loc.02361.001_large.jpg
Philadelphia
11.11.1890
Walt Whitman
Dear Friend
I have returned from New York had a pleasant visit, and took supper and breakfast
with them—M John1 Alma2 May,3 Bertha4 Kitty5 Harold6 Calder and Albert,7 they all asked kindly after you and send their love,
had supper in Brooklyn with Caleb Pink8 who is going to
make his home in London Mrs Ingram9 was going over to see
you today but was afraid to venture on account of so much rain, but I have been to
the Prison in it all and had a talk to 2 poor Chinamen there, what a wretched system
we have to treat our brothers worse than animals New York is the same only more so
everyone seems to be striving to catch the biggest raft afloat on the uneven ocean,
what a struggle to survive
loc.02361.002_large.jpg the stream what it all means I am at a loss to know or what it
will lead to who is to say but it will be all right I suppose I have to take the
next train home and send you these few lines in a hurry Mrs Ingram joins me in kind
love to you
From Your Friend
Wm Ingram
Correspondent:
William Ingram, a Quaker, kept a tea
store—William Ingram and Son Tea Dealers—in Philadelphia. Of Ingram,
Whitman observed to Horace Traubel: "He is a man of the Thomas Paine
stripe—full of benevolent impulses, of radicalism, of the desire to
alleviate the sufferings of the world—especially the sufferings of
prisoners in jails, who are his protégés" (Horace Traubel, With Walt Whitman in Camden, Sunday, May 20, 1888). Ingram and his wife visited the physician
Richard Maurice Bucke and his family in Canada in 1890.
Notes
- 1. John H. Johnston (1837–1919) was a New York
jeweler and close friend of Whitman. Johnston was also a friend of Joaquin
Miller (Horace Traubel, With Walt Whitman in Camden, Tuesday, August 14, 1888). Whitman visited the Johnstons for the
first time early in 1877. In 1888 he observed to Horace Traubel: "I count
[Johnston] as in our inner circle, among the chosen few" (Horace Traubel, With Walt Whitman in Camden, Wednesday, October 3, 1888). See also Johnston's letter about
Whitman, printed in Charles N. Elliot, Walt Whitman as Man,
Poet and Friend (Boston: Richard G. Badger, 1915), 149–174. For
more on Johnston, see Susan L. Roberson, "Johnston, John H. (1837–1919) and Alma Calder," Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and
Donald D. Kummings (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]
- 2. Alma Calder Johnston was an author
and the second wife of John H. Johnston. Her family owned a home and property in
Equinunk, Pennsylvania. For more on the Johnstons, see Susan L. Roberson, "Johnston, John H. (1837–1919) and Alma Calder" (Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and
Donald D. Kummings (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]
- 3. Mary Frances (May) Johnston
(1862–1957) was the daughter of John H. Johnston (1837–1919) and his
first wife Amelia Johnston. She was the younger sister of Bertha Johnston
(1872–1953), who was involved in the suffrage movement. May later married
Arthur Levi, of London, England ("Mrs. A. C. Johnston, Author, Dies at 72," The Brooklyn Daily Eagle [May 3, 1917], 3). [back]
- 4. Bertha Johnston
(1872–1953) was the daughter of Whitman's friend John H. Johnston and his
first wife Amelia. Like her father, Bertha Johnston was passionate about
literature. She was also involved with the suffrage movement and was a member of
the Brooklyn Society of Ethical Culture. [back]
- 5. Katherine (sometimes spelled
"Catherine") B. Johnston (b. 1874) was a daughter of John H. Johnston, a jeweler
and close friend of Whitman's. [back]
- 6. Harold Johnston was the son
of the jeweler John H. Johnston and his first wife Amelia F. Many Johnston
(1839–1877). Amelia died the evening of March 26, 1877, while giving birth
to Harold. [back]
- 7. Albert Edward Johnston and
Calder Johnston were the sons of the jeweler John H. Johnston (1837–1919).
Calder was the youngest of John H. Johnston's three sons. [back]
- 8. Caleb Pink was a friend of
Alma Calder Johnston, the wife of the New York jeweler John H. Johnston. Pink
was a land and social reform activist in Brooklyn in the 1860s and 1870s. Pink
was the author of the 1895 book The Angel of the Mental
Orient. The Canadian physician Richard Maurice Bucke credited his
conversations with Pink with helping Bucke to interpret the overwhelming sense
of epiphany that he felt when he first read Leaves of
Grass. Bucke wrote about this experience in his book Cosmic Consciousness: A Study in the Evolution of the Human Mind
(Philadelphia: Innes and Sons, 1905), in which he writes of the importance of
Pink ("C.P.") and Pink's book for his own work. See Steven Jay Marsden, "'Hot
Little Prophets': Reading, Mysticism, and Walt Whitman's Disciples"
(Dissertation, Texas A & M University, 2004), 156. [back]
- 9. Little is known about Jane
Ingram (ca. 1826), the wife of William Ingram, who was the owner of a tea store
in Philadelphia. [back]