The following has been taken from the Union Almanac for 1866 or 1867. The poem itself was published in part in 1869 in a book titled Beautiful Snow; and Other Poems by the publisher T.B. Peterson & Brothers (Philadelphia).
In the early part of the Civil War, one dark Saturday morning in the dead of winter, there died at the Commercial Hospital, Cincinnati, a young woman over whose head only 2 and 20 summers had passed. She had once been possessed of an enviable share of beauty, had been as she herself said, “flattered and sought for the charms of her face,” but alas, upon her fair brow had long been written that terrible word—fallen!
Once the pride of respectable parentage, her first wrong step was the small beginning of the same old story over again, which has been the only life-history of thousands.
Highly educated and accomplished in manners, she might have been helpful in the best of society, but the evil hour which proved her ruin was but the door from childhood, and having spent a young life in disgrace and shame, the poor friendless one died the melancholy death of a broken-hearted outcast.
Among her personal effects was found in manuscript “The Beautiful Snow” which was carried to a man of culture and literary tastes, at the time editor of the National Union. In the columns of that paper, on the morning following the girl’s death, the poem appeared in print for the first time. When the paper came out, the body of its author had not yet received burial. The attention of a leading American poet was directed to the newly published lines and he was so taken with their stirring pathos, that he followed the corpse to its final resting place.
Such are the plain facts concerning her whose poem will long be regarded as one of the brightest gems in American literature.
The Beautiful Snow
Oh the snow, the beautiful snow.
Filling the sky and earth below.
Over the housetops, over the street,
Over the heads of the people you meet.
Dancing, flirting, skimming along,
Beautiful snow, it can do no wrong,
Flying to kiss a fair lady’s cheek,
Clinging to lips in frolicsome freak.
Beautiful snow from heaven above
Pure as an angel, gentle as love.
Oh, the snow, the beautiful snow,
How the flakes gather and laugh as they go,
Whirling about in maddening fun,
It plays in its glee with everyone.
Chasing, Laughing, Hurrying by,
It lights on the face and it sparkles the eye.
And e’en the dogs with a bark & bound
Snap at the crystals as they eddey around.
The town is alive and its heart is aglow
To welcome the coming of the beautiful snow.
How wild the crowd goes swaying along,
Hailing each other with humor and song;
How the day sleighs like meters flash by.
As with jingling bells they swiftly fly.
Ringing, Swinging, Dashing they go
Over the crust of the beautiful snow.
Snow so pure when it falls from the sky
To be trampled in mud by the crowd passing by,
To be trampled and tracked by thousands of feet
Till it blends with the horrible filth in the street.
Once I was pure as the snow, but I fell
Fell like the snow flakes from heaven to hell;
Fell to be trampled as filth in the street,
Fell to be scoffed at, and be sit on and beat.
Pleading, Cursing, Dreading to die,
Selling my soul to whomever would buy;
Dealing in shame for a morsel of bread,
Hating the living and fearing the dead.
Merciful God, have I fallen so low?
And yet I was once like the beautiful snow.
Once I was fair as the beautiful snow,
With an eye like a crystal, a heart like its glow;
Flattered and sought for the charms of my face.
Father, Mother, Sisters all,
God and myself I have lost by my fall;
And the veriest wretch that goes shivering by
Will make a wide sweep lest I wander too nigh
For all that is in or about me I know
There is nothing so pure as the beautiful snow.
How strange it should be that this beautiful snow
Should fall on a sinner with nowhere to go.
How strange it should be when the night comes again
And finds me outside, weighed down by my sin
Fainting, Freezing, Dying alone,
Too wicked for prayer, to weak for a man
To be heard in the streets of the crazy town
Gone mad in the joy of the snow coming down;
To be and to die in my terrible woe
With a bed and a shroud of the beautiful snow.
Helpless and foul as the trampled snow,
Sinner, despair not. Christ stoopeth low
To rescue the soul that is lost in sin
And raise it to life and enjoyment again.
Groaning, Bleeding, Dying for thee,
The crucified hung on the accursed tree
His accents for mercy fell soft on my ear.
Is there mercy for me? Will he heed my weak prayer?
O God, in the stream that for sinners did flow
Now wash me and I shall be whiter than snow.
