edited by his wife with a memorial by william hayes ward


Sidney Lanier (1842-1881), born in Macon, Georgia, was a musician, poet, and one the most important literary figures of the Reconstruction era South. A fervent supporter of the Confederacy, he volunteered with the first Georgia unit to fight on the Virginia lines, and was at Chickahominy and Malvern Hill. He later served as a mounted scout on the James River, and as a signalman for blockade runners entering the port of Wilmington. He was taken prisoner on Nov. 2, 1864 and held at Point Lookout for four months. The confinement broke his health as the war destroyed his fortunes. But it was out of this hardship that his literary career began, and his first book, the novel Tiger-Lilies (1867), chronicled his prison experience. The remainder of his short life was divided between his twin passions: playing music, as a member of the Theodore Thomas orchestra, and writing poetry. His emergence as a major poet came through the pages of Lippincott's, with the publication of "Corn" (Feb. 1875) and "The Symphony" (June 1875). In 1876,