The Walt Whitman Archive
Life & Letters
Correspondence
About this Item
Title: Walt Whitman to Robert Pearsall Smith, 12 September [1887]
Date: September 12, 1887
Whitman Archive ID: loc.03837
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: Ryan Furlong, Stefan Schöberlein, Caterina Bernardini, and Stephanie Blalock
 image 1 |  image 2 |
328 Mickle Street
Camden N.J.—USA.1
Sept:12
In addition to what I wrote & sent off a couple of hours ago:2 Dr Bucke3 has just been in to see me & strongly suggests that the head4 ought to go to the Kensington Museum (instead of the Royal Academy, or any other place)
W W
Correspondent:
Robert Pearsall Smith
(1827–1898) was a Quaker who became an evangelical minister associated
with the "Holiness movement." He was also a writer and businessman. Whitman
often stayed at his Philadelphia home, where the poet became friendly with the
Smith children—Mary, Logan, and Alys. For more information about Smith,
see Christina Davey, "Smith, Robert Pearsall (1827–1898)," Walt
Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New
York: Garland Publishing, 1998).
Notes:
1. This postal card is addressed: Pearsall Smith | 40 Grosvenor Road | the Embankment | London | S W | England. It is postmarked: Camden, N.J. | Sep 12 | 6 PM | 87; Philadel [illegible] | SEP | 12 | 1887 | PAID. [back]
2. See Whitman's letter to Robert Pearsall Smith from earlier in the day on September 12, [1887]. [back]
3. 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]
4. A bust of Whitman by Sidney H. Morse (1832–1903). For more on this, see Ruth L. Bohan, Looking into Walt Whitman: American Art, 1850–1920 (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2006), 57–84; and David Reynolds, Walt Whitman's America: A Cultural Biography (New York: Vintage Books, 1996), 546–590. [back]