Louisa Van Velsor Whitman
(1795–1873)
BIRTH
September 22, 1795
PLACE
Long Island, New York
NAME
Louisa Van Velsor
DEATH
May 23, 1873
PLACE
Camden, New Jersey
FAMILY
HUSBAND
Walter Whitman
(1789–1855)
CHILDREN
Walt Whitman
(1819-1892)
HOMES
RELIGIOUS VIEWS
RELIGION NOT DOCUMENTED
DENOMINATION NOT DOCUMENTED
MEMBERSHIPS
AWARDS
Louisa Van Velsor Whitman was the mother of poet Walt Whitman. Her family came from Long Island; her surviving letters to Walt document family life during the Civil War.
EARLY LIFE
The Walt Whitman Archive gives Louisa’s birth as September 22, 1795, and names her parents as Cornelius Van Velsor and Naomi Williams.
CAREER
DEATH
Louisa suffered a stroke-like episode in early May 1873 and became too weak to read or write easily. Walt Whitman reached her in Camden three days before she died there on May 23. She was buried at Evergreen Cemetery on May 26; her remains are now in the Whitman family tomb at Harleigh Cemetery. The records do not establish a more precise immediate medical cause.
POPULAR BIOGRAPHIES
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