Louisa Van Velsor Whitman to Walt Whitman, 15 March [1869]
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My dear Walt1
dont be frightened
at getting this unseasonable letter there
is nothing more than usual the matter
i am quite lame but otherwise as well
as usual i hope this will find you over
your trouble with the distress in your
head)2
the cause of my writing george
has got disappointed and dont hardly
know what to doo in the money matters
the masons he contracted to doo the work
lumped out the plaistering and they have
got it all done but the last coat and
smith3 says they wont finish it till
they have the payment which is six
hundred dollars he wants to know
if you could without trouble let
him have it he says he could pay
you back in may certainly he has
tried every way that could be thought
of smith had a man to day to look
at his house he would sell it 500 doll
less than his price if he could
raise some money on it but the man dident
buy it) georg
says if it would be
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a trouble for you to get it he
will doo the best he can but if you
could send him a draft for
five or six hundred it would
accomadate him very much
indeed he wants you to telegraph
to him when you get this letter
as he expects he will have to go
to the foundry4 this week he
says if it wasent for our moving
and his letting out the lower part
he woulent care if it did stop
he feels shure of getting money
by the first of may he has tried
to transfer the mortgage on this
house offered the back interest
and more besides but it all failed
i dont suppose there hardly ever
was such difficuly the real estate
agent say it will be very different
in a little while) george says this
building without money is a bad business
i suppose walter dea you got my
letter of last week) there is 800 dollars
to come from jeff5 yet but he cant pay
but 200 dollar a month)6
the houses is both
insured) if you cant send it walt
without difficulty george wont think
hard i told him if you could i knew
you would)
Notes
- 1. This letter dates to March 15, 1869. The date "March 15" is in Louisa Van Velsor Whitman's hand on the second page, and Richard Maurice Bucke dated the letter to 1869. Edwin Haviland Miller agreed with Bucke's year (Walt Whitman, The Correspondence [New York: New York University Press, 1961–77], 2:367). In March 1869 George Washington Whitman was struggling to keep his housebuilding business afloat financially, and Louisa Van Velsor Whitman in this letter asks Walt Whitman for a loan of "five or six hundred" on George's behalf, the "cause of her writing." This direct request had been prepared two weeks earlier when Louisa wrote on the reluctance of agents to lend money to George: they instead sought the safety of government bonds (see her March 4, 1869 letter to Walt). Walt sent a bank draft immediately after receiving this letter, and Louisa acknowledged George's receipt of the draft (see her March 17, 1869 letter to Walt). Thomas Jefferson "Jeff" Whitman confirmed Walt's loan to George a week later (see Jeff's March 25, 1869 letter to Walt). [back]
- 2. In his February 2–8, 1869 letter to Louisa Van Velsor Whitman, Walt Whitman wrote of "severe cold in my head" and "bad spells, dizziness in the head." Walt's suffering continued for some time. In her February 18, 1869 letter, Louisa wrote, "i was sorry Walter you have them bad spells with your head it must be very bad indeed." She also recommended a "kind of linement [sic] called cloroform [sic]." [back]
- 3. George Washington Whitman started a building business with a partner named Smith in 1865, and they were joined by a mason named French the following year. See Jerome M. Loving, ed., "Introduction," Civil War Letters of George Washington Whitman (Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press, 1975), 27–29. [back]
- 4. According to Louisa Van Velsor Whitman's March 6, 1868 letter to Walt Whitman, George Washington Whitman was returning to the R. D. Wood Foundry in Camden, New Jersey, to inspect the "new main" for Moses Lane, chief engineer of the Brooklyn Water Works. George's brother Thomas Jefferson "Jeff" Whitman also had pipe made for the St. Louis Water Works in Camden. George accepted a position as inspector of pipes at the foundry in late 1869. [back]
- 5. Thomas Jefferson Whitman (1833–1890), known as "Jeff," was the son of Louisa Van Velsor Whitman and Walter Whitman, Sr., and Walt Whitman's favorite brother. In early adulthood he worked as a surveyor and topographical engineer. In the 1850s he began working for the Brooklyn Water Works, at which he remained employed through the Civil War. In 1867 Jeff became Superintendent of Water Works in St. Louis and became a nationally recognized name in civil engineering. For more on Jeff, see "Whitman, Thomas Jefferson (1833–1890)." [back]
- 6. Thomas Jefferson "Jeff" Whitman had agreed to lend his brother George Washington Whitman $2,000 (see Louisa Van Velsor Whitman's March 4, 1869 letter to Walt Whitman). If there are "800 dollars to come," as Louisa wrote above, George had already received six $200 installments from Jeff—with four more to come. However, the set of installments may have differed. Louisa attempted to provide a complete accounting in her June 23, 1869 letter to Walt: two installments from Jeff in the amount of $500 each were followed by a series of installments of $200, which George eventually expected would total $3,000 for a mortgage on top of the initial $1,000 in two installments. It is unclear whether Jeff agreed to provide $4,000 in full—$3,000 in $200 installments on top of the initial $1,000—because he only loaned George $3,400, which was $600 less than George expected. [back]
- 7. Louisa Van Velsor Whitman shortened a series of words in her conventional closing: "mor[e]," "remem[ber]," and "you[r]." [back]
- 8. Louisa Van Velsor Whitman (1795–1873) married Walter Whitman, Sr., in 1816; together they had nine children, of whom Walt Whitman was the second. For more information on Louisa and her letters, see Wesley Raabe, "'walter dear': The Letters from Louisa Van Velsor Whitman to Her Son Walt" and Sherry Ceniza, "Whitman, Louisa Van Velsor (1795–1873)." [back]