg=PA335 |accessdate=March 10, 2019 |language=en}}</ref>
==Personal life== On November 13, 1812, Todd was married to his second cousin, Elizabeth "Eliza" Parker (1794–1825). Eliza was the daughter of Robert Porter Parker, a prominent landowner and merchant who had died in 1800. Eliza's mother, Elizabeth Rittenhouse (née Porter) Parker,<ref name="Evans2010">{{cite book|last1=Evans|first1=W. A.|title=Mrs. Abraham Lincoln: A Study of Her Personality and Her Influence on Lincoln|date=2010|publisher=SIU Press|isbn=9780809385607|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=c5bk28IyqREC&pg=PA36|accessdate=August 23, 2017|language=en}}</ref> a daughter of Col. Andrew Porter did not remarry prior to her death in 1850.<ref name="SRP1898">{{cite book|last1=Sons of the Revolution Pennsylvania Society|title=Decennial Register of the Pennsylvania Society of Sons of the Revolution: 1888-1898|date=1898|publisher=F. B. Lippincott|url=https://archive.org/details/decennialregist00unkngoog|page=[https://archive.org/details/decennialregist00unkngoog/page/n99 79]|accessdate=August 23, 2017|language=en}}</ref>{{refn|group=lower-alpha|Eliza's mother, Elizabeth Rittenhouse (née Porter) Parker was a half-sister of David Rittenhouse Porter (1788–1867), a Governor of Pennsylvania, George Bryan Porter (1791–1834), a Governor of the Michigan Territory, and James Madison Porter (1793–1862), a U.S. Secretary of War under President John Tyler.<ref name="Unrue2010">{{cite book|last1=Unrue|first1=Darlene Harbour|title=Katherine Anne Porter Remembered|date=2010|publisher=University of Alabama Press|isbn=9780817316679|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gPrRCBF3KmcC&pg=PR15|accessdate=August 23, 2017|language=en}}</ref><ref name="Blumenthal2018">{{cite book |last1=Blumenthal |first1=Sidney |title=A Self-Made Man: The Political Life of Abraham Lincoln Vol. I, 1809–1849 |date=2017 |publisher=Simon and Schuster |isbn=9781476777269 |page=213 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=d57RDgAAQBAJ&pg=PA213 |accessdate=March 10, 2019 |language=en}}</ref>}} Together, Eliza and Robert were the parents of seven children, six of whom survived to maturity, before her death in 1825, from complications during George's birth. Their children were:<ref name="mtlhouse">{{cite web |title=The Todd Family |url=https://www.mtlhouse.org/the-todd-family |website=www.mtlhouse.org |publisher=Mary Todd Lincoln House |accessdate=March 9, 2019}}</ref>
* Elizabeth Todd (1813–1888), who married Ninian Edwards Jr., the son of the Illinois Governor Ninian Edwards.<ref>{{cite web|title=Eisenhower Thanks Mary Lincoln's Niece for the Gift of a 'Truly Historic Memento', 1952|url=http://www.shapell.org/manuscript.aspx?eisenhower-lincoln-connection|work=Shapell Manuscript Collection|publisher=Shapell Manuscript Foundation}}</ref> * Levi Oldham Todd (1816–1864), who married Louise Searle and remained in Lexington until his death.<ref name="Billings2010">{{cite book |last1=Billings |first1=Roger |last2=Williams |first2=Frank J. |title=Abraham Lincoln, Esq.: The Legal Career of America's Greatest President |date=2010 |publisher=University Press of Kentucky |isbn=9780813139937 |page=212 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wVn9CcsNAo0C&pg=PT212 |accessdate=March 10, 2019 |language=en}}</ref> * Frances Jane Todd (1817–1899), who married Dr. William Smith Wallace.<ref name="Draper2012">{{cite book |last1=Draper |first1=Kenneth E. |title=The Pike's Peakers and the Rocky Mountain Rangers: A History of Colorado in the Civil War |date=2012 |publisher=Xlibris Corporation |isbn=9781477102336 |page=34 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OWRPAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA34 |accessdate=March 10, 2019 |language=en}}</ref> * Mary Ann Todd (1818–1882), who married Abraham Lincoln, later the 16th President of the United States. * Ann Maria Todd Smith (1820–1891), who married Clark Moulton Smith, a successful merchant.<ref name="Draper2012"/> * Robert Parker Todd (1821–1822), who died in infancy.<ref name="mtlhouse"/> * George Rogers Clark Todd (1825–1900), a surgeon who served in a Confederate hospital in South Carolina.<ref name="Neely1996"/>
