Text: Joseph Lewis French, “The Closing Scene: An Account of Poe's Last Days in Baltimore,” Book News Monthly (Philadelphia, PA), vol. 25, no. 12, August 1907, pp. 805-810

[page 805, continued:]

THE Baltimore “Sun” of October 8, 1849, contained the following: “We regret to learn that Edgar A. Poe, Esq., the distinguished American poet, scholar, and critic, died in this c’ty yesterday morning, after an illness of four or five days. This announcement, coming so sudden (sic) and [column 2:] unexpected, will cause poignant regret among all who admire genius, and have sympathy for the frailties too often at Mr. Poe, we believe, was attending it. native of this State, though reared by a foster-father at Richmond, Va., where he lately spent some time on a visit. He was in the thirty-eighth year of his age.” [page 805:] This announcement, while it contains two important errors — as to age and nativity — is the first, and might be said to be the official, announcement to the world of the passing away of the fieriest spirit that western civilization has produced. The death chronicled occurred on Sunday morning, about five o’clock, just as day was emerging from night, in that solemn hour when so many souls breathe their last. Poe had arrived in Baltimore from Richmond by boat on the previous Tuesday, and he had taken the train for Philadelphia that day in a more or less bewildered condition from intoxication. From Havre de Grace he was brought back by a kindly conductor, who again left him to his own devices on arriving at Baltimore. He had spent his last day in Richmond in the company of friends of a highly respectable character. He took supper in the evening alone at Saddler's, a fashionable restaurant, where he met some acquaintances who detained him [column 2:] till late, and then accompanied him to the Baltimore boat. According to their statements — but how reliable may be the statement of a convivial Southern gentleman of the time about a boon companion is reasonable matter for conjecture — he was quite sober, and entirely cheerful to the last, remarking, as he took the boat, that he would soon be in Richmond again, As to whether he took along any liquid supplies, although again considering time and place, this is very likely, or as to what the boat afforded in a day when nearly everybody drank more or less on a journey, are again matters of conjecture. The journey was long and tedious, and could not have occupied less than thirty-six hours, giving him two nights and a day while en route.

Returning to Baltimore, he went across to the bar-room of an old hotel, now known as Maltby's, which was standing then, as now, just opposite the Baltimore & Ohio Depot. Here, having fully [page 807:] entered on the convivial path, he seems to have surrendered himself at once to the influences of the day and scene. It was election day, and “treats” were common. A Whig in politics, Poe talked brilliantly as long as the light of reason remained in him. When his senses faded away, and he sank into a stupor, he was carried off by a couple of “heelers,” who were afterwards identified, and was “cooped,” as the term was then: literally, confined in either the back yard or the cellar of a place used for that purpose. The next day he was given drugs to restore his faculties, and was taken to different polling places, in each of which, partly at the will of his captors undoubtedly, partly on his own initiative — regarding the whole affair as more or less of a huge joke — he cast a vote. There was no registration law in that early day in Baltimore, and any man who could face a “challenge” at the poll, and who was willing to take the oath there, could cast [column 2:] his ballot. It was a common custom to capture and “coop” innocent strangers and foreigners for the purpose of extracting their votes in this way, very much as sailors were “pressed” in the old days, or rather as recruits were sworn in at the time of Queen Anne and the Georges, after first being plied with liquor. Whether the matter in the case of Poe was wholly outrageous cannot be determined. He was known in Baltimore, he had many friends, even relatives there. He was seen drinking in public the better part of the day, Wednesday, and was doubtless frequently remonstrated with. Under the influence of liquor he was as irresponsible as a child, yet there was enough of the demoniac in his disposition to tempt him to any wild extravagance. It is not known how many times he voted, but that he got what liquor he wanted for it is beyond question. This and the drugging, together with the exposure of the previous night, destroyed [page 808:] his intellect, and brought to an untimely end one of the great geniuses in American letters.

