• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

That my wife is ill, then, is true; and you may imagine with what feeling I add that this illness, hopeless from the first, has been heightened and precipitated by her reception, at two different periods, of anonymous letters—one enclosing the paragraph now in question; the other, those published calumnies of Messrs—, for which I yet hope to find redress in a court of justice.

Of the facts, that I myself have been long and dangerously ill, and that my illness has been a well understood thing among my brethren of the press, the best evidence is afforded by the innumerable paragraphs of personal and literary abuse with which I have been latterly assailed. This matter, however, will remedy itself. At the very first blush of my new prosperity, the gentlemen who toadied me in the old, will recollect themselves and toady me again. You, who know me, will comprehend that I speak of these things only as having served, in a measure, to lighten the gloom of unhappiness, by a gentle and not unpleasant sentiment of mingled pity, merriment and contempt.

That, as the inevitable consequence of so long an illness, I have been in want of money, it would be folly in me to deny—but that I have ever materially suffered from privation, beyond the extent of my capacity for suffering, is not altogether true. That I am “without friends” is a gross calumny, which I am sure you never could have believed, and which a thousand noble-hearted men would have good right never to forgive me for permitting to pass unnoticed and undenied. Even in the city of New York I could have no difficulty in naming a hundred persons, to each of whom—when the hour for speaking had arrived—I could and would have applied for aid and with unbounded confidence, and with absolutely no sense of humiliation.

I do not think, my dear Willis, that there is any need of my saying more. I am getting better, and may add—if it be any comfort to my enemies—that I have little fear of getting worse. The truth is, I have a great deal to do; and I have made up my mind not to die till it is done.

Sincerely yours,

EDGAR A. POE.

Rumors of Poe’s destitution, illness, and possible insanity swirled in the New York newspapers in late 1846. Poe here turns to his erstwhile employer to help him refute the charge that he has no friends. The paragraph in question represented Poe and his wife as “dangerously ill” and “so far reduced as to be barely able to obtain the necessaries of life.” The “published calumnies” for which Poe sought (and won) legal satisfaction were promulgated by Thomas Dunn English and Hiram Fuller.

EDGAR ALLAN POE TO MARIE L. SHEW

[January 29, 1847.]

Kindest—dearest friend—

My poor Virginia still lives, although failing fast and now suffering much pain. May God grant her life until she sees you and thanks you once again! Her bosom is full to overflowing—like my own—with a boundless—inexpressible gratitude to you. Lest she may never see you more—she bids me say that she sends you her sweetest kiss of love and will die blessing you. But come—oh come to-morrow! Yes, I will be calm—everything you so nobly wish to see me. My mother sends you, also, her “warmest love and thanks.” She begs me to ask you, if possible, to make arrangements at home so that you may stay with us tomorrow night. I enclose the order to the Postmaster.

Heaven bless you and farewell

EDGAR A POE.

Fordham,

Jan. 29. 47

Mrs. Shew nursed both Poe and Virginia during the worst months of their life together. This note, penned on the eve of Virginia’s death, expresses the gratitude and love of both husband and wife.

EDGAR ALLAN POE TO GEORGE W. EVELETH

New-York—Jan. 4, 1848.

My Dear Sir—

Your last, dated July 26, ends with—“Write will you not”? I have been living ever since in a constant state of intention to write, and finally concluded not to write at all until I could say something definite about The Stylus and other matters. You perceive that I now send you