Six months after the death of his first wife, he proposed to Elizabeth "Betsy" Humphreys, and they married on November 1, 1826.<ref name="Sword2007">{{cite book |last1=Sword |first1=Wiley |title=Southern Invincibility: A History of the Confederate Heart |date=2007 |publisher=St. Martin's Press |isbn=9781429981408 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9xSCggxX_ZIC&pg=PA42 |accessdate=March 10, 2019 |language=en}}</ref> Betsy was the daughter of Dr. Alexander Humphreys and Mary (née Brown) Humphreys. Her maternal uncle was John Brown.{{refn|group=lower-alpha|Betsy's uncle, John Brown, was a U.S. Representative and U.S. Senator from Kentucky who served as President pro tempore of the U.S. Senate. He was the father of Mason Brown (1799–1867), the Secretary of State of Kentucky, and Orlando Brown (1801–1867), the publisher and historian, both first cousins of Betsy.<ref name="mtlhouse"/>}} Together, Betsy and Robert were the parents of nine additional children, eight of whom survived to maturity:<ref name="mtlhouse"/>
* Robert Humphrey Todd (1827–1827), who died in infancy.<ref name="mtlhouse"/> * Margaret Todd (1828–1904), who married Charles Henry Kellogg.<ref name="Neely1996">{{cite journal |last1=Neely |first1=Jr |title=The Secret Treason of Abraham Lincoln's Brother-in-Law |journal=Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association |date=Winter 1996 |volume=17 |issue=1 |pages=39–43 |url=https://quod.lib.umich.edu/j/jala/2629860.0017.105/1:2/--secret-treason-of-abraham-lincolns-brother-in-law?rgn=div1;view=fulltext |accessdate=March 10, 2019 |issn=1945-7987}}</ref> * Samuel Brown Todd (1830–1862), a Confederate soldier who was killed on the second day of the Battle of Shiloh.<ref name="Draper2012"/> * David Humphreys Todd (1832–1871), a commandant of the Richmond prisons and served in the 21st Louisiana Infantry Regiment.<ref name="Draper2012"/> * Martha Todd (1833–1868), who married C. B. White of Alabama.<ref name="Green1889">{{cite book |last1=Green |first1=Thomas Marshall |title=Historic Families of Kentucky |date=1889 |publisher=R. Clarke & Company |pages=[https://archive.org/details/historicfamilie00greegoog/page/n233 215]–216 |url=https://archive.org/details/historicfamilie00greegoog |access-date=March 10, 2019 |language=en |chapter=The Logans }}</ref> * Emilie Pariet Todd (1836–1930), who married Confederate Gen. Benjamin Hardin Helm, and son of the Kentucky Governor John L. Helm.<ref name="Draper2012"/> * Alexander Humphreys Todd (1839–1862), a Confederate soldier killed at the Battle of Baton Rouge.<ref name="Draper2012"/> * Elodie Breck Todd (1840–1877), who married Brig. General Nathaniel Henry Rhodes Dawson, later the third U.S. Commissioner of Education.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.ruralswalabama.org/attraction/elodie-todd-dawson-monument-selma-live-oak-cemetery/ |title=Elodie Todd Dawson Monument in Selma's Old Live Oak Cemetery |website=RuralSWAlabama.org |publisher=RuralSWAlabama |access-date=August 20, 2017 }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.al.com/living/index.ssf/2015/07/13_of_alabamas_most_photograph.html |title=13 of Alabama's most photographed cemetery monuments |date=July 16, 2015 |access-date=August 20, 2017 |website=al.com |publisher=Alabama Media Group |first=Kelly |last=Kazek }}</ref> * Catherine Bodley Todd (1841–1875), who married William Wallace Herr.<ref name="Draper2012"/>
In 1832, Todd purchased a three-story, fourteen room, brick residence at 578 West Main Street in Lexington. The new Todd family home was built {{Circa|1803|1806}} as an inn and tavern and known as "The Sign of the Green Tree".<ref name="mtlhouse"/> Today, the home has been preserved and is known as the Mary Todd Lincoln House.<ref name="mtlhouse"/>
Todd died suddenly from cholera on July 17, 1849, aged 58, in Liberty Heights, a neighborhood in Lexington.<ref name="Ellison2014">{{cite book |last1=Ellison |first1=Betty Boles |title=The True Mary Todd Lincoln: A Biography |date=2014 |publisher=McFarland |isbn=9781476615172 |page=74 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=JIsjAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA74 |accessdate=March 10, 2019 |language=en}}</ref>
==Notes== {{Reflist|group=lower-alpha}}
==References== {{Reflist|30em}}
==External links== * {{find a Grave|6045098}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Todd, Robert Smith}} Category:1791 births Category:1849 deaths Category:Businesspeople from Kentucky Category:Deaths from cholera in the United States Category:Kentucky lawyers Category:Kentucky state senators Category:Kentucky Whigs Category:Members of the Kentucky House of Representatives Category:People from Kentucky in the War of 1812 Category:Politicians from Lexington, Kentucky Category:Transylvania University alumni Category:19th-century American businesspeople Category:19th-century American lawyers Category:19th-century members of the Kentucky General Assembly Category:Bankers from Kentucky