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Abraham Lincoln handled at least 147 divorce cases during his twenty-five years as a lawyer. One in Shelby County also concerned the ownership of land. William Stewardson and Mary Jane Dawson, both English immigrants, married in 1848. She purchased forty-three acres of land with money that she brought into the marriage. After two years, their marriage disintegrated, and William left, moving in with his son from a previous marriage. Mary Jane sold off some of William's possessions, buying a forty-acre tract of land. In 1852, Mary Jane hired Lincoln, filing for divorce on the grounds of desertion. William responded that she was impossible to live with and constantly berated him. A jury ruled for Mary Jane and awarded her $50 per year alimony but left open the question of the ownership of the two parcels of land. In another lawsuit the following year, Lincoln continued to represent Mary Jane in order to resolve ownership of the land. The court reduced her alimony to $30, ruled that Mary Jane keep the land purchased with her money, and that she transfer to William the land purchased with his money.
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The land was situated halfway between Shelbyville and the current town of Strasburg. After the Illinois Supreme Court case, Mary Jane Stewardson sold her forty-three acres of land to her stepson, William Stewardson, Jr., and moved to Peoria, where she died in 1883. William Stewardson remained in Shelby County, where he died in 1864. William Stewardson, Jr. Continued to accumulate significant amounts of land, and he donated a tract that became the village of Stewardson in 1874.
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Disappointed in the Shelby County Circuit Court's decision, Mary Jane Stewardson continued to employ Lincoln and appealed the judgment to the Illinois Supreme Court. Stewardson was one of three Shelby County cases that Lincoln handled in Springfield.. The Supreme Court agreed with the circuit court's decision, that Mary Jane received a fair settlement. While Mary Jane may have been a difficult person, she understood the value of land in earning an income. Since paper money fluctuated in value wildly and hard money was scarce, land was a valuable commodity in early Illinois. A married woman typically had no rights to buy and sell land because her status as an individual became assumed by the husband upon marriage. As an abandoned wife in this case, Mary Jane was forced to become an independent person, wisely investing in real estate.
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