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Catalog of the Walt Whitman Literary Manuscripts in The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens

Original records created by The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens; revised and expanded by the Walt Whitman Archive and the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries. Encoded Archival Description completed with the assistance of the Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation, the University of Nebraska Research Council, the Institute for Museum and Library Services, and the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Individual items at this repository

  • Whitman Archive Title: Tests
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00007
  • Repository ID: HM 11203
  • Date: ca. 1860
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 1 leaf, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2
  • Content: Draft, with a few corrections, of "Tests," a poem published first in Leaves of Grass (1860–61) and reprinted in subsequent editions.
  • Whitman Archive Title: Beginners
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00006
  • Repository ID: HM 11202
  • Date: about 1860
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 1 leaf, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2
  • Content: Complete draft, lightly revised, of "Beginners," a poem first published in Leaves of Grass (1860–61) and reprinted in all subsequent editons.
  • Whitman Archive Title: You Lingering Sparse Leaves of Me
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00017
  • Repository ID: HM 1193
  • Repository Title: [Leaves of grass]
  • Date: between 1885 and 1887
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 1 leaf, proof with handwritten annotations
  • View Images: 1 | 2
  • Content: Corrected proof sheet for the poem "You Lingering Sparse Leaves of Me," which was first published in the November 1887 issue of Lippincott's Magazine in a collection of four poems titled "November Boughs." It was reprinted in Leaves of Grass (1891-1892).
  • Whitman Archive Title: The singer in the prison
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00010
  • Repository ID: HM 11206
  • Repository Title: The singer in the prison
  • Date: about 1869
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 4 leaves, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8
  • Content: This is draft of "The Singer in the Prison," a poem first published in December 25, 1869 issue of Saturday Evening Visitor with the subtitle "A Christmas Incident." Whitman included it, without subtitle, in the "Leaves of Grass" cluster of Passage to India (1871). Finally, in the 1881–82 edition it became part of the "Autumn Rivulets" cluster.
  • Whitman Archive Title: Thoughts
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00002
  • Repository ID: HM 11201
  • Date: about 1860
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 3 leaves, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6
  • Content: Draft, with minor corrections, of the first poem in the cluster titled "Thoughts" when it was first published in Leaves of Grass (1860–61). It was reprinted in the 1867 edition of Leaves of Grass but omitted from all subsequent editions.
  • Whitman Archive Title: 6
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00003
  • Repository ID: HM 11201
  • Repository Title: Thoughts
  • Date: about 1860
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 1 leaf, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2
  • Content: Draft, with a few corrections, of the sixth poem in the cluster titled "Thoughts" when it was first published in Leaves of Grass (1860–61). In the 1867 edition it appeared again as "6" in the "Thoughts" cluster. In the 1871–72 edition, revised and titled Thought, it was included in the "Songs of Parting" cluster. It did not appear in later editions of Leaves of Grass.
  • Whitman Archive Title: Thoughts
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00004
  • Repository ID: HM 11201
  • Date: about 1860
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 1 leaf, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2
  • Content: Draft, with revisions, of the seventh poem in the cluster titled "Thoughts" when it was first published in Leaves of Grass (1860–61). In the 1867 edition it appeared again as "7" in the "Thoughts" cluster. In the 1871–72 edition it was titled "Thought" and not included in any cluster. Finally, in Leaves of Grass (1881–82) it appeared as "Thought" in the "By the Roadside" cluster.
  • Whitman Archive Title: 2
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00005
  • Repository ID: HM 11201
  • Repository Title: Thoughts
  • Date: about 1860
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 1 leaf, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2
  • Content: Draft, with minor revisions, of the second poem in the cluster titled "Thoughts" when it was first published in Leaves of Grass (1860–61). In the 1867 and 1871–72 editions it appeared again as "2" in clusters titled "Thoughts." Finally, in Leaves of Grass (1881–82) Whitman combined parts of this and another poem, again titled Thoughts, and included it in the "By the Roadside" cluster.
  • Whitman Archive Title: To Him that was Crucified
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00013
  • Repository ID: HM 11208
  • Repository Title: To him that was crucified
  • Date: about 1860
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 3 leaves, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6
  • Content: Draft, with many corrections, of "To Him That Was Crucified," a poem first published in Leaves of Grass (1860–61).
  • Whitman Archive Title: To Other Lands
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00009
  • Repository ID: HM 11204
  • Repository Title: To other lands
  • Date: about 1860
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 1 leaf, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2
  • Content: Draft, with some corrections, of the poem eventually titled "To Foreign Lands," first published in Leaves of Grass (1860–61) as "To other Lands" as part of the "Messenger Leaves" cluster. In the 1871–72 edition it received its final title and position within the "Inscriptions" cluster.
