I got your letter when I was in Washington and fully expected to stay over and see you on my return,1 but I was kept so much longer than I thought I would be kept and so much more work was thrown on me that I was compelled to hurry back to New York by night. It is possible that I may be in Philadelphia this week—indeed it is probable—and in that case I shall certainly cross the ferry; but in the meantime why should you be idle? I shall not presume to give you any hints as to how to write; I think you know what I want:—
1st. Lincoln: Mr. Rice2 has got
the ambition of editing a work that can never be loc.03286.002_large.jpg
loc.03286.003_large.jpg superseded.3 He proposes to get every man of note now living who ever
met Lincoln to write down in plain words and as accurately as the human memory will
record, just what Lincoln did; just how Lincoln looked; just what impression Lincoln
made on him. However, he does not want the last clause
(that is to say, the impressions) recorded by anybody but only by men whose names
will go down to history. Like Gradgrind,4 "what he
wants is facts."
You, of course, are among the favored few whose impressions will be acceptable; so, you see, if you will write down an account of every interview you ever had with Lincoln, that will complete what I ask of you in his name on that subject.
2d Memoires of the War.
He would like from you an account of some phase of the Civil War which you
witnessed. But I will see you before you have time, probably, to write the second article, and, possible, I may be able to suggest the best topic from his point loc.03286.004_large.jpg
loc.03286.005_large.jpg of view to begin
with.
Now, my dear Walt Whitman, won't you go to work at once because Rice is chained lightning in a dress suit and damned impatient.
Yours Ever, Jas RedpathCorrespondent:
James Redpath (1833–1891),
an antislavery activist, journalist, and longtime friend of Whitman, was the
author of The Public Life of Capt. John Brown (Boston:
Thayer and Eldridge, 1860), a correspondent for the New York
Tribune during the war, and the originator of the "Lyceum" lectures. He
met Whitman in Boston in 1860, and he remained an enthusiastic admirer; see
Horace Traubel, With Walt Whitman in Camden, Friday, January 4, 1889. He concluded his first letter to Whitman on
June 25, 1860: "I love you, Walt! A conquering
Brigade will ere long march to the music of your barbaric jawp." Redpath became
managing editor of The North American Review in 1886. See
also Charles F. Horner, The Life of James Redpath and the
Development of the Modern Lyceum, (New York: Barse & Hopkins,
1926); John R. McKivigan, Forgotten Firebrand: James Redpath
and the Making of Nineteenth-Century America, (Ithaca, NY: Cornell
University Press, 2008); and J.R. LeMaster, "Redpath, James [1833–1891]," Walt Whitman: An
Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New York:
Garland Publishing, 1998).