loc_vm.00917_large.jpg
Medical Superintendent's
Office.
INSANE ASYLUM
LONDON ONTARIO1
17 Sept.br 1891
My dearest Friend,
I write this in Dr's2 office3—(3. 10 pm)
Dr. busy—asks me to give you his love. Day gloriously fine—warm
as one of our hottest Midsummer days.—We are going
to drive soon to the cricket ground here (in front of Refractory Wards) to
watch a cricket match for a short time. Much cooler to
watch it than to take part in it!
I was very proud & happy this morning to receive your letter of
the 13th,4
& the batch of papers you sent me. Thank you from my heart.
It stirs me very deeply that you should
trouble to write in your present circumstances, & nothing
that you have ever done seems more characteristic of the love which
your whole life exemplifies. Love to you in return—deep & tender
& lifelong.
And thank you for your advice (to "tie up" &c) so full of tender
sympathy & kindness.—
I am glad that you "continue same as before" which means really—as
you say—"thankful it's no worse"
loc_vm.00918_large.jpg
I understand well that at best it is "bad enough." I could wish it
were otherwise if I were not convinced that a divine purpose underlies it all. It seems to be your
lot—as Symonds5 says—to teach us not only to live, but how to suffer & to die.
That there "is all fullness to reward you," I do not doubt,—to
reward you, personally—As for us, well, our loving sympathy only goes out to you
all the more deeply & tenderly.—And all future generations of your lovers
will think of you with "more tender love.—
I thank you for Ernest Rhys's6 letter,7 & will write to
him on my return.
Since I began this Dr. & I have had a drive together to the Cricket
Ground—staying there about 10 minutes—match between
"Doctors V Lawyers"—Drs
just out for about 147 runs—Dr. Beemer8
scoring over 60.
Mail just come in with 3 English letters for me—Father,9 Dr J,10 &
RK Greenhalgh.11 Letters never tasted so good to me as they do now!
Am impatient to read them, & will close. Please give my love to Mrs
Davis12 & to Warry13—& to Traubel14
& his wife.15 With supreme love to
you & constant thoughts & good wishes
Yours affectionately
J.W. Wallace
PS/ Letter from father16 tells me of two magazines received from you—Thanks! Letter from
RKG on Sep 9—supposes that I saw you that
day—& says. "I feel the hour sacred
& sweet, for I am sure today has seen the communion of two souls, both dear
as life to me &c." Sends love to you.
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see notes Oct 2 1891
loc_vm.00916_large.jpg
Correspondent:
James William Wallace
(1853–1926), of Bolton, England, was an architect and great admirer of
Whitman. Wallace, along with Dr. John Johnston (1852–1927), a physician in
Bolton, founded the "Bolton College" of English admirers of the poet. Johnston
and Wallace corresponded with Whitman and with Horace Traubel and other members
of the Whitman circle in the United States, and they separately visited the poet
and published memoirs of their trips in John Johnston and James William Wallace,
Visits to Walt Whitman in 1890–1891 by Two
Lancashire Friends (London: Allen and Unwin, 1917). For more
information on Wallace, see Larry D. Griffin, "Wallace, James William (1853–1926)," 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, | 328, Mickle St | Camden | New Jersey | U.S. It is postmarked: LONDON | [illegible] | SP 17 | 91 | CANADA; CAMDEN, N.J. | SEP 19 | 12 [illegible]M | 91 | REC'D. [back]
- 2. Richard Maurice Bucke (1837–1902) was a
Canadian physician and psychiatrist who grew close to Whitman after reading Leaves of Grass in 1867 (and later memorizing it) and
meeting the poet in Camden a decade later. Even before meeting Whitman, Bucke
claimed in 1872 that a reading of Leaves of Grass led him
to experience "cosmic consciousness" and an overwhelming sense of epiphany.
Bucke became the poet's first biographer with Walt
Whitman (Philadelphia: David McKay, 1883), and he later served as one
of his medical advisors and literary executors. For more on the relationship of
Bucke and Whitman, see Howard Nelson, "Bucke, Richard Maurice," Walt Whitman: An
Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New York:
Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]
- 3. At the time of this letter,
Wallace was on a trip to visit both Dr. Bucke and Whitman. Accounts of these
visits can be found in Wallace and Dr. John Johnston's Visits
to Walt Whitman in 1890–91 (London, England: G. Allen &
Unwin, ltd., 1917). [back]
- 4. Wallace is referring here to
Whitman's letter dated September 13–14,
1891. [back]
- 5. John Addington Symonds
(1840–1893), a prominent biographer, literary critic, and poet in
Victorian England, was author of the seven-volume history Renaissance in Italy, as well as Walt
Whitman—A Study (1893), and a translator of Michelangelo's
sonnets. But in the smaller circles of the emerging upper-class English
homosexual community, he was also well known as a writer of homoerotic poetry
and a pioneer in the study of homosexuality, or sexual inversion as it was then
known. See Andrew C. Higgins, "Symonds, John Addington [1840–1893]," Walt
Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New
York: Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]
- 6. Ernest Percival Rhys
(1859–1946) was a British author and editor; he founded the Everyman's
Library series of inexpensive reprintings of popular works. He included a volume
of Whitman's poems in the Canterbury Poets series and two volumes of Whitman's
prose in the Camelot series for Walter Scott publishers. For more information
about Rhys, see Joel Myerson, "Rhys, Ernest Percival (1859–1946)," Walt
Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New
York: Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]
- 7. It is uncertain which letter is
being referred to here. [back]
- 8. Dr. Nelson Henry (N. H.)