  • Whitman Archive Title: Longings for Home
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00001
  • Repository ID: HM 11200
  • Repository Title: Longings for home
  • Date: about 1860
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 5 leaves, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10
  • Content: Lightly revised draft of a poem first published as "Longings For Home" in Southern Literary Messenger (July 1860) and Leaves of Grass (1860–61). It was reprinted in Leaves of Grass (1871–72). In later editions it appeared under the title "O Magnet-South," with minor revisions.
  • Whitman Archive Title: To the Future
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00008
  • Repository ID: HM 11205
  • Repository Title: To a common prostitute
  • Date: about 1860
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 1 leaf, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2
  • Content: Draft of a poem titled "To the Future." Although the poem was unpublished in its entirety, the seventh line was used in the poem "To My Soul," which was first published in the 1860 edition of Leaves of Grass and later retitled "As the Time Draws Nigh." On the reverse is a draft of "To a Common Prostitute."
  • Whitman Archive Title: To a Common Prostitute
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00065
  • Repository ID: HM 11205
  • Repository Title: To a common prostitute
  • Date: about 1860
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 1leaf, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2
  • Content: Draft of "To a Common Prostitute," a poem published first in the 1860–61 edition of Leaves of Grass and retained in all subsequent editions. On the verso is a draft of an unpublished poem entitled "To the Future."
  • Whitman Archive Title: [Write a piece for address]
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00019
  • Repository ID: HM 1194
  • Repository Title: The dead in this war
  • Date: between 1864 and 1875
  • Genre: prose
  • Physical Description: 2 leaves, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4
  • Content: Notes about death during the U.S. Civil War, apparently intended for a projected lecture that never materialized. Whitman used these notes for the short essay "The Million Dead, too, summ'd up—The Unknown," which was first published in Memoranda During the War (1875–76).
  • Whitman Archive Title: [Most all of the wounds very bad]
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00041
  • Repository ID: HM 6708
  • Repository Title: Notes on hospital experiences
  • Date: 1862-1874
  • Genre: prose
  • Physical Description: 4 leaves, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8
  • Content: A manuscript describing Whitman's time spent in the army camps and hospitals near Fredericksburg in late December, 1862. The manuscripts are fairly neat and on the verso on the fourth leaf Whitman has written "Proofs," indicating that these were likely handwritten proofs for one of the several newspaper articles that Whitman published about these experiences, articles that would later be incorporated into Memoranda During the War . Some of the lines here first appeared in "Our Wounded and Sick Soldiers," published in the New York Times on 11 December 1864, and were later reprinted in a series of articles written for the New York Weekly Graphic in 1874.
  • Whitman Archive Title: [I for the old round earth]
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00022
  • Repository ID: HM 6714
  • Repository Title: Preface to Leaves of Grass
  • Date: 1863-1867
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 2 leaves, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4
  • Content: Although the repository labels this manuscript as a draft of the Preface to the 1855 Leaves of Grass , it appears to have been written in the mid-1860s and was potentially intended as the opening inscription to the 1867 edition of Leaves (Whitman has written "Inscription, to precede Leaves of Grass, when finished" at the top of the first leaf). While the poem in this form was never published, the line describing the Greek god Kronos as "brown-skinned" may have led to a similar description in "Chanting the Square Deific," which first appeared in Sequel to Drum-Taps in 1865.
  • Whitman Archive Title: [While the schools]
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00066
  • Repository ID: HM 6714
  • Repository Title: Preface to Leaves of Grass
  • Date: between 1863 and 1867
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 1 leaf, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2
  • Content: Although the repository groups this manuscript with two other leaves and ties them all to the 1855 Preface to Leaves of Grass , it appears that this is a separate manuscript and that none of them are related to the 1855 Preface. This manuscript was likely written in the mid-1860s and was never published.
  • Whitman Archive Title: Bed 37
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00027
  • Date: 1863
  • Genre: prose
  • Physical Description: 1 leaf, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2
  • Content: Notes made about a visit to Armory Square Hospital in Washington, D.C. in 1863. Revised versions of these lines were published in "'Tis But Ten Years Since (Fourth Paper)", the fourth of six articles about the Civil War that Whitman published in the New York Weekly Graphic in January and February, 1874. The fourth number appeared on 21 February 1874. The articles were later gathered and republished as Memoranda During the War in 1875.
  • Whitman Archive Title: [Reminiscences]
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00033
  • Date: 1864-1865
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 1 leaf, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2
  • Content: A manuscript fragment containing what appear to be poetic lines written about the dead of the Civil War, and which are included at the Huntington Library with a group of notes labeled "Hospital Notes 1863." Edward Grier suggests that these lines may have been for an early version of a lecture that Whitman intended to give on "The Dead in this War." The lines also anticipate portions of "When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd." The manuscript is labeled "Reminiscences 64" at the top.
