Marginalia: Special J.H. Whitty Memorial Edition

In 1911, Poe enthusiast J.H. Whitty published what he said were previously unknown recollections of Poe written by the poet's close friend Frederick W. Thomas (who died in 1866.) These lengthy, detailed reminiscences have been used as source material by Poe biographers ever since. There are, however, certain obvious problems with these "Thomas Reminiscences":

1. All we have of Thomas' alleged acount is what Whitty published. The actual manuscript is not extant, and there is no record of it being seen by anyone other than Whitty. (His long-time associate Thomas O. Mabbott wrote that Whitty became "evasive" when Mabbott asked to see the document.)

2. We have only Whitty's word that he even acquired this previously unknown MS., and he was very vague about how they came into his hands. (He also claimed to have acquired proof-sheets of "late drafts" of several of Poe's poems that also somehow came into Thomas' hands, but these have similarly vanished.)

3. Whitty was, as one acquaintance described him, a "crank." He was an extremely peculiar fanatic who, like so many of the more unbalanced amateur Poe specialists, had an egomaniacal obsession with showing the world "new and previously unknown" material related to his idol. And--again like others of his type--it seems to have been unimportant to him if this material was genuine or not. During his long career, he came up with many other examples of "previously unknown" Poeana--much of which proved to be, as other Poe scholars were forced to admit, completely imaginary. The editors of the published collection of Poe's letters wrote tactfully that Whitty was "inclined to make exaggerated claims without documentation, and prone to romantic fancies." They admitted that Whitty's "veracity" has been questioned. Mabbott nonchalantly conceded that Whitty was "eccentric," "often wrong," "far from reliable," and inclined to mix fact with colorful fiction. He also wrote that Whitty "brought himself into disrepute by farfetched claims to 'discoveries about Poe'."

Given all of this, why in the world is this "Thomas manuscript" accepted unreservedly?

Incidentally, there are a number of other Whitty "discoveries" that are also, inexplicably, still used as source material, such as his completely lunatic--and completely undocumented--claim that Poe wrote two poems that appeared anonymously in "Graham's Magazine" in 1845, "Stanzas," and "Divine Right of Kings." Whitty claimed his source for this attribution was an old volume of "Graham's" in his possession, where Frances S. Osgood had written Poe's name at the bottom of these two poems. When asked to bring forth this volume, Whitty flatly refused, and to this day it has yet to be seen. Despite this highly self-incriminating refusal to prove his claims, these two dreadful poems are still to this day--for reasons that frankly baffle me--often republished as Poe's work, an attribution that undoubtedly would mortify the poor man. (Mabbott, who is largely responsible for these poems being accepted as Poe's, claimed that years after Whitty's "discovery" of these verses, a volume of "Graham's" was discovered in the Boston Public Library, with annotations in an unknown handwriting--definitely not Osgood's--assigning them to Poe. As I have pointed out before, it never occurred to Mabbott that we have no idea who wrote these notations and when it was done. It was undoubtedly the work of someone who had heard of Whitty's claims--or even Whitty himself. In any case, anonymous notations to anonymous poems can hardly be considered scholarly proof of anything.)

This attribution also ignores the fact that what evidence we have on the subject indicates that the poems in question, which were signed merely "P," were authored by Charles J. Peterson, who was then on the staff of "Graham's." Thomas O. Mabbott even admitted that signing poems with a single initial of a surname was "usually an editor's prerogative," which made his agreement to attribute these poems to Poe, rather than editor Peterson--who is accepted to have written other poems for "Graham's" signed "P"--utterly incomprehensible.

Incidentally, it was also Whitty who first posited the curious notion that Poe and Mrs. Osgood conducted a poetic "literary flirtation" in the pages of the "Broadway Journal." Until he began weaving this strange yarn in the early 1900s, no one had ever taken the least notice of these poems as any sort of biographical source material. (He also devised the even more ridiculous idea that Osgood's story "Ida Grey" reflected their relationship.) There really is little basis for his assertions, but Poe's biographers, charmed by the implied salaciousness of it all, have automatically parroted Whitty's fantasies ever since. All in all, if Whitty, like Susan Archer Talley Weiss, had not displayed the complete humorlessness that characterizes the true crackpot, I would seriously suspect that everything they wrote about Poe was an elaborate prank on history.

