Text: Anonymous, “Letters of Edgar Poe,” Pall Mall Gazette (London, UK), vol. XXVII, whole no. 4124, May 10, 1878, p. 10, cols. 1-2

UNDER the heading of “Unknown Correspondence by Edgar Poe,” the New Quarterly Magazine gives a selection from hitherto unpublished letters which, we are told, “throw an entirely new light on a part of his life hitherto unexplored — namely, the poet's relations with three high-minded women, around whose names the documents naturally group themselves.” These letters, too, exhibit “the story of his first and last love,” which, says the collector of the correspondence, is “as romantic and interesting as was ever penned by poet.”

From the expression “first and last love” it might be inferred that the lady so described was Edgar Poe's only love. This, however, would be a mistake: there were intervening loves; and from 1847 to 1849, the two last years of Poe's life and the period over which the newly published correspondence extends, he appears, so far as can be judged from the general tone of his letters and from particular expressions contained in them, to have been devoted to at least four women : his wife Virginia, whose early death suggested the fanciful and touching poem of “Annabel Lee;” Mrs. Shew, a lady who behaved with all possible kindness to the dying Virginia, and afterwards proved herself a sincere friend to Edgar Poe himself; a lady called “Annie,” about whom all we know is that it was to her that the beautiful verses inscribed “ For Annie were dedicated, and that she was married and had a sister Sarah, to whom Poe extended some portion of that adoration which was chiefly concentrated on Annie herself; and, finally, Elmira, Poe's “first and last” love. It was almost inevitable that Elmira Royster should be Edgar Poe's first love, for he was a child and she was a child” when they first met It was equally inevitable that Elmira Shelton (as she had in the meantime become) should when Poe met her again be his last love; for only a few weeks after this second meeting Edgar Poe died. The newly published letters exhibit Poe in his relations not only, as the editor says, with “three high-minded women,” but with five; for surely Edgar Poe's admirable mother-in-law, or mother, as he preferred to call her — whose fidelity far surpassed that of either of the ladies to whom he addressed such fervent epistles — should not be forgotten. That Edgar Poe loved his young wife passionately and felt her death as a terrible blow was already known. It was natural, then, that he should feel much affection for the lady who did so much to soften his wife's last hours. The family were indebted to Mrs. Shew for flowers, fruit, ice, wine, medicine, and even for the garments in which Poe's wife was buried. Mrs. Shew had promised the dying Virginia to visit her husband every other day for a long time until he should be able to go to work again; and soon after Virginia Poe's death we find Mrs. Shew nursing the distracted husband, and passing alternate nights at his bedside. She was a doctor's daughter and knew something of medicine, and, watching Poe carefully, came to the conclusion that “in his best health he had lesion of one side of the brain.” “As he could not bear stimulants or tonics,” she adds, “without producing insanity, I did not feel much hope that he could be raised up from brain fever brought on by extreme suffering of mind and body; actual want and hunger and cold having been borne by this heroic husband in order to supply food, medicine, and comforts to his dying wife, until exhaustion and lifelessness were so near at every reaction of the fever that even sedatives had to be administered with extreme caution.” Soon after his recovery Mrs. Shew told him, in all candour, that “nothing would or could save him from sudden death but a prudent life of calm with a woman fond enough and strong enough to manage his affairs for him.” Poe listened with irony to these lectures, and complained that Mrs. Shew “had never read his works or poems.” No direct clue is given to Mrs. Shew's age; but from Poe's speaking of her as “a woman little skilled in worldly troubles and cares,” and from his afterwards describing her as “a little country maiden,” it is evident that she must have been young. Poe addresses her as “Dearest Louise,” “My dear Louise,” “My dear friend Louise,” and “Louise, my brightest: most unselfish of all who ever loved me.” Although Mrs. Shew did not read Edgar Poe's poems, she seems to have given him the idea of one of the most ingenious and most successful of them — ”The Bells.” Ultimately Mrs. Shew, we are informed, was compelled by the poet's “ eccentricities” to define certain limits to their intercourse. Poe took offence, and in June, 1849, wrote to her for the last time. In his farewell letter he called her the “truest, tenderest of this world's most womanly souls;” and “an angel to my forlorn and darkened nature.”

