Earth and Space News: Edgar Allan Poe Walked the High Bridge Between the Bronx and Manhattan

Summary: Summary: Edgar Allan Poe walked the High Bridge between the boroughs of the present-day Bronx and Manhattan in the last year of his life, 1848 to 1849.

(title; first line) "Edgar Allan Poe Walking High Bridge," posthumous portrait of Poe in 1930 lithograph by Swedish-American book and magazine illustrator and genre and portrait painter Bernard Jacob Rosenmeyer (1870-1943), The Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs: Print Collection, The New York Public Library NYPL Digital Collections; at the end of his life, Bernard Jacob Rosenmeyer resided in Yonkers, Westchester County, on Midland Avenue, next to Tibbetts Brook and by the Croton Aqueduct, according to novelist and writer Dale Ramsay in "Poe Walking on the High Bridge," posted Jan. 7, 2011, as a newsletter article on the Friends of the Old Croton Aqueduct website: Art Lovers. Cesar Perez, via Facebook Oct. 30, 2022

American editor, literary critic, poet and writer Edgar Allan Poe (Jan. 19, 1809-Oct. 7, 1849) walked the High Bridge that connected New York City's present-day boroughs of the Bronx on the east bank of the Harlem River with Manhattan on the river's west bank.

In spring 1846 Poe moved with his first-cousin wife, Virginia Eliza Poe (née Clemm; Aug. 15, 1822-Jan. 30, 1847), and paternal-aunt mother-in-law, Maria Poe Clemm (March 17, 1790-Feb. 16, 1871), into a cottage on Kingsbridge Road in Westchester County's rural village of Fordham. The creation of the present-day Bronx began with the ceding of Westchester County's West Bronx towns of Kingsbridge, Morrisania and West Farms to New York County as Annexed District in 1874. In 1895 Westchester County ceded the East Bronx region to New York County. In borough of the Bronx, established in 1898, comprised the annexed East and West Bronx regions as well as Fordham Village.

The move happened "around May of 1846," according to Dale Ramsay in "Poe Walking on the High Bridge," posted Jan. 7, 2011, as a newsletter article on the Friends of the Old Croton Aqueduct website. Since June 1843, Poe, Virginia and Maria had been boarding in a two-story, peaked-roof farmhouse owned by coal businessman and farmer Patrick Brennan (died December 1870) and his wife, Mary Elizabeth, and located in Manhattan at West 84th Street and Bloomingdale Road (renamed Boulevard in 1869; renamed Broadway in 1899), according to Daniel Holland in "The Farmhouse On 84th Street and Broadway," updated Oct. 10, 2024, on his Danny Dutch website. Virginia's worsening health, nevertheless, necessitated a scene change from the Brennan farmhouse to the rural cottage.

“. . . . It is true that notwithstanding her vivacity and cheerfulness at the time we have alluded to, her health was, even then, rapidly sinking; and it was for her dear sake and for the recovery of that peace which had been so fatally periled amid the irritations and anxieties of his New York life, that Poe left the city and removed to the little Dutch cottage in Fordham, where he passed the three remaining years of his life. It was to this quiet haven in the beautiful spring of 1846, when the fruit trees were all in bloom and the grass in its freshest verdure, that he brought his Virginia to die," as described by American essayist, poet and Transcendentalist Sarah Helen Power Whitman (born Sarah Helen Power; Jan. 19, 1803-June 27, 1878) in her biography of her former fiancé, Edgar Poe and His Critics, published in 1861 (page 28).

The cottage in Fordham was sited at an approximately two and one-half mile northeast of the High Bridge across the Harlem River, as measured by macabre-themed writer J.W. (James) Ocker in Poe-Land: The Hallowed Haunts of Edgar Allan Poe (2015; page 133). The High Bridge was designed as part of the Croton Aqueduct (1837-1842) for the conveyance of Croton River Dam water from northern Westchester County to Manhattan.

Construction of the High Bridge began in 1839 and finished at the end of October 1848. The placement of two pipes and the passage of Croton River water through them were finalized in May and July 1848. Final finesses included covering the pipes with sand and earth. The protective layer was then surfaced by turfing and flagging.

"The first line of pipes on the Aqueduct bridge across Harlem river, was completed, and the Croton water passed through it, on the 30th of May last. The second line was completed on the 15th of July, and the water passed through it soon afterwards. The contractors then proceeded diligently with the covering of sand and earth, and with the turfing and flagging over all. This work, with the embankments and masonry around the gate-houses, &c., cleaning off and pointing such parts of the masonry of the bridge as required it, and various other items, occupied them till the end of October, at which time it was considered they had completed the work embraced in their contract," detailed the project's resident engineer, Peter Hastie, in a letter, dated Dec. 28, 1848, to Chief Engineer John Bloomfield Jervis (New York Water Commissioners, "Document No. 32," Dec. 28, 1848; page 622).