Beemer (ca. 1854–1934) was in charge of the "Refractory Building" at
Bucke's asylum and served as his first assistant physician. Whitman met Beemer
during his visit there in the summer of 1880. See James H. Coyne, Richard Maurice Bucke: A Sketch (Toronto: Transactions of
the Royal Society of Canada, 1906), 52. [back]
- 9. Little is known about James
Wallace, Sr., who was a millwright. Wallace, Sr. and his wife Margaret
Thornburrow Wallace, were the parents of James William Wallace, an architect in
Bolton, England. [back]
- 10. Dr. John Johnston (1852–1927)
of Annan, Dumfriesshire, Scotland, was a physician, photographer, and avid
cyclist. Johnston was trained in Edinburgh and served as a hospital surgeon in
West Bromwich for two years before moving to Bolton, England, in 1876. Johnston
worked as a general practitioner in Bolton and as an instructor of ambulance
classes for the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railways. He served at Whalley Military
Hospital during World War I and became Medical Superintendent of Townley's
Hospital in 1917 (John Anson, "Bolton's Illustrious Doctor Johnston—a man
of many talents," Bolton News [March 28, 2021]; Paul
Salveson, Moorlands, Memories, and Reflections: A Centenary
Celebration of Allen Clarke's Moorlands and Memories [Lancashire
Loominary, 2020]). Johnston, along with the architect James W. Wallace, founded
the "Bolton College" of English admirers of the poet. Johnston and Wallace
corresponded with Whitman and with Horace Traubel and other members of the
Whitman circle in the United States, and they separately visited the poet and
published memoirs of their trips in John Johnston and James William Wallace, Visits to Walt Whitman in 1890–1891 by Two Lancashire
Friends (London: Allen and Unwin, 1917). For more information on
Johnston, see Larry D. Griffin, "Johnston, Dr. John (1852–1927)," Walt
Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New
York: Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]
- 11. Richard Greenhalgh, a bank
clerk and one of Whitman's Bolton admirers, frequently hosted annual
celebrations of the poet's birthday. In his March 9, 1892, letter to Traubel,
Greenhalgh wrote that "Walt has taught me 'the glory of my daily life and
trade.' In all the departments of my life Walt entered with his loving
personality & I am never alone" (Horace Traubel, With Walt
Whitman in Camden, Sunday, March 20, 1892). James Wallace described Greenhalgh as
"undoubtedly a rich, royal, plain fellow, not given to ornate word or act" (Sunday, September 27, 1891). For more on Greenhalgh, see Paul
Salveson, "Loving
Comrades: Lancashire's Links to Walt Whitman," Walt
Whitman Quarterly Review 14.2 (1996), 57–84. [back]
- 12. Mary Oakes Davis (1837 or
1838–1908) was Whitman's housekeeper. For more, see Carol J. Singley,
"Davis, Mary Oakes (1837 or 1838–1908)," Walt
Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New
York: Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]
- 13. Frank Warren Fritzinger
(1867–1899), known as "Warry," took Edward Wilkins's place as Whitman's
nurse, beginning in October 1889. Fritzinger and his brother Harry were the sons
of Henry Whireman Fritzinger (about 1828–1881), a former sea captain who
went blind, and Almira E. Fritzinger. Following Henry Sr.'s death, Warren and
his brother—having lost both parents—became wards of Mary O. Davis,
Whitman's housekeeper, who had also taken care of the sea captain and who
inherited part of his estate. A picture of Warry is displayed in the May 1891
New England Magazine (278). See Joann P. Krieg, "Fritzinger, Frederick Warren (1866–1899),"
Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and
Donald D. Kummings (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998), 240. [back]
- 14. 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]
- 15. Horace Traubel was married
to Anne Montgomerie Traubel (b. 1864–1954). [back]
- 16. As yet we have no information about
this person. [back]