Documents Reveal Joe Biden’s Great-Great-Grandfather Was Pardoned By Abraham Lincoln

New documents reveal that President Abraham Lincoln pardoned Joe Biden’s great-great-grandfather.

The documents reveal that Moses J. Robinette (Biden’s great-great-grandfather) was charged with attempted murder after a knife fight and imprisoned on a Florida island.

Abe should be prosecuted for treason?😂

Joe Biden's great-great grandfather Moses Robinette was pardoned by Abraham Lincoln after stabbing a man, being convicted of attempted murder and imprisoned on a remote island off Florida in 1864, documents reveal
https://t.co/tMS8wbGp1N

— dactylion (@dactylion14) February 20, 2024

The Washington Post shares more on the story:

On that March evening near Beverly Ford, Alexander, a brigade wagon master, overheard Robinette saying something about him to the female cook and rushed into the mess shanty to demand an explanation. Tempers flared, expletives followed, and Robinette drew his pocketknife. A brief scuffle left Alexander bleeding from several cuts before camp watchmen arrived to arrest Robinette.

Nearly a month passed before Robinette’s military trial began. The charges specified that he had become intoxicated and incited “a dangerous quarrel,” violating good order and military discipline. Because a drawn weapon was involved, assault with “attempt to kill” was included among the charges.

And furthermore:

They testified that Robinette had, from the outbreak of the war, been “ardent, and Influential … in opposing Traitors and their schemes to destroy the Government.”

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The letter concluded with an emotional flourish: “Think of his motherless Daughters and sons at home! … [Praying for] your interposition in behalf of the unfortunate Father … and distressed family of loved Children, Union Daughters & Union Sons.”

The missive did not go straight to the White House but first landed on the desk of Waitman T. Willey, a newly elected senator from the recently admitted state of West Virginia. He endorsed the plea, calling Robinette’s punishment “a hard sentence on the case as stated.” Lincoln’s private secretary, John G. Nicolay, promptly requested that the judge advocate general, Joseph Holt, send over a report and the trial transcripts for presidential review.

Holt’s report arrived in late August, and Lincoln made his decision, writing, “Pardon for unexecuted part of punishment. A. Lincoln. Sep. 1. 1864.” Shortly thereafter, the War Department issued Special Orders No. 296, freeing Robinette from prison.

After more than a month on sweltering Dry Tortugas, Robinette returned to his family in Maryland, where he took up farming again. He lived into the 20th century, dying at his daughter’s home in 1903. While his brief obituary eulogized him as a “man of education and gentlemanly attainments,” no mention was made of his wartime court-martial or his fleeting connection to Lincoln.

It seems that the Biden family has a long history of committing crimes!

Abraham Lincoln pardoned Joe Biden’s great-great-grandfather, records show https://t.co/1BJO11HYMK

— Still🏝️Roaming (@roaming_rn) February 20, 2024

https://twitter.com/MarEngRetired/status/1759729988599783758

The folks at Fox News share more on the story:

President Biden’s great-great-grandfather received a pardon from President Lincoln, according to newly discovered documents in the National Archives.

Biden’s relative in the incident, Moses J. Robinette, got into a fight with another Union Army civilian employee while camped along the Rappahannock River near Beverly Ford, Virginia, as the Civil War raged on March 12, 1864, according to documents reviewed by The Washington Post.

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The fight left the other man, John J. Alexander, bleeding from knife wounds, and Robinette was charged with attempted murder and was incarcerated near Florida.

Three of Robinette’s friends were officers in the U.S. Army, and they petitioned Lincoln directly to overturn the sentence.

They argued Robinette’s sentence was overly harsh for “defending himself and cutting with a Penknife a Teamster much his superior in strength and size, all under the impulse of the excitement of the moment,” according to the Post.