*****

It is exasperatingly typical of Poe that even details about his wedding are uncertain. His Richmond marriage to Virginia, which took place on this date in 1836, (happy anniversary, kids!) is usually described as having taken place in the parlor of the boardinghouse run by a Mrs. Yarrington, where he and the ladies Clemm were then living. It is also accepted that the young couple enjoyed a brief honeymoon in Petersburg, Virginia, as the guests of a local newspaper publisher named Hiram Haines. These claims, as well as nearly all the other details we have about the wedding, were first publicized in 1926, in Mary E. Phillips' "Edgar Allan Poe: The Man." Phillips' source for her account of the marriage and honeymoon was--wait for it!--none other than James Howard Whitty, who cited a "Jane Foster" who was supposedly one of the wedding guests.

However, F. B. Converse, the son of Amasa Converse, the minister who married the pair, told a journalist years later that the wedding was held in the parlor of his father's home. Dr. Converse added, "There were very few persons present at the wedding; my mother and the members of the family, and perhaps one or more companions, whom they brought with them." A Mrs. Mallory, who also lived in Mrs. Yarrington's boardinghouse, described Mrs. Clemm inviting her and some other ladies into her room, where she offered them cake and wine in celebration of the marriage, but this witness said nothing about the ceremony itself being held in the house. (Mrs. Mallory indicated that Mrs. Clemm's little impromptu party was the first she or any of the other women had heard of the marriage.)

If these accounts are true (and they at least have the virtue of being first-hand) it would discredit everything Whitty said this Jane Foster--who makes no other appearances in Poe's history--told him about the Poe wedding. I am not aware of any other independent source that verifies this alleged honeymoon--if anyone out there has found any such documentation, I would certainly like to know about it. (We also have nothing directly from Jane Foster herself.) Having Whitty's fingerprints on the tale is alone enough to make me uneasy about practically everything we think we "know" about the wedding, including Poe and Virginia's supposed Petersburg sojourn--as much as I'd like to think this star-crossed pair had at least one pleasant vacation during their union. The story of their honeymoon may well be true--at least, we know of no evidence that directly disproves it. (I emphasize this point in order to keep the good citizens of Petersburg from coming after me with the feathers and tar.) However, as is usual with Poe's history, it comes with a bit of a question mark. In any case, I hear that Petersburg's "Hiram Haines Coffee House," located in the building where the Poes supposedly resided during their honeymoon, is a charming place, and well worth a visit if you're ever in the area.


(Images of Poe bust and antebellum wedding courtesy NYPL Digital Gallery)

Update 12/10/11: While researching the "Raven's Bride" plagiarism case, blogger Archie Valparaiso unearthed a bit of historical information that not only refutes Lenore Hart's claims to have done original "historical research" on her now-discredited novel, it demolishes the legend of the entire Petersburg trip. Read of his discovery here, and savor the pure comedy gold.

If the railway from Richmond to Petersburg was only built after Edgar and Virginia were married, it, of course, renders the Whitty/Foster story about the newlyweds traveling by train an impossibility. And if that detail is false, it naturally discredits all of Whitty's account about the wedding and alleged honeymoon--a story that has been endlessly and trustingly repeated to this day.

The Many Faces of Virginia Poe

"When a man makes up his mind without evidence, no evidence disproving his opinion will change his mind."
-Robert A. Heinlein

The only likeness of Virginia Clemm Poe with any claims to authenticity is the famous "deathbed portrait," a watercolor presumably painted immediately after her death. Even this picture has a number of question marks surrounding it. The portrait--which was not made public until 1893--was said to be in the possession of her mother Maria Clemm, who evidently bequeathed it to the family of her relative Neilson Poe, which suggests it is genuine. However, we have no information about when and by whom the painting was done (there is no basis for the speculation that the portrait, which is obviously the work of a professional artist, was executed by Marie Louise Shew,) or whether the picture is even a good likeness.

It would be odd if Virginia, who had grown very thin and slight during her long battle with tuberculosis, had been as facially plump as the girl in the portrait. The painting shows a young woman with hazel eyes, when the most reliable descriptions give Virginia's eyes as unusually large and very dark. Also, one of the few areas of consensus among Poe's contemporaries is that Virginia was very beautiful, even until the time of her death. The portrait depicts someone who, while pleasant-looking, could hardly be called lovely, or even noticeably pretty. It may be that this painting was not done from an "in-person" view of Virginia, but merely from a description of her provided to the artist.

Given the unsatisfactory nature of this portrait, it is not surprising that a number of attempts have been made to find a "from-life" image of Poe's wife. There are three pictures in particular that in recent years have often been presented as authentic portraits of Virginia. Unfortunately, there is no solid reason in the world to think they have any connection with her at all.

The first of these I discussed in an earlier post. It is one of three drawings that in 1930 were sold as artwork done by Poe himself. The sketches were immediately unmasked as forgeries, but that has not prevented them from having a surprisingly persistent circulation.