The proximity of the High Bridge to Poe's cottage encouraged perambulation by such wayfarers as walk-loving Poe and his strolling-inclined guests. The cottage's and the bridge's natural beauty impressed an unnamed American writer during his visit in the summer of 1847.

"An American writer, who visited the cottage during the summer of the same year, described it as half buried in fruit trees, and as having a thick grove of pines in its immediate neighbourhood. . . . Round an old cherry-tree, near the door, was a broad bank of greenest turf. The neighbouring beds of mignonette and heliotrope, and the pleasant shade above, made this a favourite seat. Rising at four o'clock in the morning, for a walk to the magnificent Aqueduct bridge over Harlem river, our informant found the poet, with his mother, standing on the turf beneath the cherry-tree, eagerly watching the movements of two beautiful birds that seemed contemplating a settlement in its branches" (pages 30-31).

Sarah Helen Whitman noted Poe's appreciation of his High Bridge treks. The exercize, the solitude and the vistas frequently drew him to the Romanesque Revivial-style, 15 arch stone bridge.

"During Mr. Poe’s residence at Fordham a walk to High Bridge was one of his favourite and habitual recreations. The water of the Aqueduct is conveyed across the river on a range of lofty granite arches, which rise to the height of a hundred and forty-five feet above high-water level. On the top a turfed and grassy road, used only by foot-passengers, and flanked on either side by a low parapet of granite, makes one of the finest promenades imaginable.

“The winding river and the high rocky shores of the western extremity of the bridge are seen to great advantage from this lofty avenue. In the last melancholy years of his life – ‘the lonesome latter years’ – Poe was accustomed to walk there at all times of the day and night; often pacing the then solitary pathway for hours without meeting a human being" (page 32).

Edgar Allan Poe, his first-cousin wife, Virginia, and his paternal-aunt mother-in-law, Maria, moved to a cottage on Kingsbridge Road in Fordham in spring 1846; the cottage's location, at a two and one-half mile walk northeast of the High Bridge across the Harlem River, allowed Poe walking excursions that included traversing the bridge after completion of turfing and flagging of the surface at the end of October 1848; "Poe Cottage, Fordham, N.Y.," ca. Oct. 12, 1910, print engraved by Benjamin F. Buck, New York: No known restrictions on publication, via Library of Congress Prints & Photographs Online Catalog (PPOC)

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Dedication

This post is dedicated to the memory of our beloved blue-eyed brother, Charles, who guided the creation of the Met Opera and Astronomy posts on Earth and Space News. We memorialized our brother in "Our Beloved Blue-Eyed Brother, Charles, With Whom We Are Well Pleased," published on Earth and Space News on Thursday, Nov. 18, 2021, an anniversary of our beloved father's death.

Image credits:

"Edgar Allan Poe Walking High Bridge," posthumous portrait of Poe in 1930 lithograph by Swedish-American book and magazine illustrator and genre and portrait painter Bernard Jacob Rosenmeyer (1870-1943), The Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs: Print Collection, The New York Public Library NYPL Digital Collections; at the end of his life, Bernard Jacob Rosenmeyer resided in Yonkers, Westchester County, on Midland Avenue, next to Tibbetts Brook and by the Croton Aqueduct, according to novelist and writer Dale Ramsay in "Poe Walking on the High Bridge," posted Jan. 7, 2011, as a newsletter article on the Friends of the Old Croton Aqueduct website: Art Lovers. Cesar Perez, via Facebook Oct. 30, 2022, @ https://www.facebook.com/groups/261158297744040/posts/1422589218267603/

Art Lovers. Cesar Perez. October 30, 2022. "Bernard Jacob Rosenmeyer American, 1870–1943 'Poe Walking on the High Bridge', 1900. Edgar Allan Poe was an Aqueduct walker. Poe readers who still own a copy of his Tales in the Great Illustrated Classics edition from 1952 may remember the dramatic image of a melancholy Poe walking in the snow in his billowing thick cloak, a long straight avenue receding behind him. The landscape on either side, with its barren trees, drops away to nothing in the distance. That is because Poe is crossing the High Bridge on this frosty walk, with the span over the river behind him. High Bridge, of course, continued the route of the Old Croton Aqueduct from the Bronx across the Harlem River into Manhattan. Construction of the bridge began in 1837, and it was completed in 1848. Poe was then a Bronx resident, living in a tiny cottage on Kingsbridge Road, in rural Fordham Village, just east of the Aqueduct. The Bridge opened on the Fourth of July the year before Poe's death in Baltimore, at the age of forty, in mysterious circumstances. The picture, which is also on view at Poe Cottage, in the Bronx, is titled, Poe Walking on the High Bridge.
The artist was well-known in his day as a book and magazine illustrator and a genre and portrait painter. When I first saw this picture, and learned of its significance for Aqueduct walkers, I thought that Poe's story, 'The Imp of the Perverse,' must surely have been inspired in part by Poe's crossings of the High Bridge, which, at more than 100 feet above the water, deserves the name." Facebook. Oct. 30, 2022.
Available via Facebook @ https://www.facebook.com/groups/261158297744040/posts/1422589218267603/

