Virginia Lucas Poetry Scrapbook

Biography of Philip Pendleton Cooke

            Philip Pendleton Cooke was born on October 26, 1816, in Martinsburg, West Virginia. His father, John Rogers Cooke, was an attorney and a member of the Virginia Constitutional Convention. His younger brother was writer John Esten Cooke and his cousin was John Pendleton Kennedy, a novelist and Maryland Congressman. He was also close friends with Edgar Allan Poe. 
            In 1824, Cooke’s family moved to Winchester where he enrolled in an academy. Later, in 1831, he attended the College of New Jersey (currently known as Princeton University). After graduating in 1834, he began studying law with his father in Winchester. Cooke later found the profession to be unpleasant and unrewarding. He was admitted to the bar in 1837, the same year he married Williann Corbin Tayloe Burwell with whom he later had four daughters and one son. Being a lawyer while also struggling with financial issues often got in the way of his literary career; however, he’d still find ways to write. 
            Poetry had always been a passion of Cooke’s. While living in Winchester as a teenager, he wrote poetry for the Winchester Virginia Republican. In college, he used a pseudonym to publish three poems in the Knickerbocker Magazine. After his return to Virginia, his work was most often seen in the Southern Literary Messenger which published his poetry under the pseudonyms “Larry Lyle” or “Zarry Zyle.” Most of America knew Cooke for his two poems, “Florence Vane” and “Young Rosalie Lee” which both gained wide popularity. In 1847, his book of poems titled Froissart Ballads, and Other Poems was published; however, only 750 copies were printed, and it was very unsuccessful. He turned to prose after his book’s failure in an attempt to gain financial success. Cooke continued writing prose until his death on January 20, 1850, after he contracted pneumonia while out hunting in the cold. He’s best known for “Florence Vane” and his contributions to American Romantic literature. 


Jackson, David K. “The Writings of Philip Pendleton Cooke.” The Southern Literary Journal, vol. 2, no. 2, 1970, pp. 156–58, http://www.jstor.org/stable/20077392.

Whitley, William B. “Philip Pendleton Cooke (1816–1850).” Encyclopedia Virginia, 22 Dec. 2021, https://encyclopediavirginia.org/entries/cooke-philip-pendleton-1816-1850/.