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Walt Whitman to Sylvester Baxter, 3 August 1887

About This Item

  • Title: Walt Whitman to Sylvester Baxter, 3 August 1887
  • Date: August 3, 1887
  • Creator(s): Walt Whitman
  • Whitman Archive ID: bpl.00019
  • Source: The Walt Whitman Collection, Boston Public Library. 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 created by Whitman Archive staff and/or were derived from Walt Whitman, The Correspondence, ed. Ted Genoways (Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 2004), vol. 7, and supplemented or updated by Whitman Archive staff.
  • Contributors to digital file: Alex Ashland Stefan Schöberlein Caterina Bernardini Stephanie Blalock
  • Cite this page: Whitman, Walt. "Walt Whitman to Sylvester Baxter, 3 August 1887." The Walt Whitman Archive. Gen. ed. Matt Cohen, Ed Folsom, & Kenneth M. Price. Accessed 20 September 2024. <http://www.whitmanarchive.org>.
  • Source File: bpl.00019.xml (TEI)
 bpl.00019.001_large.jpg Camden Aug: 3 P M '87 Dear S B

Yours has just come with $285 additional for the Cottage1 (making 788 altogether)—Thanks true & deep to you & to Dr Wesselhaeft​ 2 & to all—

A little let up to day & I am sitting here by the open window comfortable enough—but the three previous days here have been terrible—

Believe me dear S B I shall have the good of your & the friends' kind help—

Walt Whitman  bpl.00019.002_large.jpg

Correspondent:
Sylvester Baxter (1850–1927) was on the staff of the Boston Herald. Apparently he met Whitman for the first time when the poet delivered his Lincoln address in Boston in April, 1881; see Rufus A. Coleman, "Whitman and Trowbridge," PMLA 63 (1948), 268. Baxter wrote many newspaper columns in praise of Whitman's writings, and in 1886 attempted to obtain a pension for the poet. For more, see Christopher O. Griffin, "Baxter, Sylvester [1850–1927]," Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998).

Notes

  • 1. Boston friends were raising money to buy a summer cottage they hoped would improve Whitman's failing health. Whitman eventually used the money to build his extravagant mausoleum in Harleigh Cemetery—to the shock and dismay of those who had worked hardest to solicit money for the cottage. [back]
  • 2. Apparently Dr. William P. Wesselhoeft contributed $50 to the fund, since Baxter enclosed Wesselhoeft's check for that sum in his letter to Whitman of August 2. [back]
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