#1Jan 16th, 2005
"The Intimate World of Abraham Lincoln," by C.A. Tripp, has ruffled more than a few feathers among biographers, historians and readers alike by focusing on an issue that has been a subject of scholarly debate for years.
While other biographers have tended to skirt the question of Lincoln's sexuality, Tripp's tome tackles it head-on, suggesting Lincoln had physically intimate relations with a succession of men before and during his troubled marriage to Mary Todd.
While in his late 20s, Lincoln shared a bed with his close friend Joshua Speed for four years and, Tripp asserts, later did the same with a presidential bodyguard whenever his wife was away.
Critics of Tripp's book have pointed out that men sharing beds was common practise in the 1800s, often on a practical level, due to insufficient heating and a lack of comfortable mattresses.
