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Poe is born
Edgar Poe is born in Boston to Elizabeth Arnold Poe and David Poe, Jr., both traveling actors. The couple already has one son named Henry. -
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Edgar Allan Poe's life span
Poe is born in Boston to Elizabeth Arnold Poe and David Poe, Jr., both traveling actors. After being found unconscious in a Baltimore gutter, Edgar Allan Poe is taken to the hospital and pronounced dead of causes still unknown. -
Poe's sister is born
Poe's sister Rosalie is born. Shortly after her birth, or possibly even before it, David Poe deserts the family, leaving Poe's mother alone with three children. Making matters worse, Elizabeth Poe soon falls ill with tuberculosis. -
Poe's perenst die
Elizabeth Arnold Poe dies of tuberculosis in Richmond, Virginia. Within days, David Poe also dies of tuberculosis. With no parents to take care of them, the three children of the family are split up. Henry goes to live with his paternal grandparents. A Richmond couple, John and Frances Allan, take in Edgar as a foster child. Rosalie is taken in by another Richmond family named Mackenzie. Both Edgar and Rosalie adopt their foster families' names as their middle names. -
Poe's family sails to London
The Allan family sails to London, where Edgar enrolls in school. -
The family moves back to th e U.S
Five years after leaving America for England, the Allans return to Richmond, Virginia. -
Poe's first poem
A fifteen-year-old Edgar Allan Poe pens his first known poem: "Last night, with many cares & toils oppres'd,/ Weary, I laid me on a couch to rest." -
Poe goes to collage
Poe enrolls midway through the academic year at the University of Virginia, which had opened less than a year before. -
Poe leaves the Allans
After making a $2,000 gambling debt while at college, He gets into an argument with his foster father and John Allan refuses to give him money to settle the debt. Poe ditches college and his family. He moves to Baltimore to join relatives there. -
Poe becomes an author and a solider
Poe enlists in the U.S. Army under the name "Edgar A. Perry." Shortly after, his first book—a poetry collection entitled Tamerlane and Other Poems—is published. The author is listed only as "A Bostonian." -
Poe's foster mother dies
Poe's foster mother, Frances Allan, with whom he was still close to, dies in Richmond. Poe, who is now a sergeant major in the Army,gets permission to leave to travel to her funeral. -
Poe's second book published
He publishes his second book of poetry, Al Aaraaf, Tamerlane and Minor Poems. -
Poe's brother dies
Edgar's older brother Henry dies of either tuberculosis or cholera at the age of 27. -
Poe takes a job
Poe takes a job as editor of the Southern Literary Messenger magazine. He publishes critical reviews of other writers' work as well as his own stories and poems. -
Poe gets merried
Poe—now 27 years old—marries his thirteen-year-old cousin, Virginia Clemm, at a ceremony in Richmond, Virginia. -
Poe moves north
Poe moves his new wife and mother-in-law to New York and then to Philadelphia. -
Poe's first novel
Poe's first novel, The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym, is published. -
Death of Wife
Poe's wife Virginia dies of tuberculosis at their home in the Bronx. Poe has been so despondent during the final months of her illness that friends thought he was going insane. The loss of his wife sends Poe into a downward spiral of alcoholism. -
Poe dies
After being found unconscious in a Baltimore gutter, Edgar Allan Poe is taken to the hospital and pronounced dead of causes still unknown. He is buried at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Baltimore.