A Secret Life: The Lies and Scandals of President Grover Cleveland

by Charles Lachman

  Two of Hovenden’s unmarried daughters lived with him and tried to comfort the old man. “Well, Father, it is not your fault, dear. You could not have guarded against this,” Maria’s sister said.

  “I know,” Hovenden answered. “But I, her father, knew nothing of this. I do not even now know what the exact story is. I know, however, that it is bad, very bad. Here I am almost blind and we, my children, have this additional affliction. Oh, I wish I could but meet Maria. I would have her tell all. There must be some truth in the terrible accusation.”

  One of Hovenden’s daughters wanted the reporter to understand what the family was going through. “We have known, sir, nothing whatever about this awful story. We feel the disgrace keenly.” She said Maria had visited her father’s home just three weeks before. It was the first time they had seen each other since the early 1860s, when Maria had married Frederick T. Halpin. She had come to call because she had heard that her father was dying. “It is indeed strange that she never confided this matter to her family,” she added.

  Hovenden had many questions concerning Maria’s life in Buffalo and the birth of Oscar Folsom Cleveland. The newsman from the Brooklyn Times told them everything he knew, and the Hovendens expressed their appreciation. It was better to know now than to read about it in cold type. Still, the information was “like knives piercing their hearts.” No matter what the set of circumstances, according to the code of conduct by which they all lived, Maria was in a state of ignominy and had brought shame on her family.

  From college school girl to First Lady.

  A woman defamed. The first photograph published of Maria Halpin.

  Another unauthorized ad using the image of the First Lady, this time for a popular laxative.

  Campaign poster from Cleveland’s re-election bid, with running mate Allen Thurman. Note the presence of First Lady Frances Folsom Cleveland in center. First Ladies were rarely seen during election campaigns. Cleveland lost.

  Cancerous growth removed during a secret operation on President Cleveland in 1893, now preserved at the Mutter Museum, Philadelphia.

  The other side of the specimen jar preserving President Cleveland’s cancercous growth.

  Cleveland became the first and, so far, only president to get married in the White House. The ceremony was held in the intimate Blue Room. From a 19th century hand-colored woodcut.

  First Lady Frances Folsom Cleveland, depicted in an ad for a bottle of medicine. The unauthorized use of her image infuriated the president.

  Excerpts from Maria Halpin’s Oct. 28, 1884 affidavit denouncing Grover Cleveland. “The circumstances under which my ruin was accomplished are too revolting on the part of Grover Cleveland to be made public...”

  Former First Lady Rose Cleveland, taken in Rome.

  Frances Folsom Cleveland, at age 22 she became the youngest First Lady in American history.

  Cleveland in 1886, the year she married Grover Cleveland and became First Lady.

  Grover Cleveland on board the private yacht Oneida, site of his secret cancer operation during his second term as president.

  Grover Cleveland as a young man.

  Helen Fairchild Smith, the dean, or Lady Principal, at Wells College. It was said she took it as her mission to prepare Folsom Folsom for the White House.

  Maria Halpin defends her honor in this excerpt from her affidavit, stating that her “life was as pure and spotless as that of any lady in the City of Buffalo—a fact which Grover Cleveland should be man enough and just enough to admit...”

  Maria Halpin says she “has been induced to remain silent”

  Maria’s brother-in-law, Simeon Talbott. He convinced Maria to give up Baby Oscar. Young woman on right is Maria’s daughter, Ada.

  Maria Halpin’s son, Frederick. He met with a top Cleveland aide in Room 210 at the Hoffman House hotel in Manhattan. To left, his sister Ada, Maria’s daughter from her first marriage.

  Maria Halpin’s son, Frederick Halpin, circa 1867. The back of the photo read, “Sick & expected to die.” Frederick survived, and lived to come to the defense of his mother’s honor.

  Obituary of Dr. James E. King Jr., from 1947. The son of Grover Cleveland and Maria Halpin, revealed for the first time in this book.