  • Whitman Archive Title: Soon shall the winter's foil be here
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00016
  • Repository ID: HM 1192
  • Date: about 1888
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 1 leaf, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2
  • Content: Heavily corrected draft of "Soon Shall the Winter's Foil Be Here," a poem published first in the New York Herald on February 21, 1888. It was reprinted in November Boughs (1888) and Leaves of Grass (1891–92), where it appeared in the "Sands at Seventy" cluster.
  • Whitman Archive Title: [in life]
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00051
  • Repository ID: HM 16537
  • Repository Title: [Memoranda During the War]
  • Date: 1873-1875
  • Genre: prose
  • Physical Description: 1 leaf, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2
  • Content: A manuscript fragment that, on the recto, contains lines similar to those found in the opening paragraph of Memoranda During the War (1875), and may have been an alternate or earlier version of that introduction. The paragraph first appeared in a slightly different form in the New York Weekly Graphic on 24 January 1874, part of a five-part series about the war that Whitman published in that paper. The verso contains lines which appear in the final paragraph of Whitman's introduction to Memoranda , and were likely written later than the lines on the recto.
  • Whitman Archive Title: 'Come said my soul. . .'
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00021
  • Repository ID: HM 6713
  • Repository Title: 'Come said my soul. . .'
  • Date: about 1875
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 1 leaf, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2
  • Content: A signed draft, heavily revised, of the untitled poem that Whitman used for some printings of Leaves of Grass, beginning in 1876. It was first published as part of "A Christmas Garland in Prose and Verse" in the New York Daily Graphic of December 25, 1874. The date in the poet's note at the top suggests that this manuscript might represent a revision stage later than the poem's initial publication.
  • Whitman Archive Title: Lafayette in Brooklyn
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00037
  • Repository ID: HM 1189
  • Repository Title: Account of the visit of Lafayette to Brooklyn in 1825
  • Date: 1881
  • Genre: prose
  • Physical Description: 6 leaves, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12
  • Content: A manuscript containing the text of a address that Whitman purportedly gave at the New England Historic Genealogical Society in Boston, likely on 7 October 1881 (see Edward Grier, Notebooks and Unpublished Prose Manuscripts [New York: New York University Press, 1984] 1:32).
  • Whitman Archive Title: A Thought on Shakspere
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00045
  • Repository ID: HM 6712
  • Repository Title: A Thought on Shakespeare
  • Date: 1881-1886
  • Genre: prose
  • Physical Description: 6 leaves, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12
  • Content: A fairly late draft of the essay "A Thought on Shakspere," which first appeared in The Critic on 14 August 1886. It would later be reprinted in Democratic Vistas, and Other Papers (1888) and again in November Boughs .
  • Whitman Archive Title: Carlyle from American points of View
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00034
  • Repository ID: HM 138
  • Repository Title: Carlyle from American points of view
  • Date: 1882
  • Genre: prose
  • Physical Description: 37 leaves, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | 32 | 33 | 34 | 35 | 36 | 37 | 38 | 39 | 40 | 41 | 42 | 43 | 44 | 45 | 46 | 47 | 48 | 49 | 50 | 51 | 52 | 53 | 54 | 55 | 56 | 57 | 58 | 59 | 60 | 61 | 62 | 63 | 64 | 65 | 66 | 67 | 68 | 69 | 70 | 71 | 72 | 73 | 74
  • Content: A draft of Whitman's essay "Carlyle from American Points of View," first published in Specimen Days in 1882. At the top of the draft, Whitman indicates that the piece was originally submitted for publication in the North American Review on 20 May 1882, but was rejected.
  • Whitman Archive Title: Fancies at Navesink, the Pilot in the mist
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00014
  • Repository ID: HM 1190
  • Repository Title: Fancies at Navesink, the Pilot in the mist
  • Date: about 1885
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 1 leaf, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2
  • Content: A draft of "Pilot in the Mist," the first in the eight-poem sequence "Fancies at Navesink," first published in the August 1885 issue of Nineteenth Century. On the verso is a letter dated October 3, 1884 to Whitman from Richard Hines requesting information about Martin Farquhar Tupper.
  • Whitman Archive Title: A Twilight Song
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00020
  • Repository ID: HM 1224
  • Date: about 1890
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 1 leaf, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2
  • Content: Late draft, with a few corrections, of "A Twilight Song," a poem first published in the May 1890 issue of Century Illustrated Monthly Magazine, where it was subtitled "For unknown buried soldiers, North and South." It was reprinted, without the subtitle, in Good-Bye My Fancy (1891) and in the "Good-By my Fancy" annex of Leaves of Grass (1891–92).
