Walt Whitman to an Editor, 26 (?) December 1864

About This Item

Title: Walt Whitman to an Editor, 26 (?) December 1864
Date: December 26(?), 1864
Creator(s): Walt Whitman
Whitman Archive ID: nyp.00195
Source: Henry W. and Albert A. Berg Collection, New York Public Library. The transcription presented here is derived from Walt Whitman, The Correspondence, ed. Edwin Haviland Miller (New York: New York University Press, 1961–1977), 244. For a description of the editorial rationale behind our treatment of the correspondence, see our statement of editorial policy.
Contributors to digital file: Elizabeth Lorang Kathryn Kruger Vanessa Steinroetter Alyssa Olson
Cite this page: Whitman, Walt. "Walt Whitman to an Editor, 26 (?) December 1864." The Walt Whitman Archive. Gen. ed. Matt Cohen, Ed Folsom, & Kenneth M. Price. Accessed 04 December 2024. <http://www.whitmanarchive.org>.
Source File: nyp.00195.xml (TEI)

Sir: whether it agrees with your own opinion or not I hope you will open your columns to this communication of mine, seeking to stir up the government to a general exchange of prisoners.1 I hope also you may feel to say a word about it editorially—if you could call attention to it.

As I have sent similar communications this afternoon to one or two other papers, I would particularly solicit that you find room for it in tomorrow's issue.

Notes

1. This is the draft of a letter written to the editor of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle or the New York Times to accompany a communication entitled "The Prisoners," which was to appear on December 27, 1864 (reprinted by Charles I. Glicksberg, Walt Whitman and the Civil War [Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1933], 178–180). Whitman assailed the Secretary of War and General Butler for their attitudes toward the exchange of prisoners. [back]