  Rose Cleveland’s “Viking”—Evangeline Marrs Simpson Whipple.

  Rose Elizabeth Cleveland served as her brother’s First Lady from March 4, 1885-June 2, 1886.

  The boys of the Buffalo Orphan Asylum, where Grover Cleveland’s illegitimate son, Oscar, was taken. The orphans are seen here harvesting potatoes for the orphanage.

  Rose Elizabeth Cleveland, in a studio portrait taken in Rome, Italy.

  The Cleveland Family. Marion (far left); Francis (Cleveland was sixty-six when he was born); Esther; and Richard. Said Cleveland of his days in retirement, “I herd the children.”

  The Cleveland siblings. Grover is at far left. Rose is second row, far left. Cecil and Fred, seated in front row, were lost at sea in 1872.

  The Goddess—Frances Folsom Cleveland, America’s youngest First Lady.

  The famous “I want my Pa!” cartoon from the Sept. 27, 1884 cover of “Judge” magazine. The edgy caption read, “Another voice for Cleveland.”

  The Lion in Winter. Last known photo of Grover Cleveland, taken March 5, 1908. He died fifteen weeks later.

  The Halpin affividait—”I did not believe it possible that even Grover Cleveland could attempt to further blacken me in the eyes of the world...”

  The Wells College Class of 1885. Frances Folsom is seen on second row.

  The Providence Lunatic Asylum, later renamed the Providence Retreat, where Maria Halpin was taken by force.

  The story that started it all—the July 21, 1884 edition of the Buffalo Evening Telegraph, with the famous headline, “A Terrible Tale.”

  The widow Emma Folsom and her daughter Frances. President Cleveland was offended when newspapers reported he was marrying Emma. “I don’t see why the papers keep marrying me to old ladies.”

  Other publications, chiefly the partisan Republican type, were disposed to give Maria the benefit of the doubt. Still fuming that his newspaper had been robbed of its huge scoop, the editor of Charles Banks’s New Rochelle Pioneer was now claiming that Maria had been “betrayed into the hands of her enemies.”

  When the editor was asked, “Where do you believe the woman now is?” he responded, “I do not know, but if you inquire from Mr. William Hudson, I think he can tell you.”

  Under pressure to account for Maria’s whereabouts, Hudson wrote an open letter from his office in Albany, stating that he knew nothing about the “alleged disappearance or so-called abduction” and had no more insight into what happened to the Halpin woman than any other citizen who followed the news. His denial was met with disbelief. The Pioneer posed the question, “How can Mr. Hudson . . . explain his business in New Rochelle on this very night and almost the very minute that she is known to have been taken away?”

  The stress of the previous week had gotten to James Seacord. In tears, he said that he missed his dead wife. “I have had trouble enough already, without more being added.” It was all too much for an old man to take.

  “Has Mrs. Halpin seen the story of her wrongs as published in the papers?” he was asked.

  “She had,” Seacord said.

  “What does she say of it?”

  “That it’s every word true.”

  Around New Rochelle, Seacord was reputed to be a solid citizen—poor but honest. He was utterly opposed to Maria Halpin going public about her relationship with Grover Cleveland. All he wanted was privacy. One New Rochelle resident said Maria “idolized her uncle,” predicting that if she ever emerged from hiding, she would “bow to his judgment” and remain mute.

  As the days passed and nothing was heard from Maria, her family in Brooklyn started thinking the worst. Her two unmarried sisters went to New Rochelle to speak with Seacord and look into the circumstances of Maria’s disappearance but, unable to make muc
h progress, returned home and reported the dismaying news to their father. Some questioned whether Maria would ever show her face again, considering the ignominy she had brought upon her family. To this, Hovenden responded, “She is my child, I am her father, I forgive her, but I must have her with me before I die.” As tears trickled into his long grey beard, the retired police officer summoned what strength he had left and declared, “If I could see as I once could, I would put a bullet through the heart of the villain who has wronged my child and brought upon us this disgrace.”

