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Joseph C. Baldwin to Walt Whitman, 11 August 1877

About This Item

  • Title: Joseph C. Baldwin to Walt Whitman, 11 August 1877
  • Date: August 11, 1877
  • Creator(s): Joseph C. Baldwin
  • Whitman Archive ID: loc.04068
  • Source: The Charles E. Feinberg Collection of the Papers of Walt Whitman, 1839–1919, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. Transcribed from digital images or a microfilm reproduction of the original item. For a description of the editorial rationale behind our treatment of the correspondence, see our statement of editorial policy.
  • Contributors to digital file: Alicia Bones Nima Najafi Kianfar Eder Jaramillo Nicole Gray
  • Cite this page: Baldwin, Joseph C.. "Joseph C. Baldwin to Walt Whitman, 11 August 1877." The Walt Whitman Archive. Gen. ed. Matt Cohen, Ed Folsom, & Kenneth M. Price. Accessed 23 April 2024. <http://www.whitmanarchive.org>.
  • Source File: loc.04068.xml (TEI)
 loc.01800.004_large.jpg Elliottstown Effingham Co: Ills:—1 August 11th /77 Dear Walt

Thinking you would like to Here​ from me I would write you a few lines in as much as Im​ well and Hope this will find you the same2

Business is very dull Here now and crops is ruined for the want of rain. all of my worment​ of of mind and toil of body is of no avil​ Im​ feafuly​ in want now and when my crops is geathered​ it wont​ be much better as I see  loc.01800.003_large.jpg O I musent​ say Im​ in want Because I Have got plenty to eat and some close​

But not much money now I dont​ nead​ as much

But the fuather​ looks dark But may come out Better than I amagn​

I will Buy some Hogs on a credit and feed my unsailable​ corn to them and may come out all right in due time I received those papers many thanks)

yours truly Jos. C. Baldwin

write soon

 loc.01800.001_large.jpg  loc.01800.002_large.jpg

Notes

  • 1. Whitman wrote a series of notes about the Odyssey on the back of one of the pages of this letter. At the top of the notes are the words "for Abraham Lincoln." [back]
  • 2. Joseph C. Baldwin was a young sharecropper living in Elliottstown, Illinois, who Whitman likely met in Camden in 1873. Baldwin is discussed in Calamus Lovers: Walt Whitman's Working Class Camerados, ed. Charley Shively (San Francisco: Gay Sunshine Press, 1987), 122–135. [back]
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