Baum, Jenny. "A Random Walk After Edgar Allan Poe." New York Public Library Blog. Oct. 7, 2020.
Available @ https://www.nypl.org/blog/2020/10/07/random-walk-after-edgar-allan-poe

Brown, Henry Collins. "The old house of Edgar Allan Poe, as it originally stood on Kingsbridge Road. Now in Poe Park. Restored and cared for by the Bronx Society of Arts and Sciences." Page 23. Valentine's City of New York; A Guide Book, With Six Maps and One Hundred and Sixty Full Page Pictures. New York: Valentine's Manual, Inc., 1920.
Available via Internet Archive @ https://archive.org/details/valentinescityof00browa/page/23/mode/1up

Comfort, Randall. "The Poe Cottage." Pages 246-247. "Old Mansions of the West Bronx," pages 241-260. In: Henry Collins Brown, ed., Valentine's Manual of Old New York. No. 7 New Series. New York: Valentine's Manual, Inc., 1923.
Available via Columbia University Libraries Digital Collections @ http://www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/digital/collections/cul/texts/ldpd_6274889_000/ldpd_6274889_000.pdf

Cook, Harry Tecumseh; and Nathan Julius Kaplan. "Chapter XVIII: Fordham Manor." Pages 150-157. The Borough of the Bronx, 1639-1913; Its Marvelous Development and Historical Surroundings. New York: Published by the Author, 1913.
Available via Internet Archive @ https://archive.org/details/boroughofbronx161913cook/page/150/mode/1up

Crain, Esther. "Edgar Allan Poe’s haunted walks on High Bridge." Ephemeral New York. Oct. 7, 2016.
Available @ https://ephemeralnewyork.wordpress.com/2016/10/07/edgar-allan-poes-haunted-walks-on-high-bridge/

Danny Dutch (Daniel Holland). "The Farmhouse On 84th Street and Broadway." Danny Dutch. Updated Oct. 10, 2024.
Available @ https://www.dannydutch.com/post/the-farmhouse-on-84th-street-and-broadway

Dr.Sliderule. "Edgar Allan Poe Walking The High Bridge." The High Bridge -- Its Past, Present & Future. Tuesday, January 15, 2013.
Available @ http://highbridgeparkdevelopment.blogspot.com/2013/01/edgar-allan-poe-walking-high-bridge.html

Edgar Allan Poe National Historic Site Pennsylvania. "Edgar Allan Poe and His Tumultuous Romances." National Park Service > Articles.
Available via NPS @ https://www.nps.gov/articles/poeromances.htm?utm_source=article&utm_medium=website&utm_campaign=experience_more&utm_content=large

Edgar Allan Poe National Historic Site Pennsylvania. "Edgar Allan Poe and Literary Criticism." National Park Service > Articles.
Available via NPS @ https://www.nps.gov/articles/poe-literarycritic.htm

Harrison, James A., ed. The Last Letters of Edgar Allan Poe to Sarah Helen Whitman: In Commemoration of the Hundredth Anniversary of Poe's Birth, January 19, 1909. New York and London: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1909.
Available via Internet Archive @ https://archive.org/details/lastlettersofedg00poeeuoft/

Hastie, Peter. "New York, 28th December, 1848 To John B. Jervis, Esq., Chief Engineer N.Y.W.W. The first line of pipes on the Aqueduct bridge across Harlem river, was completed, and the Croton water passed through it, on the 30th of May last. The second line was completed on the 15th of July, and the water passed through it soon afterwards. The contractors then proceeded diligently with the covering of sand and earth, and with the turfing and flagging over all. This work, with the embankments and masonry around the gate-houses, &c., cleaning off and pointing such parts of the masonry of the bridge as required it, and various other items, occupied them till the end of October, at which time it was considered they had completed the work embraced in their contract. . . . P. Hastie, Res’t Engineer N.Y.W.W." Pages 622, 624. In “Document No. 32. Board of Aldermen, January 15, 1849. The Water Commissioners presented their Semi-Annual Report, ending Dec. 31, 1848.” Pages 613-624. New York Water Commissioners; and New York Board of Aldermen, Documents of the Board of Alderman of the City of New York. From No. 1 to No. 42, Inclusive. -- From May, 1848, to March, 1849. Volume XV Part I. New York: McSpedon & Baker, Printers to the Common Council, 1849.
Available via Google Books Read free of charge @ https://www.google.com/books/edition/Documents/jAQAAAAAMAAJ

