William Ross Wallace

William Ross Wallace (1819 – May 5, 1881) was an American poet best known for writing "The Hand That Rocks The Cradle Is The Hand That Rules The World".

Wallace was born in Lexington, Kentucky in 1819.Wallace's obituary in "The New York Times" lists his place of birth as Paris, Kentucky. Most sources state he was born in Lexington, however.] His father, a Presbyterian preacher, died when Wallace was still an infant.cite book|first=William T.|last=Coggeshall|title=Poets and Poetry of the West|publisher=Follett, Foster, and Company|location=New York|year=1860|pages=227–37] Wallace was educated at Bloomington and South Hanover College, Indiana, and studied law in Lexington, Kentucky. In 1841, he moved to New York City, where he practiced law, and at the same time engaged in literary pursuits.cite encyclopedia |year=1889 |title =Wallace, William Ross |encyclopedia=Appleton's Cyclopedia of American Biography |publisher=D. Appleton and company|location=New York|pages=335] His first work that attracted favorable criticism, a poem entitled "Perdita", published in the "Union Magazine", was followed by "Alban" (1848), a poetical romance, and "Meditations in America" (1851). Other poems that attained popularity include "The Sword of Bunker Hill" (1861), a national hymn; "Keep Step with the Music of the Union" (1861); "The Liberty Bell" (1862); and his most famous poem, "The Hand That Rocks The Cradle Is The Hand That Rules The World" (1865), a poem praising motherhood.cite book|title=House of Beadle & Adams and its Dime and Nickel Novels: The Story of a Vanished Literature|first=Albert|last=Johannsen|publisher=University of Oklahoma Press|year=1950] He contributed to "Godey's Lady's Book", "Harper's Magazine", "Harper's Weekly", the "New York Ledger", and the "Louisville Daily Journal". William Cullen Bryant said of his writings: "They are marked by a splendor of imagination and an affluence of diction which show him the born poet." Edgar Allan Poe, a friend of Wallace's, referred to him as "one of the very noblest of American poets". [cite book|first=Nathaniel Parker|last=Willis|coauthors=James Russell Lowell|title=The Works of the Late Edgar Allan Poe|volume=3|publisher=J. S. Redfield|year=1857|pages=240–241] Wallace died at his home in New York City on May 5, 1881, a week after suffering a stroke.cite news|title=Death Of Wm. Ross Wallace. Poems That He Wrote, His Illness, And His Friendship With Poe|work=The New York Times|date=May 7, 1881|url=http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9F01E6DA133CEE3ABC4F53DFB366838A699FDE] He was working on a book to be titled "Pleasures of the Beautiful" at the time of his death.

Books by Wallace

*"The Battle of Tippecanoe, Triumphs of Science, and Other Poems" (1837)
*"Wordsworth: A Poem" (1846)
*"Alban the Pirate: A Romaunt of the Metropolis" (1848)
*"Meditations in America, and Other Poems" (1851)
*"Prattsville, an American Poem" (1852)
*"The Loved and the Lost" (1856)
*"Progress of the United States: Henry Clay, an Ode "Of Thine Own Country Sing" (1856)
*"Patriotic and Heroic Eloquence: A Book for the Patriot, Statesman and Student" (1861)
*"The Liberty Bell" (1862)

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