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President Lincoln’s 1863 Thanksgiving Proclamation

What do you think of when you hear the word Thanksgiving? Perhaps it’s the gathering of friends and family, turkey, cranberry relish, mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie, and watching football. But how did this national holiday come about?

Examine President Lincoln’s 1863 Thanksgiving Proclamation. Click on “View Primary Source Details” to see all three pages. Then focus on a the particular passage from the proclamation that is provided, and answer the questions that follow. Next, study the engraving “The Union Altar.” Share three examples of how the engraving reflects the text of the Thanksgiving Proclamation.

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President Abraham Lincoln's Thanksgiving Proclamation

View Primary Source Details

Historical Comprehension Questions

Read the selected passage from President Lincoln's 1863 Thanksgiving Proclamation that follows in the next box. As you do so, identify and look up unfamiliar words.

In the blank box that follows, answer:

What is the civil strife?
Who are the widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers?
What is the purpose of the line "heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it...to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union."

Excerpt from Thanksgiving Day Proclamation

"I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union."

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Document Analysis Questions

Closely examine the next image, the engraving, "The Union Altar" by Thomas Nast, that was published in "Harper's Weekly" on December 5, 1863.

In the blank box that follows, list three examples of how the engraving reflects Lincoln's Proclamation.

Nast, Thomas. "The Union Altar." Harper's Weekly. Dec. 5, 1863.

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When you're done

Presidents since Abraham Lincoln have issued a Thanksgiving Proclamation every year, appointing the day set by Lincoln – the “last Thursday in November” – as the official day of national Thanksgiving. In 1939, President Franklin D. Roosevelt moved the holiday to the third Thursday of November to lengthen the Christmas shopping season. After protests from across the nation, in 1941 Congress passed a joint resolution (H.J. Res. 41) declaring the Federal Thanksgiving Day holiday the “fourth Thursday in November.”

Explain three reasons why a national day of Thanksgiving has been important to the United States.

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To the extent possible under law, National Archives Foundation has waived all copyright and related or neighboring rights to “President Lincoln’s 1863 Thanksgiving Proclamation”

President Abraham Lincoln's Thanksgiving Proclamation

Nast, Thomas. "The Union Altar." Harper's Weekly. Dec. 5, 1863.

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