1849: Found Delirious in Someone Else’s Clothes: the Mysterious Death of Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe was discovered slumped outside a Baltimore tavern being used as a polling place, barely conscious and dressed in clothes that were not his own. He could not explain where he had been for the five days since he was last seen, and he never recovered enough to try; he died four days later at a city hospital, aged 40.
On this date, his doctor recorded his last words as “Lord help my poor soul”, after a night of Poe repeatedly calling out a name, Reynolds, that no one has ever identified. Newspapers blamed drink, but Poe’s death certificate and medical records have since vanished, and the true cause was never established.
One theory, raised decades later, points to cooping: a 19th century election scam in which gangs plied captives with liquor and forced them to vote repeatedly in disguise, which would explain both his stupor and his stolen clothes. No version of events has ever been confirmed.
