Walt Whitman

A Register of His Papers in the Library of Congress

Prepared by Michael McElderry
Revised and expanded by Michael McElderry

Manuscript Division, Library of Congress

Washington, D.C.

2003

Contact information: http://lcweb.loc.gov/rr/mss/address.html

Finding aid encoded by Library of Congress Manuscript Division, 2005

Finding aid URL: http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.mss/eadmss.ms005001

Latest revision: 2005-04-08

Table of Contents

Collection Summary

Selected Search Terms

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Subjects:

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Administrative Information

Provenance:

Processing History:

Copyright Status:

Microfilm:

Preferred Citation:

Scope and Content Note

Container List

Collection Summary

Selected Search Terms

The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in the Library's online catalog. They are grouped by name of person or organization, by subject or location, and by genres and listed alphabetically therein.

Administrative Information

The papers of Walt Whitman, poet, were acquired by the Library of Congress through gift, transfer, and purchase, 1927-2001. The collection contains items described in the Library's publication Walt Whitman: A Catalog Based upon the Collections of the Library of Congress (Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress, 1955), as well as more recent acquisitions unrelated to other collections of Whitman's papers in the Library.

The papers of Walt Whitman were processed in 1981 and revised and expanded in 1997. Additional material received 1997-2001 was processed in 2003.

The status of copyright in the unpublished writings of Walt Whitman is governed by the Copyright Law of the United States (Title 17, U.S.C.).

A microfilm edition of part of these papers is available on one reel. Consult a reference librarian in the Manuscript Division concerning availability for purchase or interlibrary loan.

Researchers wishing to cite this collection should include the following information: Container or reel number, Walt Whitman Papers, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.

Scope and Content Note

The papers of Walt Whitman (1819-1892) span the years 1837-1957 and contain examples of the poet's original correspondence and literary manuscripts, photocopies and transcripts of similar Whitman material, and printed matter and miscellaneous items relating to Whitman. Although the collection contains only a small sampling of the types of items found in the Library's larger collections of Whitman material, most notably those of Thomas Biggs Harned and Charles E. Feinberg, it includes Whitman's correspondence with Abraham P. Leech and a printed copy of Whitman's poem O Captain! My Captain! containing the poet's handwritten corrections. A small selection of Whitman family correspondence describing domestic routines and expressing personal sentiments is also included.

Whitman's letters to Abraham Leech, 1840-1841, the poet's earliest known correspondence, describe his life as a schoolteacher in the towns of Woodbury and Whitestone, Long Island, New York. The letters relate his distaste as a young man for teaching at Woodbury and portray his general dislike for small-town life at that time. Whitman also expressed his support for the Democratic party and its candidate for the 1840 presidential election, Martin Van Buren, despite Leech's adherence to the Whig party candidate, William Henry Harrison. The file also contains copies of letters from Leech to Whitman, genealogical notes of the Leech family, a small diary kept by Abraham Leech, 1838-1844, and other miscellaneous fragments and items.

O Captain! My Captain!, considered by many to be Whitman's most popular poem, was widely anthologized during his lifetime. The collection contains a copy of the poem formerly described as a proof sheet in the Library's publication Walt Whitman: A Catalog Based upon the Collections of the Library of Congress. It is instead a printed page torn from volume thirty-two of the Riverside Literature Series, corrected in Whitman's hand, and returned to Riverside Press. A short letter to the printer remarking on the errors and noting Whitman's accompanying corrections is included on the verso of the page.

Many of the items in the collection are identified in the catalog, which contains an annotated bibliographic listing of Whitman items located within the collections of various divisions in the Library of Congress. Identification numbers tagged to specific entries in the catalog are noted on the folders containing those items. This catalog should be consulted for the fullest description of the material.

Container List