  Maria’s brother-in-law, Simeon Talbott, was on the road in Logansport, Indiana, when he received a letter from Grover Cleveland. Talbott had not heard from Cleveland in eight years since he had negotiated the five-hundred-dollar out-of-court settlement with Cleveland on Maria’s behalf. At that time, Cleveland had found the traveling leather-goods salesman to be an even-tempered fellow you could do business with, and they had worked everything out amicably. He had no reason to believe they could not do so now. Cleveland had written to Talbott as someone he could level with, man-to-man.

  When Talbott read the letter, he could not believe the arrogance of the governor of New York. In it, Cleveland urged him to make a public statement, declaring that Cleveland had always treated Maria Halpin with respect. If he did so, the governor promised him “anything I could wish for in case he was elected.” In his letter, Cleveland claimed that Horatio King’s smears—that Maria had been intimate with two and possibly four other men in Buffalo around the time of Baby Oscar’s birth—had been “wholly unauthorized by him and were not true.” He pledged that, in the event that Talbott issued the statement he proposed, the record regarding Maria’s alleged promiscuity would be “corrected.” Talbott felt like tearing the letter to shreds. His wife back in Jersey City had told him that Maria was offered a $10,000 enticement from the Democratic Party for her cooperation in defusing the scandal, but turned it down. According to Talbott, she said that she would rather “die” than issue any kind of public support for Cleveland. Talbott, seething with indignation, strode to the offices of the local newspaper, the Logansport Journal, to go public with what he really thought of Grover Cleveland.

  “Yes, I know Cleveland, perhaps better than any man living. Maria Halpin is my sister-in-law. The story told in the newspapers is literally true, and the half has not been told. Grover Cleveland did seduce my sister-in-law under a positive promise of marriage, while she was living in Buffalo. This I know to be true, and Cleveland afterward paid the five hundred dollars to me for Maria Halpin when legal proceedings were about to be instituted against him. Cleveland now has possession of the child.”

  James E. King Jr. was ten years old and vacationing with his mother, Sarah Kendall King, in Gilmanton, New Hampshire, that summer of 1884, blissfully unaware that the circumstances surrounding his birth had become the foremost issue of the presidential campaign. James was enjoying his summer, occupying himself with simple boyhood pleasures, when he became the focus of all this national attention. The day came when his mother, in a state of mounting panic, informed him that they were ending their vacation and immediately returning to Buffalo.

  Minnie Kendall took note of her sister-in-law’s hasty departure with a mixture of relief and contempt. Minnie, who was married to Sarah’s brother, William Kendall, had been hired by Dr. James King in 1874 to nurse Baby Oscar. The Kendalls had raised the child for the first full year of his life, until they were obliged to surrender him and get out of Buffalo because they knew too much. They had relocated to their home state of New Hampshire.

  Now in 1884, a reporter for the Chicago Tribune had come to her door and introduced himself. Her every instinct told her to keep what she knew to herself. Minnie Kendall shut the door in his face. In spite of everything, Sarah King was still family. This plus the fact that Dr. King had warned her numerous times over the years never to say a word about Baby Oscar. It took considerable persuasion by the Tribune reporter to finally get Minnie to talk. When she did, she confirmed that Oscar Folsom Cleveland was now known as James E. King Jr.

  “They engaged me to care for a young child. They said they would pay me for it. They both urged me to and told me several times that I would call him my twin baby. I finally consented, and they left the child.” She said she was told to call the boy Jack.

  Minnie recalled the day several weeks later when Dr. King came to her apartment and told her to bring “Jack” to the downtown law offices of Grover Cleveland.

  “Who was present at this time?”

  “Myself, Maria Halpin, the baby, lawyer, and Dr. King. It was in the forenoon that we went there.”

