Any living (and contactable) descendants of Edgar Allen Poe?

Question

I need to get in touch, if I can somehow, with a present day descendant of Edgar Allen Poe, but I have no idea how to or who I could talk to about it. All I really need is a Primary source for information on him for a report, and perhaps some physical details to present.

Answer 1

Poe's relatives would not be primary sources because they would be dependent on other sources, not having known Edgar themselves.

He wrote a brief autobiographical note. You will find it at:
http://www.eapoe.org/works/misc/poeautob.htm
but unfortunately no one knows how much of what he wrote was fact and how much was fiction!

The Edgar Allan Poe Society has published the following about his appearance:
Most general accounts of Poe's appearance relate that he was a handsome man. Women in particular considered him good looking. His attractiveness was enhanced by his bearing, which seems to have been influenced by his brief military experience. A great number of comments focus on the expansive nature of his forehead, which was granted special significance while phrenology, now dismissed as nonsense, was widely considered a reliable science.


"His face is a fine one, and well gifted with intellectual beauty" (Thomas Dunn English, The Aristidean, April, 1845. The Poe Log, p. 529).

"Poe, himself, is a very good looking fellow" (William Gilmore Simms to the Southern Patriot, July 15, 1846, quoted in The Poe Log, p. 655)

"Mr. Poe is a small thin man, slightly formed, keen visaged with dark complexion, dark hair, and we believe dark eyes. His face is not an ordinary one" (John M. Daniel, The Semi-Weekly Examiner, August 21, 1849, quoted in The Poe Log, pp. 827.)

In 1845, Poe greeted Mrs. Osgood with ". . . his proud and beautiful head erect, his dark eyes flashing with the elective light of feeling and of thought, a peculiar, an inimitable blending of sweetness and hauteur in his expression and manner. . . . " (Frances S. Osgood )

"His features were not large, were rather irregular, and decidedly handsome. . . . The general expression of his face beyond the ordinary abstraction was not pleasant. It was neither insolent, rude, nor angry. But it was decidedly disagreeable, nevertheless. . . . His forehead was, without exception, the finest in its proportions and expression that we have ever seen" (John M. Daniel, Southern Literary Messenger, March 1850. Reprinted in Ian Walker, Edgar Allan Poe: The Critical Heritage, p. 362).

"He was, in my opinion rather [more] distinguished-looking than handsome" (Susan Archer Tally Weiss, "The Last Days of Edgar A. Poe," p. 711).

"Poe had a remarkably pleasing and prepossessing countenance, what the ladies would call decidedly handsome" (William Gowan, quoted in Quinn, p. 267 and The Poe Log, p. 242).

"I distinctly recall his face, with its ample forehead, brilliant eyes, and narrowness of nose and chin; an essentially ideal face, not noble, yet anything but coarse, with the look of oversensitiveness which when uncontrolled may prove more debasing that coarseness. It was a face to rivet one's attention in any crowd; yet a face that no one would feel safe in loving. . . . " (Thomas Wentworth Higginson, quoted in The Poe Log, pp. 577-578).

"His face was rather oval -- tapering in the contour rather suddenly to the chin, which was very classical -- and, especially when he smiled, really handsome" (Thomas Holley Chivers, Chivers Life of Poe, pp. 56-57).

"Poe's face was handsome. Although his forehead when seen in profile showed a receding line from the brow up, viewed from the front it presented a broad and noble expanse, very large at and above the temples" (John Sartain, Reminiscences of a Very Old Man, New York: Benjamin Blom, 1899, p. 215. Reprinted by New York: Benjamin Blom, 1969).

Answer 2

He did not have any known children so he would not have any descendants.

As for other relatives, his 2 siblings also died childless as far as anyone knows. He seems to have had 2 or 3 uncles. If any of those people had any children then anyone alive today would be a very distant cousin of Poe's, not a descendant, and would not be considered any more of a primary source than anyone else.

Answer 3

Sonny Poe 101 cousin of ole Edgar!

Answer 4

For the best answers, search on this site https://shorturl.im/avtCo

Edgar Allan Poe, second son of David, Jr. and Elizabeth Arnold Poe, was born January 19, 1809, and died October 7, 1849. He was married May 16, 1836, to HIS 14 YEAR OLD COUSIN, Virginia Clemm, daughter of William and Maria Poe Clemm. She was born August, 1822, and died January 30, 1847. They had no children.

Answer 5

I m a blood relative of Edgar Allen Poe. He s my great great ....great Uncle. He married a Feagan and from his children I came. My grandma has a whole family tree from when he was around.

Answer 6

well i happen to be a relative of Edgar Allen Poe

Answer 7

Im a descendant of E.A.P., on my fathers side, my name is Evan, i will not give a last name, not because i am afraid of any sort of publicity, not that i would get any, but because i dont like stalkers. I am not of the Poe name, therefor not a direct descendant (per say) but rather a descendant of a "bastard" (someone who is born when someone who is married cheats) you may say im a liar if you wish but i am open to getting in contact with anyone who wishes to, well, get in contact.