Dennis Hanks

Dennis Hanks

Quick Facts

Significance:

First cousin once removed and step-brother-in-law to Abraham Lincoln

Place of Birth:

Hardin County, Kentucky

Date of Birth:

1799

Place of Death:

Paris, Illinois

Date of Death:

October 21, 1892

Place of Burial:

Charleston, Illinois

Cemetery Name:

Old City Cemetery

Dennis Hanks was born in 1799 in Hardin County, Kentucky. He was the illegitimate son of Charles Friend and Nancy Hanks, an aunt of Lincoln’s mother, also named Nancy Hanks, making him first cousin once removed to Abraham and Sarah Lincoln. Dennis was raised by his aunt and uncle, Thomas and Elizabeth Sparrow. 

Dennis moved to southern Indiana in 1817 and lived with the Sparrow family. Abraham and Dennis became close friends. In 1818, when both the Sparrows and Nancy Hanks Lincoln died of milk-sickness, Dennis moved in with the Lincoln family. He and Abraham Lincoln shared the loft space in the cabin. On September 13, 1821, he married Elizabeth Johnston, the daughter of Thomas Lincoln’s second wife, Sarah Bush Johnston Lincoln. They later moved with the Lincoln family to Illinois in 1830. Together they had eight children survive infancy, Nancy, Sarah, Harriett, John, Amanda, Charles, Mary, and Theophilus.

Though Dennis and Abraham parted ways after moving to Illinois, they still, to some degree, stayed connected. From 1844 to 1846, his daughter Harriet boarded with Abraham and Mary Lincoln in Springfield while she was in school. In 1851, Lincoln represented Dennis in a lawsuit against William B. White. During Lincoln’s presidency, Dennis assisted in the care of Lincoln’s aging and ill stepmother.

After Lincoln’s assassination, Hanks was a key player in purchasing and displaying to the public a cabin Lincoln lived in briefly in Decatur, Illinois.

His death was unsusual. At the age of 93, after returning from an "Emancapation Day" party he was struck by a wagon, running over his shoulder and arm. He lived for a while after this accident. He died on October 21, 1892.