The letters to “Annie” are far more fervid than those addressed to Mrs. Shew. Annie, whose surname is not given, had, we are told, “aided the poet in the darkest hours of his adversity;” a very vague statement, since the hours of the unhappy poet were habitually dark. She believed in him, however, when he was calumniated, “ received him as an honoured guest when the world contemned him, remained faithful to him through all, and when death released his wearied spirit not only defended his name and fame, but afforded a long and hospitable shelter to his broken-hearted ‘more than mother,’ Mrs. Clemm.” It says much, no doubt, for Poe that he should have been able to inspire such attachment as several women of noble nature and high character evidently entertained for him. It is only rational, however, to bear in mind that if many women found that his letters were “divinely beautiful,” two of the three women around whose names the newly published letters are said to “group themselves” broke off their acquaintance with him; while the third, who has left an eloquent tribute to his high personal qualities, had seen very little of him as a man, and must have remembered him chiefly as a youth when she first made his acquaintance. That Poe not only had the language of devotion at his command, but was capable of devotion itself, is sufficiently proved by his love for his wife and by his constant care of her during her last illness. But to appreciate the exact significance of the letters to Annie it would be [column 2:] necessary to know much more of this lady and of Poe's relations to her than the editor thinks fit to tell us. Poe addresses her as “My own sweet sister Annie,” “My pure beautiful angel,” and “My pure, virtuous, generous, beautiful, beautiful sister Annie.” Writing concerning Annie to her sister Sarah, he says: “If I did not love your sister with the purest and most unexacting love, I would not dare confide in you; but you do know how truly, how purely, I love her; and you will forgive me, for you know also how impossible it is to see and not to love her.” The letters to Annie are signed “Eddy,” and in one of them he assures her that “ there is nothing in this world worth living for except love;” love “not such as I once thought I felt for Mrs. ——, but such as burns in my very soul for you; so pure, so unworldly — a love which would make all sacrifices for your sake.”

In the end Edgar Poe seems to have been the victim of some calumny which had the effect of putting an end to his intimacy with Annie. The authors of the calumny were a “Mr. and Mrs. L.;” and Poe is scarcely seen to advantage in one passage where he informs his correspondent that lie once brought an action against a woman for slander and recovered “exemplary damages,” and that he will take legal proceedings against Mr. L. if ever he shall muster courage to utter a single actionable word. Reference has been previously made to an action for damages, brought in Poe's name, which resulted in a verdict for £20; and the editor has told us in connection with this affair that “it is not sup posed he had anything to do with bringing the action.” But as Poe boasts of having brought with success one action for damages, and threatens to bring another, it is difficult to adopt this negative hypothesis, of which it would be little to say, in the language of geometry,, that it is “absurd.” Of Mrs. Shelton (Elmira Royster) we learn but little; nor did Poe himself see anything of her from the time of his going to the university until he was forty years of age. In spite of his love for Annie, he became engaged to Mrs. Shelton, which it may be said is a proof that his love for Annie was pure, but not that it was all-absorbing.

Poe's letters show that he had a warm affectionate heart, and that he could be as eloquent in prose as in verse. But the selected and necessarily mutilated correspondence can scarcely be said to throw any new light on his character. It appears that in America Edgar Poe has been much calumniated; and those English readers to whom the calumnies of which he has been made the object are known may be recommended to think over the words of Mrs. Shelton, his “first and last love,” who wrote of him: “It distresses me greatly when I see anything scurrilous about him. Do not believe a tenth part of what is said. It is chiefly produced by jealousy and envy. I have the greatest respect for his memory.”