The description of his finding, by Dr. Snodgrass, of Baltimore, that afternoon in Ryan's Tavern, where he had at last been abandoned by his captors as utterly worn out and worthless, is the saddest scene in all literary history. The details are given with a scrupulosity that leaves no doubt as to their accuracy. The only way to account, in the statement which follows here, for Poe's utter destitution and the state of his apparel was that, in addition to being utilized, he had either been disguised or made sport of by his captors. For we know from contemporary accounts that when he left Richmond he carried a cane, and such an article of dress could not for one instant be regarded in connection with the clothes he was found in. At about three o’clock in the afternoon of the fateful election day Doctor Snodgrass, who lived near by, was summoned to Ryan's Tavern by the following note:

And here is the scene as described by the doctor:

There can be no question whatever that, palliate the facts as we may, the end of Poe was the most dreadful in the h'story of letters. Francois Villon disappeared into the night of Time aifter the career of a desperate criminal. His end can only be conjectured fearfully. But in Poe's case every ray that the twin lamps of circumstance and judgment can bring to bear upon the scene only serves to strengthen the plain testimony of his friend and physician. It was not a record written for the eves of relatives and friends. It was not a defense. It was the statement of a scientific man and a humanitarian to eye-witnessed facts. As to the scenes in the hospital, it is best to draw a veil over what can but too plainly be read between the lines of current account. He was at first unconscious — [column 2:] sleeping at once the sleep of exhaustion and of death. To this succeeded spells of delirium, constant talking with spectral and imaginary objects on the walls, during which “his face was pale and his whole person drenched in perspiration, ‘ which was not wholly subdued till the second day after his admission. “In the interval of lucidity which followed,” says Dr. Moran, physician in charge of the hospital, “I endeavored to cheer him, but he broke out with an imprecation ‘that the best thing his best friend could do would be to take a pistol and blow out his brains.’ Shortly after giving expression to these words Mr. Poe seemed to doze, and I left him for a short time. When I returned I found him in a violent delirium, resisting the efforts of two nurses to keep him in bed. This state continued until Saturday evening, when he commenced calling for one ‘Reynolds,’ which he did through the night until three on Sunday morning. At this time a very decided change began to affect him. Having become exhausted from exertion he became quiet, and seemed to rest for a short time. Then gently moving his head, he said, ‘Lord help my poor soul!’ and expired. His remains,’ the Doctor adds — it ‘s his post-mortem account to Mrs. Clemm in a letter — ‘were [page 810:] visited by some of the first ‘individuals of the city, many of them anxious to have a lock of his hair.”

Judge Neilson Poe, his cousin, and Mr. Henry Herring, a relative by marriage, took charge of the remains, which were interred in the churchyard of the Westminster Presbyterian Church. The occasion of the interment was a curious mixture of creeds — Poe himself being an Episcopalian, the service conducted by a Methodist minister, and the place of burial a Presbyterian churchyard. The day was cold and wet — and but a few friends witnessed the last rites, among them a former classmate at the University of Virginia, the Hon. Z. Collins Lee, Poe's cousin, Edmund Smith, Doctor Snodgrass, who rescued him, his cousin, Judge Neilson Poe, and the officiating clergyman, Rev. W. T. D. Clemm, a relative of the poet's mother-in-law. His trunk and clothes were sought in vain. They had [column 2:] most probably been stolen, which lends color to the belief that the clothes he was found in were not his own. That he had been drugged and starved we know. What more likely than that he had been further singled out by the worst element among his captors at this general time of disorder, who stripped him and dressed him in the cast-off apparel he was found in? This is the story of Poe's sad and most dreadful end. There is no need, after nearly sixty years have passed, to gloss over the facts nor to palliate the details. The full story, of course, will never be known. It is a record of woe at which the imagination stands appalled. But such facts as remain shed a clear enough light on the whole tragedy, and can, when all is considered, only add an enduring, if awful, interest to the history of the life-career of a remarkable man of genius.