Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The Poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was married to a Mary S. Potter she died in childbirth the baby died too. He was very sad. He wrote a poem about her, it was his only love poem. Later he was courting another lady Francis Appleton, she wrote a letter to her sister and said that he was not a songbird he was a mockingbird. They eventually got married and were very happy, and deeply in love. They had six children. 
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was good and teaching things to people. One of his six children died in it's first year and they were heartbroken. Eventually he got back to teaching. Then Henry had another really sad thing happen in his life. One day when his wife was curling her daughter's hair, one of the papers got caught in the fire and set her dress on fire. Henry heard her scream and ran in. He got a rug to cover her with but it wasn't big enough. She pushed him away and ran to the door but before he could put out the flames she was really burnt. The doctor was called but she only lived about one day. Henry was very badly burned and couldn't attend her funeral. He was heartbroken and sad for a long time after this. He grew a beard, most probably to hide his scars.

This is the Sonnet he wrote in her honor:

In the long, sleepless watches of the night,
A gentle face--the face of one long dead--
looks at me from the wall, where round its head
The night-lamp casts a halo of pale light.
Here in this room she died, and soul more white
Never through martyrdom of fire was led
To its repose; nor can in books be read
The legend of a life more benedight.
There is a mountain in the distant West
That, sun-defying, in its deep ravines
Displays a cross of snow upon its side.
These eighteen years, through all the changing scenes
And seasons, changeless since the day she died

He died at Harvard March 24th 1882. Everyone said he was a gentle soul.