Support the Archive

The Walt Whitman Archive

Jamaica April 16th 1860

I was at home yesterday as usual  everything is going on about the same. Andrew has recovered in a great measure, ¹   so that he sits up and would probably have been out-doors but the weather has been very wet and cold here for the last week. Mother herself I think is not very well. she has a bad cold that seems to pull her down. I have got one of the worst colds I ever had, and feel extremely unlike myself, still anything of that kind sits lighter on me than on one of Mother's age, and this morning Ed. seemed to be quite sick, that is he couldn't eat and complained of a bad pain in his side, however Mother put a mustard plaster on him and he felt considerably better when I left home.

Mattie and George, the rest of "the family" are well. The Mr Brown ²   who has rented the lower part of the house has sent a number of things to the house, carpets &c. Mother has let him fix the front parlor and she has emigrated and taken posession of your room. The Moore people ³   have not moved yet, and I believe do not intend to till 7 of May

The Water Works men are all trembling in our boots, the [prospects?] being that we are all going to be kicked out, neck and heels, from the chief down to the Axeman. It seems that Mr F. Spinola ⁴   started a bill at Albany some time last winter trying to oust the new commissioners (King, Lewis &c &c) ⁵    well someone made an amendment casting out the present old Com. the new Com. Chief Eng. &c all the way through, and appointing Mr McElroy ⁶   in place of Mr Kirkwood. ⁷   It has passed one house, and I guess the chances are abt even for its passing the other, as Wells the Contractor ⁸   is helping it with all the power he can muster. I think it will be a dark day for the B. W. W. if he succeeds, but I suppose to the victor belongs the spoils. I know I ain't going to worry, if it does go through. ⁹  

Mother wants me to be sure and tell you that you must bring her one of those books by the authoress of "Consuelo" ¹⁰   also Redpath's "John Brown" ¹¹    she says you needn't send them as that would involve cost, but to surely remember to bring them with you when you come home.

I read your letter at home. ¹²   I am glad that you are having so good a time and that your book has such a good prospect of success. I sincerely hope you will meet with no disappointment.

Write me again Walt. I like much to hear how you are getting along. I shall write to you again probably next week. Mattie sends her love.

Your affectionate Brother Jeff.

---

About the Text

The text presented here is derived from Dennis Berthold and Kenneth Price, eds., Dear Brother Walt: The Letters of Thomas Jefferson Whitman (Kent, Ohio: Kent State University Press, 1984). For a detailed description of discrepancies between this electronic edition and the print source, see our statement of editorial policy .

The manuscript of this letter, dated April 16, 1860, is held in the Charles E. Feinberg Collection of the Papers of Walt Whitman, 1839-1919, Library of Congress, Washington, DC.

For more information on the letters of Thomas Jefferson Whitman, see Dennis Berthold and Kenneth Price's introduction to the print edition.

Notes

1.  See Letter from Thomas Jefferson Whitman to Walt Whitman, 3 April 1860.  (Back)

2.  See Letter from Thomas Jefferson Whitman to Walt Whitman, 3 April 1860.  (Back)

3.  Either E. D. or John Moore, both of whom lived on Myrtle Avenue.  (Back)

4.  A member of the New York legislature from 1855 to 1861, Francis B. Spinola (1821-91) later became a brigadier general during the Civil War, and finally a United States congressman from 1887 to 1891.  (Back)

5.  The four members of the Brooklyn Board of Water and Sewer Commissioners were Gamaliel King, William B. Lewis, John H. Funk, and Daniel L. Northrup.  (Back)

6.  Samuel McElroy preceded Kirkwood as chief engineer of what was the Nassau Water Company (later the Brooklyn Water Works). McElroy resigned his position on June 10, 1856, at which time Kirkwood took over.  (Back)

7.  James P. Kirkwood (1807-77), a prominent civil engineer and cofounder of the American Society of Civil Engineers (1852), superintended the construction of the Brooklyn Water Works as chief engineer from 1856 to 1862. After his work in Brooklyn, he moved to St. Louis and designed the waterworks which Jeff would later build. Kirkwood eventually became a nationally known independent consultant and wrote the standard text on water filtration.  (Back)

8.  In 1856 Henry S. Welles & Co. signed a contract with the Nassau Water Company to build a waterworks for Brooklyn. Welles was the main contractor for the project from its beginning to its completion in 1862.  (Back)

9.  Since Kirkwood and the others remained in their positions, the bill apparently did not pass.  (Back)

10.  WW may have loaned LVVW his two-volume edition of George Sand's The Countess of Rudolstadt (New York: William H. Graham, 1848). These volumes were in the poet's library at his death.  (Back)

11.  James Redpath, The Public Life of Captain John Brown , a panegyric published by Thayer and Eldridge in 1860—the same year the firm issued the third edition of Leaves of Grass . LVVW acknowledged receiving the "life of john brown" from WW on May 3 (?), 1860.  (Back)

12.  Jeff probably refers to a lost letter from WW to LVVW.  (Back)

Whitman Archive ID

loc.00393