IArt. "IArt is with Pinku Alam and 2 others. 'Edgar Allan Poe walking High Bridge', 1930. Artist: B.J. Rosenmeyer." Facebook. April 21, 2019.
Available via Facebook @ https://www.facebook.com/iartGaleria/posts/pfbid0qKKSRRUVv22oRVcayzEeaEAEHgoghfEdLkyReyPeYeQGg3ShPhhPktNbRH5JktC8l
Available via Facebook @ https://www.facebook.com/iartGaleria/photos/edgar-allan-poe-walking-high-bridge-1930-artist-bj-rosenmeyer/422155395262463/

jen9928. "Poe-Me Monday -- Poe’s Women, Part 3." The Archive Theater Company > Post. Aug. 21, 2023.
Available @ https://www.thearchivetheater.org/post/poe-me-monday-poe-s-women-part-3

Miller, Tom. "The Lost Brennan House -- 84th Street and Broadway." Daytonian in Manhattan. Monday, June 19, 2017.
Available @ https://daytoninmanhattan.blogspot.com/2017/06/the-lost-brennan-house-84th-street-and.html#google_vignette

Morgan, Appleton. "“The Personality of Poe.” Munsey's Magazine (New York, NY), vol. XVII, no. 4 (July 1897), 522-530.
Available via Edgar Allan Poe Society of Baltimore @ https://www.eapoe.org/papers/MISC1851/am189707.htm

Morgan, Appleton, Dr. "Edgar Allan Poe in New York." Pages 263-316. In: Henry Collins Brown, ed., Valentine's Manual of Old New York. No. 7 New Series. New York: Valentine's Manual, Inc., 1923.
Available via Columbia University Libraries Digital Collections @ http://www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/digital/collections/cul/texts/ldpd_6274889_000/pages/ldpd_6274889_000_00000295.html
Available via Columbia University Libraries Digital Collections @ http://www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/digital/collections/cul/texts/ldpd_6274889_000/ldpd_6274889_000.pdf

Nolan, Eric Robert. "'Poe on the High Bridge,' Bernard Jacob Rosenmeyer, 1930." Jan. 19, 2018.
Available @ https://ericrobertnolan.com/2018/01/19/poe-on-the-high-bridge-bernard-jacob-rosenmeyer-1930/

Ocker, J.W. (Jason W.). Poe-Land: The Hallowed Haunts of Edgar Allan Poe. Woodstock VT: The Countryman Press, 2015.
Available via Internet Archive @ https://archive.org/details/poelandhallowedh0000ocke

Ramsay, Dale. "Poe Walking on the High Bridge." Friends of the Old Croton Aqueduct > Newsletter Articles. Jan. 7, 2011.
Available @ https://www.aqueduct.org/poe-walking-high-bridge

Rosenmeyer, Bernard J. "Edgar Allan Poe Walking High Bridge." New York Public Library Digital Collections.
Available via New York Public Library Digital Collections @ https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/91f7ca76-dc15-927a-e040-e00a180630e8

Waldman, Benjamin; and Nicole Saraniero, updater. "10 Places to Remember Edgar Allan Poe in NYC." Untapped New York > Architecture. Jan. 19, 2023.
Available @ https://www.untappedcities.com/edgar-allan-poe-nyc/

Whitman, Sarah Helen. ". . . . Although he had been connected with some of the leading magazines of the day, and had edited for a time with great ability several successful periodicals, Mr. Poe’s literary reputation at the North had been comparatively limited until his removal to New York, in the autumn of 1847, when he became personally known to a large circle of authors and literary people, whose interest in his writings was manifestly enhanced by the perplexing anomalies of his character, and by the singular magnetism of his presence.” Page 16. Edgar Poe and His Critics. New York: Rudd & Carleton, M DCCC LV [1855].
Available via Google Books Read free of charge @ https://www.google.com/books/edition/Edgar_Poe_and_His_Critics/9DNbAAAAMAAJ
Available via Internet Archive @ https://archive.org/details/edgarpoecritic00whitrich/page/n17/mode/1up

