Text: Anonymous, “The Home of The Raven,” Cleveland Leader (Cleveland, OH), vol. 37, no. 231, August 18, 1884, p. 5, cols. 4-5

[page 5, column 4, continued:]

THE HOME OF THE RAVEN.

A Thatched Cottage at Fordham, in Which Virginia Poe Died and d Her Husband Almost Starved-Stories of the Poet's Life and Troubles.

New York World.

The one house in Fordham which stands pre-eminent among its neighbors in the richness of its history is the little thatched cottage in which for three years lived Edgar Allan Poe. It was sold a few days ago, and will be preserved as a relic of the singer. It stands close up to the roadway, its weatherworn sides in sharp contrast with the pretty white picket fence in front of it. The cottage is two stories in height. The tiny windows have heavy, green board shutters, and the chimney shows in its vari-colored bricks the handiwork of many masons. At the back of it was built, some few years ago, an outhouse, in doing which the tree upon whose branch the raven was said to have croaked was cut down.

Nevertheless the imaginative and exaggerative villagers, with the assistance of the car loads of romance and sentiment which visit the place daily soon found another tree about five or six years old and perched the raven upon its topmost limb. The residents seem perfectly well aware that a good antiquity should have a becoming history, and with a royal good will set about enabling this cottage to hold its own with any other American relic. Could the poet walk up the village road some day, book in hand, as he loved to do in life, he might for once forget his sorrows and smile at the fictions.

There was no way to get into the house yesterday except through a back window, as the family which did live there lately moved away. A Mrs. Valentine, the daughter of Mrs. Cromwell, who attended Poe's young wife, Virginia Clemm, during her last hours, shoved the window open, and told the author to go where he would, and to take nothing away with him. The first room entered was the dining-room. The walls were covered with bright paper and the floor painted blue. There was no doubt about it. The late residents had determined, as far as paper and paint could do it, to effectually choke off the “Raven.”

Near this chamber is another six feet square, with a single mite of window at the side, through which the summer breeze blew in. It was here that the poet's wife died, without one except her husband and Mrs. Cromwell to soothe her.

The family was so poor that there was not even a coverlet to the bed, and the cloak which Poe had terribly disgraced was thrown across her.

Her death broke her husband down. With three friends he moved the remains from the narrow room to the village vault. She now lies by his side in Baltimore. Over this room is the apartment in which, according to popular tradition, the “Raven” Was written.

It is a low chamber, with a blue, slanting roof; an old-fashioned fireplace and three windows, two of which look down into the village and the third across the fields.

Poe had wept over his wife's remains, and to her memory he wrote the “Raven,’ so the village historian has it like almost everything else in connection with Poe, has it wrong. His wife died 1848, and 1845 the “Raven” was published in the American Review.

The chamber does not very much resemble the one of Gustave Dore's imagination, which is rich with bric-a-brac and works of art. Poe never possessed such luxuries. The big fireplace is perfectly true, and the instant one steps into the room it is recognized.

But its very narrowness shows the straitened circumstances in which Poe lived, and that there were no wings or bust of Pallas is true beyond doubt.

Poe did pass most of the time when he was in the house, however, in this room, which is about as uncomfortable an apartment as one could wish to stay in. The windows are only on one side, and so very small that any kind of a desirable breeze would have to squeeze itself to get in.

In Poe's time it was as dark and weird as the spirit of its master. Here again the hand of the latter resident is seen in the blue-streaked floor and the daubs of color around, which make it look like the council-room of 47 Masonic lodge. The other rooms are 88 bad, both in ventilation and color. The floor in many places is very old and weak, and if the little concern should one day blow down on the heads of the villagers they could not say that no one would expect it.

Among the people living in the village Poe has a peculiar history, He was accustomed, so the story runs, to arise early every morning, and, book in hand, start out for a long walk. He was an uncommunicative man, and would follow the bent of his pleasure through the woods, often all day, speaking to no one, stopping only to read a pas- or and sage over twice. Everything that he ever did has been distorted. No one will admit for one second that he wrote either “The Bells” or “The Raven” in his sober senses.

“I know,” said Mrs. Valentine, “that he must have had the delirium tremens when he or wrote ‘The Raven.’ I believe he was sitting in this rocking chair — get up, aunt and let the gentleman sit in it — when he did write it: for do you imagine that a man would write a thing like that in his sober senses?”

Such is literature m Fordham, and the highest encomium that the lady, or indeed any one else in the village could bestow upon the author or his family was that they were respectable, and the admission seemed be made more out of a desire to the good repute of the village than maintain love toward Poe. There is no doubt that in be this cottage, however poor, Poe passed the happiest days of his life. He was at that time contributing to leading journals, and but for his eccentricity and love of whisky could have made a handsome competence. He wrote here “Eureka,” a prose poem, and other works. He did not remain long after the death of his wife, desiring rather try his fortune around his foster father's home, Mr. Allan, in Richmond. As usual, when on the high road to fortune he managed to ruin his expectations, and after [column 5:] having made an engagement with a wealthy lady became gloriously drunk the night before the wedding, which was therefore declared “off.” His wife, Virginia, was no doubt very dear to him, and that she loved him passionately is unquestionable. She was a Southern girl, dark and handsome, and was loved in the village as much as her husband was feared.

The purchaser of the cottage intends to keep it as a relic, and this, if done the way it has been, will soon obliterate all the traces of the old house.

Blue paint, whitewash, and gaudy papers do not blend well with the ancient fireplace, from which thee dying embers cast their shadows on floor.