The second image is an oil painting of a young woman holding flowers that first surfaced in 1929. (It can be seen here.) It appeared as part of an art collection sold by the widow of an Englishman named Joseph Thomas Scott. Mrs. Scott claimed that he acquired the painting during a visit to the United States sometime in the 1870s, and that it "was always said to represent Virginia Clemm." Mrs. Scott had no documentation for this claim, and she wrote several letters dealing with this painting that are suspiciously contradictory in their details. (When Richmond's Poe Museum was invited in the 1930s to buy the portrait, they declined because of the impossibility of authenticating the work.) Later, it was suggested that the picture--which is unsigned--had been done by Thomas Sully.

Sully has a place all to himself in the incredibly large world of bogus Poe pictures. Poe was reputedly a boyhood friend of the artist's nephew, a less-talented painter named Robert Sully--although it should be noted Robert was six years Poe's senior, and nearly all we know about this "friendship" comes to us via Susan Archer Talley Weiss. However, there is no evidence that Poe and Thomas Sully even met. Art historian Michael Deas, in his book "The Portraits and Daguerreotypes of Edgar Allan Poe," noted that although Thomas Sully left an enormous amount of documentation about his life and work, including portrait registers, diaries, letters, and autobiographical manuscripts, Poe's name is never so much as mentioned in any of them. Poe himself left no known indication that he knew either of the Sullys, much less that he or his wife may have sat for either of them. Despite this, over the years a number of anonymous portraits of dark-haired men--most of which bear not the faintest resemblance to Poe--have been hopefully labeled as "Poe by Sully" artwork. (Deas devoted an entire section of his book to the long and strange history of faux Poe portraiture.) It is most likely that this "Virginia portrait" is merely a way of giving Poe's wife equal time in the spurious picture sweepstakes.

Some have thought the portrait is modelled after Sully's style, (which would not be surprising, as he was one of the most popular artists of his day,) but even that has been debated. The girl in the picture bears a vague general resemblance to the one in the "deathbed portrait" (although this oil painting is so stylized it is hard to be certain.) However, the lack of provenance for the painting, and the complete absence of any evidence linking it to either Poe or Sully, makes it impossible to put trust in its authenticity.

The third "Virginia portrait" (which can be seen here) surfaced only a few years ago, in the possession of a descendant of Virginia's cousin Elizabeth Herring. This portrait, as well, suffers from a complete lack of documentation, other than this descendant's unverifiable assertion that she had always been "told" it was of Virginia. It is--like the other two paintings--unsigned, and, except for a stamp on the back reading "Richmond, Virginia," unlabeled. It has been conjectured that the painting was done during the brief period Edgar and Virginia lived in Richmond, possibly by--inevitably--Thomas or Robert Sully. Again, we do not have a shadow of proof this is the case. The woman in the portrait does not bear much resemblance to either the "deathbed portrait" or the Joseph Thomas Scott painting, and she looks too mature to have been Virginia, who was only fourteen when she left Richmond for good in early 1837. It seems far more logical that the sitter is another relative, possibly Elizabeth Herring herself. (When Herring married in 1834, she moved to her husband's hometown in Virginia. It is not improbable that during her marriage, she went to Richmond to have her portrait done.)

In 1970, the auction house of Adam A. Weschler & Son, Inc. offered for sale a miniature painting by an unknown artist that was described as a portrait of Virginia Clemm. I have been unable to trace any other mention of this picture (Michael Deas seemed unaware of its existence,) which suggests its genuineness was also highly suspect.

What is also telling against the authenticity of these pictures is the simple fact that there is absolutely no contemporary evidence of any life portrait or daguerreotype of Virginia. In the years following Poe's death, as his legend grew, his biographers and other admirers were understandably eager to find images of his young and beautiful wife. Although their quest for pictures of Virginia was well-publicized, not one of her friends or relatives--including members of the Herring family (who had been contacted by many of these Poe collectors)--were able to offer anything other than the "deathbed portrait." And if either of the Sullys--or any other artist--did paint Virginia, why did they not sign any of these portraits? Why would they fail to leave any sort of documentation at all that they had the honor of creating an image of Poe's wife?

It is natural that Poe scholars would be anxious to uncover representations of the living Virginia. I'd love to see one myself. However, that cannot blind anyone to the fact that these pictures that have emerged--charming to look at as they are--simply cannot be treated as trustworthy likenesses.

