Walt Whitman to Thomas B. Harned, 10 May 1889

About This Item

Title: Walt Whitman to Thomas B. Harned, 10 May 1889
Date: May 10, 1889
Creator(s): Walt Whitman
Whitman Archive ID: med.00872
Source: The location of this manuscript is unknown. Edwin Haviland Miller derives his transcription from a transcript of the letter published in The Modern School 6 (April–May, 1919): 127. The transcription presented here is derived from The Correspondence, ed. Edwin Haviland Miller (New York: New York University Press, 1961–1977), 335. For a description of the editorial rationale behind our treatment of the correspondence, see our statement of editorial policy.
Contributors to digital file: Blake Bronson-Bartlett Caterina Bernardini Brandon James O'Neil Stephanie Blalock
Cite this page: Whitman, Walt. "Walt Whitman to Thomas B. Harned, 10 May 1889." The Walt Whitman Archive. Gen. ed. Matt Cohen, Ed Folsom, & Kenneth M. Price. Accessed 09 May 2025. <http://www.whitmanarchive.org>.
Source File: med.00872.xml (TEI)

May 10th, 1889. Tom:

If you will, fill the brown bottle with sherry for me, and the small white bottle with Cognac. My dear friend O'Connor1 is dead.

Walt Whitman.

Correspondent:
Thomas Biggs Harned (1851–1921) was one of Whitman's literary executors. Harned was a lawyer in Philadelphia and, having married Augusta Anna Traubel (1856–1914), was Horace Traubel's brother-in-law. For more on him, see Dena Mattausch, "Harned, Thomas Biggs (1851–1921)," Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998). For more on his relationship with Whitman, see Thomas Biggs Harned, Memoirs of Thomas B. Harned, Walt Whitman's Friend and Literary Executor, ed. Peter Van Egmond (Hartford: Transcendental Books, 1972).

Notes

1. William Douglas O'Connor (1832–1889) was the author of the grand and grandiloquent Whitman pamphlet The Good Gray Poet: A Vindication, published in 1866. For more on Whitman's relationship with O'Connor, see Deshae E. Lott, "O'Connor, William Douglas (1832–1889)," Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]