William Howe Cuyler Hosmer

Circa 1855

William Howe Cuyler Hosmer or William H. C. Hosmer (May 25, 1814 - May 23, 1877) was a poet from the United States.

He was a cousin of sculptor Harriet Hosmer and tragic actress Jean Hosmer.[1]

Biography

Hosmer was born in Avon, New York, as the son of lawyer George Hosmer. He graduated at the University of Vermont in 1841, studied law, and became a master in chancery at Avon, and in 1854 was appointed clerk in the New York City Custom House. He was a student of the character and lore of the Native Americans in the United States, and traveled extensively among the tribes of Florida and Wisconsin.

Hosmer's lengthy narrative poem Yonnondio, or the Warriors of Genesee may have inspired or informed a short poem of the same name by Walt Whitman.[2]

Literary works

  • The Fall of Tecumseh, a drama (Avon, 1830)
  • The Themes of Song (Rochester, 1834)
  • The Pioneers of Western New York (Boston, 1838)
  • The Months (1847)
  • Yonnondio, or the Warriors of Genesee (New York, 1844)
  • Bird-Notes (1850)
  • Indian Traditions and Songs (1850)
  • Legend of the Senecas (1850)
  • Poetical Works, a collection of the above-listed works (2 vols., 1854)

Notes

  1. ↑ The Theatre. Wyman & Sons. 1890.
  2. ↑ Folsom, Ed. Walt Whitman's Native Representations. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1997: 79. ISBN 0-521-58572-4

References

  • "Subjects of Biographies". Dictionary of American Biography. Comprehensive Index. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. 1990.
  •  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Wilson, James Grant; Fiske, John, eds. (1892). "Hosmer, Titus". Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography. New York: D. Appleton.
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