The Walt Whitman Archive
Life & Letters
Correspondence
About this Item
Title: Walt Whitman to Peter Doyle, 20 March [1874]
Date: March 20, 1874
Whitman Archive ID: loc.01630
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.
Notes for this letter were derived from Walt Whitman, The Correspondence, ed. Edwin Haviland Miller, 6 vols. (New York: New York University Press, 1961–1977), and supplemented, updated, or created by Whitman Archive staff as appropriate.
Editorial note: The annotation, "1874 or 5," is in an unknown hand.
Contributors to digital file: Elizabeth Lorang, Kathryn Kruger, Zachary King, Eric Conrad, Alex Kinnaman, and Nicole Gray
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431 Stevens st. Camden.1
March 20.
4½ P.M.2
Dear boy Pete,
Nothing particular or new in my condition—I have been to the Doctor's to-day—had quite a long interview—no great satisfaction—I still have pretty uncomfortable times—& yet I keep up good heart in the main. I will make out only a short letter this time, I see. Good bye my loving son. I will try to do better next week.
Walt
Correspondent:
Peter Doyle (1843–1907) was
one of Walt Whitman's closest comrades and lovers, and their friendship spanned
nearly thirty years. The two met in 1865 when the twenty-one-year-old Doyle was
a conductor in the horsecar where the forty-five-year-old Whitman was a
passenger. Despite his status as a veteran of the Confederate Army, Doyle's
uneducated, youthful nature appealed to Whitman. Although Whitman's stroke in
1873 and subsequent move from Washington to Camden limited the time the two
could spend together, their relationship rekindled in the mid-1880s after Doyle
moved to Philadelphia and visited nearby Camden frequently. After Whitman's
death, Doyle permitted Richard Maurice Bucke to publish the letters Whitman had
sent him. For more on Doyle and his relationship with Whitman, see Martin G.
Murray, "Doyle, Peter," Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia,
ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New York: Garland Publishing,
1998),
Notes:
1. This letter is addressed: Peter Doyle | M street south | bet 4½ & 6th | Washington, | D. C. It is postmarked: Camden | Mar | 20 | N.J. [back]
2. The year is established by the discussion of Dr. Grier's diagnosis in the letter from Whitman to . O'Connor of March 22, which can be positively assigned to 1874. [back]