  • Whitman Archive Title: Authors at Home - No. VII
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00039
  • Repository ID: HM 1196
  • Repository Title: Walt Whitman at Camden
  • Date: 1885
  • Genre: prose
  • Physical Description: 9 leaves, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18
  • Content: Draft of an article entitled "Walt Whitman in Camden" that Whitman published pseudonymously in The Critic on 25 February 1885. The article, published under the name "George Selwyn," was part of a series called "American Authors at Home" that ran for several volumes in 1885. The article would later be reprinted by The Critic Co. in 1898 as a separate pamphlet entitled Walt Whitman at Home , which credited Whitman as the author of the piece.
  • Whitman Archive Title: Father Taylor (and Oratory)
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00044
  • Repository ID: HM 6711
  • Repository Title: Father Taylor (and Oratory)
  • Date: 1886-1887
  • Genre: prose
  • Physical Description: 11 leaves, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22
  • Content: Late-stage draft (with printer's instructions) of the essay "Father Taylor (and Oratory)," which first appeared in Century Magazine in February 1887. The piece would later be reprinted in November Boughs . Edward Thompson Taylor was a Boston Methodist minister known for his powerful sermons, serving as the inspiration for Melville's "Father Mapple" in Moby Dick . Whitman went to hear Taylor speak on several occassions during his stay in Boston in 1860.
  • Whitman Archive Title: Queries To My Seventieth Year
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00011
  • Repository ID: HM 11207
  • Repository Title: To my seventieth year
  • Date: 1888
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 1 leaf, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2
  • Content: Heavily revised draft, signed, of "Queries to My Seventieth Year," a poem first published in the May 2, 1888 issue of the New York Herald. It was reprinted in November Boughs (1888) and included in the "Sands at Seventy" annex of Leaves of Grass (1891–92).
  • Whitman Archive Title: Old Poets
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00053
  • Repository ID: HM 50563
  • Repository Title: Old Poets: [essay]
  • Date: 1890
  • Genre: prose
  • Physical Description: 2 leaves, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4
  • Content: A draft of Whitman's essay "Old Poets," with handwritten printer's instructions at the top of the first leaf. The essay was first printed in the North American Review in November 1890 and later reprinted in the Pall Mall Gazette (17 November 1890) and in Good-Bye My Fancy (1891).
  • Whitman Archive Title: You Lingering Sparse Leaves of Me
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00015
  • Repository ID: HM 1193
  • Repository Title: [Leaves of grass]
  • Date: May 1885
  • Genre: poetry
  • Physical Description: 1 leaf, proof with handwritten corrections and annotations
  • View Images: 1 | 2
  • Content: Corrected proof sheet for the poem "You Lingering Sparse Leaves of Me," dated May 1885. The poem was first published in the November 1887 issue of Lippincott's Magazine in a collection of four poems titled "November Boughs." It was reprinted in Leaves of Grass (1891-1892).
  • Whitman Archive Title: [Walt Whitman said lately to one of his interviewers]
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00036
  • Date: 1886
  • Genre: prose
  • Physical Description: 1 leaf, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2
  • Content: A manuscript written by Whitman and sent to William Sloane Kennedy, most likely in 1886. Kennedy would use the manuscript, along with several others, in an article entitled "Dutch Traits of Walt Whitman" which appeared under Kennedy's name in In Re Walt Whitman in 1893, a volume edited by Horace Traubel, Richard Maurice Bucke, and Thomas Harned, Whitman's literary executors. It is likely Kennedy's handwriting that appears in dark pencil on the verso.
  • Whitman Archive Title: [Going back far enough]
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00064
  • Date: 1886
  • Genre: prose
  • Physical Description: 1 leaf, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2
  • Content: A manuscript written by Whitman and sent to William Sloane Kennedy, most likely in 1886. Kennedy would use the manuscript, along with several others, in an article entitled "Dutch Traits of Walt Whitman" which appeared under Kennedy's name in In Re Walt Whitman in 1893, a volume edited by Horace Traubel, Richard Maurice Bucke, and Thomas Harned, Whitman's literary executors. On the verso is a portion of a letter to Whitman from W.E. Mitchell.
  • Whitman Archive Title: A Visit to the Opera
  • Whitman Archive ID: hun.00038
  • Repository ID: HM 1191
  • Date: 1855-1860
  • Genre: prose
  • Physical Description: 8 leaves, handwritten
  • View Images: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16
  • Content: A relatively clean draft of a journalistic piece, entitled "A Visit to the Opera." No published version in this form has been found, though the draft bears many similarities to "The Opera," an article published in the November 10, 1855 issue of Life Illustrated. It is likely that the present draft represents an early stage in the composition of the published article, but it is also possible that it was created later, as a revision intended for publication in a different periodical. Whitman has numbered the pages, although pages 8 and 9 are missing. The draft is signed "Mose Velsor, of Brooklyn," one of Whitman's commonly-used pseudonyms. For more discussion of this draft's relation to "The Opera" and to several other manuscripts, see Edward Grier, Notebooks and Unpublished Prose Manuscripts (New York: New York University Press, 1984) 1:388-397.
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