
President Lincoln was not a dynamic orator. In those years before loudspeakers, anyone making an outdoor speech had to speak loudly.
Some historians have suggested that Lincoln’s voice became a bit high-pitched when speaking loudly. Also, he had the strange habit of throwing his arms in the air while flexing his knees to make a point during a speech.
One eyewitness said the speech was followed by a “dignified silence.” A noted historian said the applause was delayed, scattered, and “barely polite.”
It is not surprising then to learn of negative reactions to President Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address.
Noted orator Edward Everett, who spoke for two hours at Gettysburg, praised Lincoln saying, “I should be glad if I could flatter myself that I came as near to the central idea of the occasion, in two hours, as you did in two minutes.”
Praise from Edward Everett, one of the great American orators of the antebellum and Civil War eras was high praise indeed.
The Abraham Lincoln speech at Gettysburg is now considered one of the most famous speeches in American history. It emboldened the Union cause during the Civil War with perhaps the most stirring words ever spoken.