Edgar Allan Poe Edgar Allan Poe was born in Boston, Massachusetts on January 19, 1809. This man created some of the most influential literary criticism of his time. Poe's parents were David Poe Jr. and Elizabeth Arnold Hopkins. They both died before he reached the age of 3. He was then taken into John Allan's custody as a foster child. John Allan was a very prosperous and rich merchant in Richmond Virginia. When he took in Poe, he …showed first 75 words of 410 total…

…showed last 75 words of 410 total…little success. Virginia's death in January 1847 was a heavy blow, but Poe continued to write and lecture. In the summer of 1849 he revisited Richmond, lectured, and was accepted anew by the fiancée he had lost in 1826. After his return north he was found unconscious on a Baltimore street. In a brief obituary the Baltimore Clipper reported that Poe had died of "congestion of the brain." Edgar Allan Poe died on October 7, 1849.