Was Abraham Lincoln gay?
A controversial documentary re-examines the president’s relationships with men
DURING America’s civil war, in 1862, Abraham Lincoln reportedly began sharing a bed with his bodyguard, a soldier named David Derickson. The tittle-tattle was recorded in the diary of Virginia Woodbury Fox, the wife of Lincoln’s naval aide, who wrote about “a soldier here devoted to the president, drives with him, and when Mrs. L. is not home, sleeps with him”. She added: “What stuff!”
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This article appeared in the Culture section of the print edition under the headline “Was Abraham Lincoln gay?”
From the October 5th 2024 edition
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