I have been too busy to even get time to say thank you, for your good letter,1 & the papers.
All are welcome, but I was rejoiced at the good news in your letter to Dr. Bucke,2 & which he quotes in his.3 I echo his words. loc.02984.002.jpg & hope that you are feeling pretty well this clear cold day.
I am very glad you sent me the letter from Dr. Bucke, I will return it later. I have been trying to get the house into living order, & the stove is all right & burns well since it was repaired. The watercloset had to be seen by the plumbers, & loc.02984.003.jpgthey are slow, so it all takes time, but I am getting in order, & you know that I did not live in Philadelphia five years for nothing! I have a great love of good house keeping, care too much I fear, for the trifles.
I hope that your boys are well, & your house-keeper. I was invited out to dine loc.02984.004.jpg yesterday, Thanksgiving day. Last year I had William4 & Harold Channing,5 but I think we did not ask any guest, William was already so much of an invalid in some ways.
With dear love, & all good wishes— As ever— Nelly O'Connor.Correspondent:
Ellen M. "Nelly" O'Connor (1830–1913) was the
wife of William D. O'Connor (1832–1889), one of Whitman's staunchest
defenders. Before marrying William, Ellen Tarr was active in the antislavery and
women's rights movements as a contributor to the Liberator and to a women's rights newspaper Una. Whitman dined with the O'Connors frequently during his Washington
years. Though Whitman and William O'Connor would temporarily break off their
friendship in late 1872 over Reconstruction policies with regard to emancipated
African Americans, Ellen would remain friendly with Whitman. The correspondence
between Whitman and Ellen is almost as voluminous as the poet's correspondence
with William. Three years after William O'Connor's death, Ellen married the
Providence businessman Albert Calder. For more on Whitman's relationship with the O'Connors, see Dashae
E. Lott, "O'Connor, William Douglas [1832–1889]" and Lott's "O'Connor (Calder),
Ellen ('Nelly') M. Tarr (1830–1913)," Walt
Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New
York: Garland Publishing, 1998).