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A Richmond lady rendered Mr. Ingram, of London, valuable assistance in collecting material from her city for his recent life and vindication of the ill-fated Edgar Allan Poe. It will be remembered that the English author contemplated getting out a second and enlarged edition of his work, and this same lady is still interesting herself in gathering traditional information concerning the poet. With her it was a labor of love. Not a stone does she leave unturned. A few days ago she called on the daughter of an old colored family servant of the Allans in order to hear some fresh reminiscence or anecdote about the childhood of Edgar. Even this illiterate menial, while she had to acknowledge the frailties and short-comings of the embryonic poet, was obliged to pay a tribute to his intellectual force and calibre which she did thus feelingly: “Mammy often tole me he was the very wust child she ever seed, but he had an extra head.”
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Notes:
This text is taken from a clipping in the Ingram-Poe collection, item 679. As a clipping, it is not possible to determine the page or column numbers. No copy of the relevant original newspaper has been located. As with so many reminiscences, there is insufficient detail to even attempt to verify it, but that statement is amusing. The identity of this Richmond lady is not known. One might suspect that it was Mrs. S. A. T. Weiss, but Ingram's surviving correspondence does not suggest that he was in direct contact with her.
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[S:0 - DNVA, 1876] - Edgar Allan Poe Society of Baltimore - A Poe Bookshelf - Recollection of a Richmond Lady (Anonymous, 1876)