Title: Walt Whitman to George W. Childs, 12 December [1878]
Date: December 12, 1878
Whitman Archive ID: uva.00390
Source: Papers of Walt Whitman (MSS 3829), Clifton Waller Barrett Library of American Literature, Albert H. Small Special Collections Library, University of Virginia. The transcription presented here is derived from Walt Whitman, The Correspondence, ed. Edwin Haviland Miller (New York: New York University Press, 1964), 3:142. For a description of the editorial rationale behind our treatment of the correspondence, see our statement of editorial policy.
Contributors to digital file: Alicia Bones, Grace Thomas, Anthony Dreesen, and Kevin McMullen
431 Stevens Street
Camden New Jersey
Dec 121
My dear friend
As the holidays come on I would like to make to from 40 to 50 [incomplete]
1. According to his Commonplace Book, Whitman sent a note on December 12 to George W. Childs (1824–1894), co-owner of the Philadelphia Public Ledger, and on December 17, he received "50 from G W C for the drivers' gloves" (Charles E. Feinberg Collection of the Papers of Walt Whitman, 1839–1919, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.). At Christmas, Whitman sent gloves to friends, relatives, and various drivers. He apparently had enough gloves to give them as presents again in 1881. This draft letter appears on the verso of notes for "A County Auction." [back]