  “Have you seen a picture of Grover Cleveland?”

  “I have, and I should say, by the picture, that he was the lawyer who was there. What they took me and the child there for I don’t know, unless it was to ensure Maria Halpin that her child was alive and well.”

  Minnie said that when she was compelled to surrender the child after a year, Dr. King was “very anxious” for her to leave Buffalo.

  “He charged us over and over again never to tell what we knew about Maria Halpin’s child and used all manner of means to intimidate us and compel us to keep the matter quiet. Dr. King’s wife said to me just before we left Buffalo, ‘Maria Halpin has got that child now, but I will get him and then she will never see him again.’”

  The Kendalls settled in Rochester, New Hampshire. William Kendall found work in a factory; Minnie made shoes. It was unnerving that Sarah King was still taking her annual summer vacations in New Hampshire. Three years before, when Minnie was visiting family in Gilmanton, she was shown a photo of a little boy in a checked suit. “That is my Jack,” she recalled saying. She recognized him at once. But how could she be so certain? “I know it is,” Minnie said. “You can’t fool me. I declare it is the boy I nursed—Maria Halpin’s child.” William Kendall, who was present during the interview, corroborated his wife’s account.

  What induced Minnie Kendall to finally tell her story? She admitted that she was filled with anxiety about coming forward, but was doing so “in the interest of justice.”

  The past was finally catching up to James and Sarah King.

  12

  “A BULLET THROUGH MY HEART”

  DAN LAMONT, CLEVELAND’S right-hand man, sat at his desk frowning. In his hands, he held a letter, which he was so absorbed in reading he was not even aware that William Hudson had stepped into the office. Finally, he looked up and said, “I’m glad you’ve come. I want to talk to you about a perplexing matter.”

  Lamont rose from his desk and turned the key to lock his door. He wanted no one but Hudson to hear the story he was about to convey. “I don’t know what to do with these papers. If I show them to the governor, I fear he will put his foot on them. If I conceal them from him and turn them over to the managers of the campaign and he comes to know of it, he’ll be angry.”

  Hudson presumed that this must have something to do with Maria Halpin.

  Lamont continued. A letter addressed to Grover Cleveland had been sent from a tailor who lived in Millersburg, Kentucky. He was writing to let the governor know that he possessed embarrassing information concerning the private life of James G. Blaine. Lamont showed Hudson the letter. The gist of it was that when Blaine married the former Harriet Stanwood, on March 25, 1851, it had literally been a shotgun wedding. Harriet’s brother had had a rifle aimed at Blaine’s head during the entire ceremony. A son, Stanwood Blaine, had been born to the newlyweds eleven weeks later, on June 18, 1851. It was information, the letter writer maintained, that would “more than” offset this business with Maria Halpin.

  The tailor was offering to come to Albany at once and “submit his proof as well

  as himself to scrutiny.” It all somehow sounded plausible.

  Lamont wanted to know what Hudson thought he should do.

  “Turn them over to the governor, Dan, and let him deal with them. I cannot see that you can do anything else.”

&n
bsp; Lamont agreed. It might be just the thing they needed to “fight this other devilish thing.” He meant Maria Halpin.

  Lamont walked out of the office, and when he returned, Grover Cleveland was with him. Cleveland squeezed his bulky frame into Lamont’s chair and read the letter. Then he studied the supporting documents that had been mailed with it. When he was finished, he leaned his elbow on the desk and stared out the window, pondering the view of the park in front of the State Capitol building. Then he gathered the papers into a neat little stack.

  “I’ll take these,” he announced. “Say nothing about them to anyone. I say this to both of you. Dan, send for this man to bring his proof as soon as he can. Promise to pay his expenses. When that man does come, bring him directly to me. I will deal with him.”

  When Cleveland left the office, Lamont and Hudson stared at each other. They were speechless. “I’ll be hanged!” Hudson said. “He’s going to use them after all.”