Editing Gettysburg Address (section)

=== Nicolay copy ===
The Nicolay copy{{Ref label|Nicolay|a|a}} is often called the "first draft" of the Gettysburg Address because it is believed to be the earliest copy that exists of it.<ref name="nicolay">Nicolay, J. "Lincoln's Gettysburg Address", ''Century Magazine'' 47 (February 1894): 596–608, cited by Johnson, Martin P. "Who Stole the Gettysburg Address", ''Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association'' 24(2) (Summer 2003): 1–19.</ref><ref name="GA drafts">{{cite web|url=http://myloc.gov/Exhibitions/gettysburgaddress/exhibitionitems/ExhibitObjects/NicolayCopy.aspx?sc_id=wikip|title=The Gettysburg Address Nicolay draft|publisher=Library of Congress|access-date=September 15, 2010|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120309141549/http://myloc.gov/Exhibitions/gettysburgaddress/exhibitionitems/ExhibitObjects/NicolayCopy.aspx?sc_id=wikip|archive-date=March 9, 2012}}</ref> Scholars disagree over whether the Nicolay copy was actually the copy Lincoln used at Gettysburg on November 19. In an 1894 article, which included a facsimile of the this copy, Nicolay, the custodian of Lincoln's papers, wrote that Lincoln brought the first part of the speech written in ink on [[White House|Executive Mansion]] stationery, and that he wrote the second page in pencil on lined paper before the ceremonial dedication on November 19.<ref name="nicolay"/> Matching folds are still evident on the two pages, suggesting that it could be the copy that eyewitnesses say Lincoln took from his coat pocket and read from at the ceremony.<ref name="GA drafts" /><ref>Sandburg, Carl (1939). "Lincoln Speaks at Gettysburg". In: ''Abraham Lincoln: The War Years'' New York: Harcourt, Brace & Company. II, 452–457; cited by Prochnow, Victor Herbert. ed. (1944). ''Great Stories from Great Lives'' Freeport: Books for Libraries Press, {{ISBN|0-8369-2018-X}}, p. 13: "The ''Cincinnati Commercial'' reporter wrote 'The President rises slowly, draws from his pocket a paper&nbsp;... [and] reads the brief and pithy remarks.'"</ref> Others believe that the delivery text has been lost, because some of the words and phrases of the Nicolay copy do not match contemporary transcriptions of Lincoln's original speech.<ref>Wills, Garry. Appendix I: "this text does not have three important phrases that the joint newspaper accounts prove he actually spoke", and "there is no physical impossibility that this is the delivery text, but it is&nbsp;... unlikely that it is."</ref> The words "under God", for example, are missing in this copy from the phrase "that this nation shall have a new birth of freedom&nbsp;..." In order for the Nicolay draft to have been the reading copy, either the contemporary transcriptions were inaccurate, or Lincoln would have had to depart from his written text in several instances. This copy of the Gettysburg Address apparently remained in John Nicolay's possession until his death in 1901, when it passed to his friend and colleague John Hay.<ref name="johnson" /> The Nicolay version was on previously on display as part of the American Treasures exhibition at the Library of Congress.<ref>[https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/treasures/tr00.html Top Treasures.] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210503122602/https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/treasures/tr00.html |date=May 3, 2021 }} American Treasures of the Library of Congress. Retrieved on December 10, 2007.</ref>