loc.02577.001.jpg
John H. Johnston. Albert Edw. Johnston.
J. H. JOHNSTON & CO.,
Diamond Merchants and Jewelers.
17 Union Square, New York.
Cor. Broadway & 15th St.
Established, 1844.
Telephone Call: 916 21st Street.
New York,
Sept 25
18
901
Dear Walt:
I inclose you a letter which I wrote you last week and directed
wrong as you will see2—
Two letters from Traubel3 this morning, convince me that everything considered Phil. is the place,4
and I think you good folks
had better go right ahead and I know it will be a great success,
Excuse haste
Sincerely yours
J H Johnston
Yes—I do appreciate what you lost5 when there was no reporter to take down
Ingersoll's6 loc.02577.002.jpg
speech.7 Bertha8 never tires of talking of it, and Ingersoll has spoken to me of it so often that
I know what it must have been. He is a very wonderful man.
J.H.J.
loc.02577.003.jpg
See notes
Sept 26 '90
loc.02577.004.jpg
Correspondent:
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).
Notes
- 1. This letter is addressed:
Walt Whitman | Camden | N.J. It is postmarked: New York | Sep 25 | 4 PM | D;
Camden, N.J. | SEP | 26 | 6AM | 1890 | [illegible]. The envelope has a printed return address: J. H. Johnston
& Co., | Diamond Merchants and Jewelers, | 17 Union Square, New York. | Cor.
Broadway & 15th St. [back]
- 2. Johnston is referring to the
letter he wrote Whitman on September 22, 1890.
Johnston enclosed the original envelope for the September 22 letter, on which he
wrote an incorrect address for Whitman and crossed it out only to write a second
incorrect address. [back]
- 3. Horace L. Traubel (1858–1919)
was an American essayist, poet, and magazine publisher. He is best remembered as
the literary executor, biographer, and self-fashioned "spirit child" of Walt
Whitman. During the late 1880s and until Whitman's death in 1892, Traubel visited
the poet virtually every day and took thorough notes of their conversations,
which he later transcribed and published in three large volumes entitled With Walt Whitman in Camden (1906, 1908, & 1914).
After his death, Traubel left behind enough manuscripts for six more volumes of
the series, the final two of which were published in 1996. For more on Traubel,
see Ed Folsom, "Traubel, Horace L. [1858–1919]," Walt
Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New
York: Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]
- 4. Johnston is referring to the
lecture event planned in Whitman's honor, which would take place on October 21
at Philadelphia's Horticultural Hall. Robert Ingersoll delivered the lecture.
See Ingersoll's October 12, 1890 and October 20, 1890 letters to Whitman. In his letter
of September 17, 1890 Bucke quoted a letter from
Johnston: "This morning an hours talk with Ingersoll and I got his promise and
authority to proceed and get up a lecture entertainment by him for Walt's
benefit—in Phila I guess—Shall I put you on committee?" [back]
- 5. Johnston is responding to
Whitman's discussion of his 71st birthday celebration in Philadelphia and the
speech delievered by Robert Ingersoll (1833–1899) at the event. See
Whitman's letter to Johnston of September 23,
1890. [back]
- 6. Robert "Bob" Green Ingersoll
(1833–1899) was a Civil War veteran and an orator of the post-Civil War
era, known for his support of agnosticism. Ingersoll was a friend of Whitman,
who considered Ingersoll the greatest orator of his time. Whitman said to Horace
Traubel, "It should not be surprising that I am drawn to Ingersoll, for he is
Leaves of Grass. He lives, embodies, the
individuality I preach. I see in Bob the noblest
specimen—American-flavored—pure out of the soil, spreading, giving,
demanding light" (Traubel, With Walt Whitman in Camden,
Wednesday, March 25, 1891). The feeling was mutual. Upon Whitman's
death in 1892, Ingersoll delivered the eulogy at the poet's funeral. The eulogy
was published to great acclaim and is considered a classic panegyric (see
Phyllis Theroux, The Book of Eulogies [New York: Simon
& Schuster, 1997], 30). [back]
- 7. Whitman's friends gave him a
birthday supper in honor of his 71st birthday on May 31, 1890, at Reisser's
Restaurant in Philadelphia, at which the noted orator Col. Robert G. Ingersoll
(1833–1899) gave a "grand speech, never to be forgotten by me" (Whitman's
Commonplace Book, Charles E. Feinberg Collection of the Papers of Walt Whitman,
1839–1919, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.). Daniel Brinton
(1837–1899), a professor of linguistics and archaeology at the University
of Pennsylvania, presided, and other speakers included the Canadian physician
Richard Maurice Bucke (1837–1902) and Silas Weir Mitchell
(1829–1914), a writer and a physician specializing in nervous disorders.
The Philadelphia Inquirer carried the story on the front
page on the following day. The Camden Daily Post article
"Ingersoll's Speech" of June 2, 1890, was written by Whitman himself and was
reprinted in Good-Bye My Fancy (Prose
Works, 1892, ed. Floyd Stovall, 2 vols. [New York: New York University
Press: 1963–1964], 686–687). Later Traubel wrote "Walt Whitman's
Birthday" for Unity (25 [August 28, 1890], 215). [back]
- 8. Bertha Johnston was the
daughter of New York jeweller, John H. Johnston. [back]