Text: Anonymous, “Poe's Letters and Manuscripts Found in a Pillow Case,” Current Opinion (New York, NY), vol. LXX, no. 6, June 1921, pp. 823-824

[page 823:]

POE LETTERS AND MANUSCRIPTS

FOUND IN A PILLOW-CASE

ONE of the most remarkable literary “finds” of recent years is reported by George H. Sargent in the Boston Transcript. It consists of the original manuscripts of “Lenore,” “Annabel Lee” and others of Edgar Allan Poe's writings and of a number of letters addressed by Poe to Henry B. Hirst, a forgotten poet of the last century. This treasure had been concealed in a pillow-case, and may properly be described as unique. There have been in the past some strange storehouses for old books and manuscripts. A copy of the first edition of Hawthorne's “Fanshawe” was found in a beanpot sold at a Maine country auction for a Dante Gabriel Rossetti's poems were exhumed from his wife's grave. But, so far as is known, a pillow-case has never before used as a repository for valuable papers.

The finder of the Poe manuscripts and letters is a lady and a direct descendant of Hirst. It that Hirst born in Philadelphia in 1813, and was admitted to the bar in 1842, having studied law, like his dearest enemy, Thomas Dunn English, altho his law studies were interrupted by intervals of clerking in a store. Previous to his admission to the bar, we are told, he had written some poems which were published in Graham's Magazine, then one of the great American literary journals, to which Poe was a contributor. His magnum opus was “Endymion, a Tale of Greece, praised by Longfellow and Poe.

In 1842 Thomas Dunn English won fame with his “Ben Bolt,” which was published in the New York Mirror. He became involved in a controversy with Hirst which led to a duel, and we now learn that Poe cherished as [column 2:] fierce an antipathy for English as Hirst did. In one of the letters brought to light, dated June 27, 1846, he speaks of having given English “a flogging which he will remember to the day of his death.”

Another letter refers to “Endymion,” and a third is a defense of Poe's tale, “Berenice.” Of greater importance than the letters are the manuscripts which Poe seems to have given to Hirst and which [page 824:] are written in his beautiful handwriting on single sheets pasted together to form one long sheet, according to his custom. The longest of these manuscripts is an essay “About Critics and Criticisms,” dealing principally with Edwin Percy Whipple and William A. Jones, two contemporary . American critics whom Poe admired but who strike us now as very minor luminaries. [column 2:] The gems of the collection are original manuscripts of “Lenore” and “Annabel Lee.” The existence of the latter has been heretofore unknown. “One of the choicest of Poe's poetical compositions, and in perfect state, its appearance after the lapse of many years,” Mr. Sargent remarks, “will give Poe collectors a thrill.”