Whitman, Sarah Helen. "An English writer, now living in Paris, the author of some valuable contributions to our American periodicals, passed several weeks at the little cottage in Fordham, in the early autumn of 1847, and described to us, with a truly English appreciativeness, its unrivalled neatness and the quaint simplicity of its interior and surroundings. It was at the time bordered by a flower-garden, whose clumps of rare dahlias and brilliant beds of fall flowers showed, in the careful culture bestowed upon them, the fine floral taste of the inmates.
An American writer, who visited the cottage during the summer of the same year, described it as half buried in fruit trees, and as having a thick grove of pines in its immediate neighbourhood. The proximity of the railroad, and the increasing population of the little village, have since wrought great changes in the place. Round an old cherry-tree, near the door, was a broad bank of greenest turf. The neighbouring beds of mignonette and heliotrope, and the pleasant shade above, made this a favourite seat. Rising at four o'clock in the morning, for a walk to the magnificent Aqueduct bridge over Harlem river, our informant found the poet, with his mother, standing on the turf beneath the cherry-tree, eagerly watching the movements of two beautiful birds that seemed contemplating a settlement in its branches. He had some rare tropical birds in cages, which he cherished and petted with assiduous care. Our English friend described him as giving to his birds and his flowers a delighted attention that seemed quite inconsistent with the gloomy and grotesque character of his writings. A favourite cat, too, enjoyed his friendly patronage, and often when he was engaged in composition it seated itself on his shoulder, purring as in complacent approval of the work proceeding under its supervision." Pages 30-32. Edgar Poe and His Critics. New York: Rudd & Carleton, M DCCC LV [1855].
Available via Google Books Read free of charge @ https://www.google.com/books/edition/Edgar_Poe_and_His_Critics/9DNbAAAAMAAJ
Available via Internet Archive @ https://archive.org/details/edgarpoecritic00whitrich/page/n31/mode/1up

Whitman, Sarah Helen. "During Mr. Poe’s residence at Fordham a walk to High Bridge was one of his favourite and habitual recreations. The water of the Aqueduct is conveyed across the river on a range of lofty granite arches, which rise to the height of a hundred and forty-five feet above high-water level. On the top a turfed and grassy road, used only by foot-passengers, and flanked on either side by a low parapet of granite, makes one of the finest promenades imaginable.
“The winding river and the high rocky shores of the western extremity of the bridge are seen to great advantage from this lofty avenue. In the last melancholy years of his life – ‘the lonesome latter years’ – Poe was accustomed to walk there at all times of the day and night; often pacing the then solitary pathway for hours without meeting a human being." Page 32. Edgar Poe and His Critics. New York: Rudd & Carleton, M DCCC LV [1855].
Available via Google Books Read free of charge @ https://www.google.com/books/edition/Edgar_Poe_and_His_Critics/9DNbAAAAMAAJ
Available via Internet Archive @ https://archive.org/details/edgarpoecritic00whitrich/page/n33/mode/1up

Whitman, Sarah Helen. Edgar Poe and His Critics. New York: Rudd & Carleton, M DCCC LV [1855].
Available via Google Books Read free of charge @ https://www.google.com/books/edition/Edgar_Poe_and_His_Critics/9DNbAAAAMAAJ
Available via Internet Archive @ https://archive.org/details/edgarpoecritic00whitrich/

Whitman, Sarah Helen. “. . . . It is true that notwithstanding her vivacity and cheerfulness at the time we have alluded to, her health was, even then, rapidly sinking; and it was for her dear sake and for the recovery of that peace which had been so fatally periled amid the irritations and anxieties of his New York life, that Poe left the city and removed to the little Dutch cottage in Fordham, where he passed the three remaining years of his life. It was to this quiet haven in the beautiful spring of 1846, when the fruit trees were all in bloom and the grass in its freshest verdure, that he brought his Virginia to die.” Page 28. Edgar Poe and His Critics. New York: Rudd & Carleton, M DCCC LV [1855].
Available via Google Books Read free of charge @ https://www.google.com/books/edition/Edgar_Poe_and_His_Critics/9DNbAAAAMAAJ
Available via Internet Archive @ https://archive.org/details/edgarpoecritic00whitrich/page/n29/mode/1up

Young, Greg (Bowery Boys). "Edgar Allan Poe in New York: Places where the master of gloom and horror made his mark." The Bowery Boys: New York City History > Podcasts. Oct. 27, 2017.
Available @ https://www.boweryboyshistory.com/2017/10/edgar-allan-poe-new-york-places-master-gloom-horror-made-mark.html

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Wednesday, April 2, 2025

Edgar Allan Poe Walked the High Bridge Between the Bronx and Manhattan

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