Perhaps Horace Traubel2 has told you that I am hoping to see you soon.
They kindly asked me to go to Camden to see Dr. Bucke,3 as I shall not now be able to make the long promised visit to Canada, as I had thought of doing.
It is a great pleasure to contemplate, that of seeing you again. I hope that you are holding your own this summer, & more than that.
You may know that I am expecting to leave Washington, & give up my home in the place that is dearest to me of any on earth, but so loc.03016.004_large.jpg it is, & I shall tell you about it when I see you.
Till then & always—love from your old friend Nelly O'Connor. loc.03016.001_large.jpg loc.03016.002_large.jpgCorrespondent:
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).