Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Letters
  3. Correspondence
  4. loc.02432

Bertha Johnston to Walt Whitman, 13 September 1891

About This Item

  • Title: Bertha Johnston to Walt Whitman, 13 September 1891
  • Date: September 13, 1891
  • Creator(s): Bertha Johnston
  • Whitman Archive ID: loc.02432
  • 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: Cristin Noonan Amanda J. Axley Stephanie Blalock Paige Wilkinson
  • Cite this page: Johnston, Bertha. "Bertha Johnston to Walt Whitman, 13 September 1891." The Walt Whitman Archive. Gen. ed. Matt Cohen, Ed Folsom, & Kenneth M. Price. Accessed 11 May 2025. <http://www.whitmanarchive.org>.
  • Source File: loc.02432.xml (TEI)
 loc.02432.001_large.jpg 305 E 17 St. Sept. 13, 1891. Dear Uncle Walt:

I hope you and your dear Comrade, Dr. Bucke1 have been able to spend some of the hour of this lovely day, out in the sunshine, together.

It is so delightful to be out of doors in bright weather, but when the  loc.02432.002_large.jpg streets are wet and dirty, I long to join the dress reform crusade and I watch the movement at Chautauqua2 very anxiously, and wish the ladies of Boston all success, when they make their first appearance on a rainy Saturday in costume based on common-sense first and beauty second. Indeed, I almost hear a voice say, "go then and do likewise," but there is  loc.02432.003_large.jpg a saying, "there are none so deaf as those who wont hear," and I am hard of hearing.

Our household is reunited once more, Harold3 having returned last Wednesday. He is already taller than I am, though only fourteen. Calder4 is lighted and happy as can be, while Kittie,5 whom we begin to call Katherine, is also tall enough to be looked up to by her older sisters.

 loc.02432.004_large.jpg

Father6 and Mother7 are away for over Sunday. An old friend persuaded them to run down to his home in New Brunswick and Mother agreed to go on condition that she should not be asked to go to church. The hours in the open air were too precious.

All send love and best wishes—

With ever so much from your funny little friend Bertha Johnston.

Correspondent:
Bertha Johnston (1872–1953) was the daughter of Whitman's friend John H. Johnston and his first wife Amelia. Like her father, Bertha Johnston was passionate about literature. She was also involved with the suffrage movement and was a member of the Brooklyn Society of Ethical Culture.

Notes

  • 1. Richard Maurice Bucke (1837–1902) was a Canadian physician and psychiatrist who grew close to Whitman after reading Leaves of Grass in 1867 (and later memorizing it) and meeting the poet in Camden a decade later. Even before meeting Whitman, Bucke claimed in 1872 that a reading of Leaves of Grass led him to experience "cosmic consciousness" and an overwhelming sense of epiphany. Bucke became the poet's first biographer with Walt Whitman (Philadelphia: David McKay, 1883), and he later served as one of his medical advisors and literary executors. For more on the relationship of Bucke and Whitman, see Howard Nelson, "Bucke, Richard Maurice," Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]
  • 2. The Women's Dress Reform movement had overtaken the famous Chautauqua social reform meetings in Chautauqua, New York, in the summer of 1891, as reformers did away with "high collars, low-necked dresses, corsets, garters of all kinds, in fact everything that would mar or disfigure the female form" (see "Reform in Woman's Dress," New York Times [July 26, 1891], 8). [back]
  • 3. Harold "Harry" Hugh Johnston was the son of Whitman's friends John H. and Amelia F. Johnston. Whitman often made long visits to the Johnstons in New York during the late 1870s, and he was very fond of Harry and the other Johnston children. For a picture of Whitman with Harry see the July 1878 photograph by William Kurtz. [back]
  • 4. Calder Johnston was John H. Johnston's youngest son. [back]
  • 5. Katherine (sometimes spelled "Catherine") B. Johnston (b. 1874) was a daughter of John H. Johnston, a jeweler and close friend of Whitman's. Katherine had at least six siblings, four of whom were older and two that were younger. When Whitman visited the Johnston family for the first time early in 1877, Katherine ("Kittie," "Kitty") would have been three years old. [back]
  • 6. John H. Johnston (1837–1919) was a New York jeweler and close friend of Whitman. Johnston was also a friend of Joaquin Miller (Horace Traubel, With Walt Whitman in Camden, Tuesday, August 14, 1888). Whitman visited the Johnstons for the first time early in 1877. In 1888 he observed to Horace Traubel: "I count [Johnston] as in our inner circle, among the chosen few" (Horace Traubel, With Walt Whitman in Camden, Wednesday, October 3, 1888). See also Johnston's letter about Whitman, printed in Charles N. Elliot, Walt Whitman as Man, Poet and Friend (Boston: Richard G. Badger, 1915), 149–174. For more on Johnston, see Susan L. Roberson, "Johnston, John H. (1837–1919) and Alma Calder," Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]
  • 7. Alma Calder Johnston was an author and the second wife of John H. Johnston. Her family owned a home and property in Equinunk, Pennsylvania. For more on the Johnstons, see Susan L. Roberson, "Johnston, John H. (1837–1919) and Alma Calder" (Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]
Back to top