Swan Point Cemetery was established in 1846, just two years before Edgar Allan Poe and Sarah Helen Whitman would be strolling among the graves together during their courtship.

Swan Point was one of the first garden cemeteries in the country, which were becoming majorly popular in the United States during the mid-nineteenth century. Small urban cemeteries were becoming overcrowded and raising health concerns among citizens. The garden cemetery movement allowed families to spread out their deceased loved ones.

Among the two hundred acres of Swan Point, you will find the final resting places of some of Providence’s most notable people, politicians, governors, Civil War veterans, artists, and writers. One of the cemetery’s most famous occupants is H.P. Lovecraft. A number of Whitman’s friends are also buried in this cemetery, a few of which were also acquainted with Poe.

Within the first few weeks of their romance in September 1848, Poe and Whitman visited Swan Point Cemetery. It was here that Whitman listened to another one of Poe’s proposals of marriage. She recounted that “he endeavored…to persuade me that my influence and my presence would have power to lift his life out of the torpor of despair which had weighed upon him, and give an inspiration to his genius, of which he had as yet given no token. Notwithstanding the eloquence with which he urged upon me his wishes and his hopes, I knew too well that I could not exercise over him the power which he ascribed to me. I was, moreover, wholly dependent on my mother [Anna Power], and her life was bound up in mine.”

A few days after this occurrence, Poe revisited Swan Point alone before he boarded the 6:00 P.M. train from Providence to Stonington, Connecticut, where he would then take the steamboat bound for his home in New York. He did not visit Whitman again before leaving Providence, writing his reason in a letter to her a few weeks later: “I cannot explain to you—since I cannot myself comprehend—the feeling which urged me not to see you again before going—not to bid you a second time farewell. I had a sad foreboding at heart.” Swan Point Cemetery bore witness to some of the most private moments between Poe and Whitman during their relationship.

The cemetery also served as inspiration for Whitman’s poetry. She wrote a poem for the consecration of Swan Point titled, “The Garden Sepulcher.” She lamented her relationship with Poe in a number of sonnets written after his death with multiple mentions of Swan Point throughout her work.

It is important to note that this is a private, active cemetery where photography is prohibited. You are required to obtain a permit to take and publish photos. You can contact the cemetery here for further details and instructions.