A postscript: Undoubtedly, the strangest contribution to the list of dubious images of Virginia--indeed, one of the strangest contributions to Poe "scholarship" in general--was made by J.H. Whitty and Thomas O. Mabbott. (That pair managed, between them, to be responsible for an astonishing number of the loonier myths about Poe.) At some point in the early 20th century, Whitty came to fancy--no one has the slightest idea how--that Poe, his wife (and Mrs. Clemm!) modeled for "fashion plates" published in "Graham's Magazine." Mabbott, who had been something of a protégé of Whitty's (which explains a lot about him,) took up the idea, even though he could never decide which "Graham's" engraving he thought may contain likenesses of the trio. He also never succeeded in formulating a reason why he imagined Poe and his womenfolk had served as models, other than weak mutterings about "vague tradition" and "probability of appearance." (Even though, in the same breath, he said that "I am not sure we should call these things portraits.")

If there is anything that illustrates the generally pathetic state of Poe research, this is it. Whitty and Mabbott, two men who--Heaven knows why--are considered among the leading Poe scholars, invented out of thin air a story that is ludicrous on its face and that has absolutely no evidence to support it. There is no "tradition"--vague or otherwise--that the Poe household ever posed as antebellum centerfolds, and the wooden, generic figures depicted in the "Graham's" engravings do not even show the slightest resemblance to the trio, or anyone else for that matter. (An obviously bemused Michael Deas commented, "It is almost needless to add that Edgar and Virginia Poe would seem odd choices for fashion models.")When it is also considered that Poe is on record as stating that one of his main reasons for resigning from "Graham's" in 1842 was his "disgust" with the "namby-pamby character of the Magazine," calling particular attention to "the contemptible pictures, fashion plates, music, and love-tales" found therein, one has to wonder if Whitty and Mabbott were secretly staging a Poe-esque hoax on us all. Certainly, that is the kindest explanation of their actions.


("Graham's" engraving that has nothing whatsoever to do with Poe: NYPL Digital Gallery)

Rating Poe Biography: The Good, the Bad, and the Simply Insane (Part Two)

The Bad:

(A note: Essentially, this category consists of practically every book ever published about Poe other than the ones mentioned in my previous post. However, these works listed below are what I consider to be the most important and influential disasters.)

*Mary E. Phillips, "Edgar Allan Poe, the Man." I long for the day when someone translates this book into English.



*Hervey Allen, "Israfel." Of all the major Poe biographies, this is perhaps the one I find most offensive. Allen was, by profession, a writer of trashy fiction (and, it was claimed, plagiarized trashy fiction, to boot,) and it shows. His lengthy Poe biography is often inaccurate, and highly speculative. That itself is hardly unusual in books about Poe. However, what makes his book particularly notable among the Poe Hall of Shame is the coarse, almost prurient tone that is diffused throughout--a tone that has proved to be quite influential, as it has been adopted by all the worst Poe-related biographers and novelists since. In that sense, I suppose you could say that Allen was a pioneer in his way. Of course, you could say the same about Typhoid Mary.

*Kenneth Silverman, "Edgar A. Poe: Mournful and Never-ending Remembrance." The book's insufferably pompous title sets the tone for the entire work. Considering Silverman makes no secret of his disdain for Poe--as both a writer and a man--one wonders what drew him to such a project. "Remembrance" has many factual errors that appear to be due to hasty and sloppy research and writing (the book often reads like a failing grad student's first draft,) and his only interest in Poe's works seems to be in making endless juvenile pop-psychology attempts to view them as some mirror of what he imagines to have been Poe's warped psyche. Silverman also misses no opportunity to interpret every event in Poe's life in a way that paints him in the worst possible light--even when the circumstances clearly suggest otherwise. Silverman is also extremely inconsistent and vague in his descriptions and interpretations of Poe's personal life--his relationship with Virginia in particular. He gives the overall impression that he simply had not bothered to think out or had not been able to decide who or what Poe was, or what had even happened in the more controversial events of his life. This often causes him to take the easy way out by dismissing this or that situation by simply calling it, "murky," while simultaneously setting himself up as a censorious analyst of it all. (Which, again, brings up the question why this book was even written.) The fact that this goofy tripe is considered the standard modern biography of Poe quite frankly appalls the hell out of me.

*Thomas O.Mabbott never wrote a biography of Poe, but he published numerous magazine artcles about the poet, and edited the best-known modern editions of Poe's works, with extensive notes and annotations. Unfortunately, he spread a great deal of myths, errors, and flat-out libels about Edgar and Virginia Poe in the process. He seemed completely unable to judge historical evidence, accepting--and thus giving credibility to--a frightening amount of sheer hogwash. For reasons that completely elude me, Mabbott is considered something of a "dean" among Poe specialists, with his opinions having been given a quite unjustified air of authority. This was a man who considered Susan Talley Weiss to have been a most trustworthy source. Enough said. Mabbott also seemed to have odd problems with simple reading comprehension. I have found a number of instances where his descriptions of what someone said or wrote in no way matched the actual quotes or writings. Very strange stuff.

