By Walt Whitman’s own estimate, he ministered to some 100,000 sick or wounded soldiers in army hospitals during the Civil War.  In Memoranda, he recalls this experience by recording his encounters with fifty or so of those hundred thousand men.  Who are Whitman’s chosen few?  And why did he choose them?

These annotations allow students to begin  to answer the "who" question by providing a thumb-nail sketch of each soldier as he (more or less) appeared to Whitman during the war:  name; loyalty; service history; and personal background (residence, occupation, marital status, physical description, religion, and nativity).  In addition, the soldier’s appearance in other Whitman works such as his hospital notebooks or correspondence (the genesis for many of the sketches) is provided.  Finally, a postscript (when possible) follows the soldier back to civilian life.

Given at least a partial answer to the "who" question, students are invited to wrestle with the more intriguing "why."  To stimulate this process, the "Critical Issues" section provides an introduction to various scholars’ analyses of  the meaning of the individual soldier in Whitman’s Memoranda.  The "Study Questions" provide some follow-up inquiries that students are encouraged to supplement with their own.

For a note on the sources used to compile these annotations, please click here.