*George Woodberry, "The Life of Edgar Allan Poe" Woodberry evidently wrote his Poe biography on commission. He was a peculiar choice for the job, as his tastes and sympathies were all with the New England Transcendentalists who were particularly anathema to Poe. (Not to mention the fact that he was a friend of Rufus Griswold's son William.) Like Silverman, Woodberry made no bones about his instinctive antipathy to both Poe's writings and personality. The 1885 edition of his biography is reasonably scholarly and not without interest, but by the time he released a heavily revised edition in 1909, he had fallen under the baleful influence of the ubiquitous Susan Talley Weiss, and the book suffered accordingly. If you wish to study Woodberry, stick to the earlier edition.

*Peter Ackroyd, "Poe: A Life Cut Short." Another publisher-commissioned hack job. A mere summary of recent Poe books--mostly Silverman's--and this summarizing is not even done well. This book is most notable for featuring one of the worst metaphors I've seen in some time--where he compares Poe to a "cuttlefish floundering in its own ink." Methinks Ackroyd wound up floundering in his own attempts at profundity.

*William Gill, "The Life of Edgar Allan Poe." Gill was among the more eccentric Poe enthusiasts. His book about Poe has some interesting original information, but on the whole is not of any importance. He is perhaps best known for his claim of having retrieved the bones of Virginia Poe when her Fordham graveyard was demolished, and keeping her remains under his bed for years. Every time I think of Gill, I'm reminded of Robert Bloch's short story "The Man Who Collected Poe."

*J.H. Whitty. Whitty never did an actual book about Poe, but he wrote extensively about the writer, and provided information to several biographers (most notably Mary Phillips and Hervey Allen.) Very unfortunately, Whitty was--in the words of an acquaintance--"a crank." He had a long history of claiming to have uncovered important Poe material that turned out to be either misrepresented by him or simply nonexistent. He also had a passion for attributing practically every poem published anonymously or under pseudonyms during the 1830s and 1840s to Poe's pen. Most of these attributions have been contested or discarded, which is a blessing for Poe's reputation, as the poems Whitty promoted were always dreadfully bad. Even Thomas Mabbott--not exactly Mr. Reliable himself--admitted that Whitty was in the habit of blending fact with fiction. How such a person could remain as any sort of Poe authority astounds me, but such is the case.

He attributed two poems that appeared anonymously in "Graham's Magazine" in 1845, "Stanzas" and "The Divine Right of Kings," as Poe's work, on the grounds that he claimed to have discovered a volume of that magazine annotated by Frances S. Osgood, where she identified EAP as the author. Whitty never produced this volume when asked to do so, but the attribution has stuck, largely because Mabbott claimed that, some years later, someone else discovered a "Graham's" volume in the Boston Public Library, where some unknown person had written Poe's name under these poems. It does not seem to have occurred to Mabbott that someone hearing of Whitty's claim--or even Whitty himself--had used his story as an excuse to label these poems as being by Poe. He also ignored the fact that these highly mediocre poems are not in the least in Poe's style, and that Poe would have had no reason not to claim them as his own, if he had truly written them.

Similarly, a Poe "memoir" Whitty wrote for an edition of his poems featured hitherto unknown and unpublished reminiscences Whitty claimed were written by Poe's friend Frederick W. Thomas. Whitty never produced the actual manuscript of these "reminiscences," or even an account of how these papers came into his hands. Nevertheless, this completely unauthenticated information has become part of standard Poe biography. There are many other examples of Whitty's mendacious influence. Like Mrs. Weiss, he deserves a special infamy for his particularly large amounts of untrustworthy or outright false contributions to the Poe record.

* "Poe" by James M. Hutchisson

All you need to know about this derivative, astonishingly inaccurate, and rather pitiful biography comes near the end of the book. Hutchisson briefly describes the later life of Sarah Elmira Shelton, adding the statement that "After expressing her anguish over Poe's death in the October letter to Muddy, Poe's last love, Elmira Royster Shelton, entered into a discreet silence on all
matters about the author for twenty-six years. She broke it only in 1875, when she granted an interview to Edward V. Valentine, of Richmond, who tape-recorded her statements. After Elmira's death on 11 February 1888, the recording was placed in the Valentine Museum in Richmond, where it remains today."

Tape-recordings. In 1875. Brilliant, Mr. Hutchisson. Simply brilliant.

Coming next: The worst of the worst!