The lesbian love story of the former first lady of the United States

When US First Lady Rose Cleveland met Evangeline, she could not name the relationship because more than a century ago, there was no word for love between two women.

In the summer of 1910, Evangeline Simpson Whipple told her housekeeper that nothing was to be moved while she was away. She was going away and would be back soon.

But Evangeline never returned. When she died in 1930, she was buried, as she wished, in Italy, next to the love of her life, the woman she had known for nearly 30 years. That woman, Rose Cleveland, had been the first lady of the United States.

Evangeline Simpson Whipple (left) and Rose Cleveland as young women. Photo: Minnesota Historical Society/New Jersey State Archives

The letters, kept by Evangeline's housekeeper in Minnesota, were compiled in a book published in 2019 and according to it, the relationship between Evangeline and Rose was not that of ordinary friends.

When President Grover Cleveland took office in 1885, he was still single, nearly 50 years old. For unmarried or widowed presidents, White House rules require a female relative to serve as First Lady. In U.S. history, about 13 women who were not the president's wife have served in this role.

Rose Cleveland, Mr. Grover's sister, was the most suitable choice. She was considered a respectable, well-educated woman, a former teacher at a girls' seminary and the author of several books.

After 14 months in office, Rose was allowed to return to normal life when the president got married. She returned to her family home in upstate New York.

Rose met Evangeline Simpson in the winter of 1889–1890, less than a year after her brother left office for the first time. Grover Cleveland was the only two-term president of the United States who did not serve consecutive terms.

They apparently met in Florida, where they spent much of their time socializing with wealthy families in the area. Rose was 43 and unmarried. Evangeline, about 33, had just inherited a fortune from her late husband, who was nearly 50 years her senior.

The affectionate letters began in April 1890, when both returned home. Evangeline lived in Massachusetts.

"My Eve! I love you so much! It paralyzes me... Oh Eve, Eve, surely you cannot realize what you mean to me," Rose wrote to Evangeline in a letter. "By every sign on Earth and in heaven, by every sign in soul, spirit and body, you are mine, inescapable. You must endure me for the rest of your life, Eve...".

"You are mine, I am yours, we are one and our lives from now on will be one, only God can separate us. I say this boldly, to pray and live by it. Am I too bold, Eve, tell me? ... I will go to bed, Eve, with your letters under my pillow," Rose wrote in another letter sent in May 1890.

Since only Rose's letters survive, it is not known how Evangeline responded. But one thing is certain: Rose did not know how to name their relationship. "I cannot find the words to say it, the right words are not spoken," she wrote. In fact, there was no word for same-sex relationships between women at the time.

According to Lizzie Ehrenhalt, author of a book that collects Rose Cleveland's letters to Evangeline, the concept of "romantic friendship" was very popular among women at the time. It was an emotional and intellectual intimacy, not necessarily sexual.

“This concept creates a certain degree of freedom for women, especially wealthy white women, to build more or less open relationships with each other,” Ehrenhalt says.

But Ehrenhalt argues that there was certainly a sexual element to the relationship between Rose and Evangeline, in addition to love and sweet words. One letter describes "long passionate embraces that brought both to the heights of pleasure, ending their quest for love."

Rose and Evangeline visited each other at home regularly. They vacationed together in Europe and the Middle East, and bought a property together in Florida. They made no secret of their relationship with their families, who seemed to accept it. Rose even wrote to Evangeline's mother to express her love for her daughter.

The relationship lasted six years before a turning point came. In 1896, Evangeline shocked her friends and family by announcing her engagement to Bishop Henry Whipple, a prominent Episcopal preacher from Minnesota who was 34 years her senior.

There are many signs that she was indeed in love with the bishop. Evangeline wrote about her feelings for Bishop Whipple in her diary.

The only known photograph shows Rose Cleveland (left) and Evangeline Simpson Whipple in the garden of Evangeline's home in Wayland, Massachusetts. Photo: Massachusetts Historical Society

Rose could not take the news of the engagement in stride. She begged Evangeline to reconsider. "I do not think you need me now. But I beg you to consider what I said this morning. I would give up everything if you would try one more time to come back to me," Rose wrote in a letter.

Evangeline married Bishop Whipple on October 22, 1896. Three weeks later, Rose sailed for Europe with a female companion and did not return for three years.

Rose continued to write to Evangeline, but the affectionate words gradually faded. She stopped calling Evangeline by her affectionate nickname and signed her letters with the more formal "REC," her full initials, Rose Elizabeth Cleveland.

On September 16, 1901, Bishop Whipple died at his home in Minnesota. Soon after, Rose's intimate letters to Evangeline continued.

Over the next nine years, their letters took on a new character, less passionate than at first, and more gentle and introspective. Evangeline still lived in Minnesota. Visits to each other's homes resumed.

By 1909, Rose was in her 60s and tired of traveling so much. "I need you and life is not long enough to wait," she wrote.

A year later, Evangeline's brother fell seriously ill while living in Italy. Evangeline and Rose rushed to Italy, sharing a cabin on a ship crossing the Atlantic.

When her brother died two years later, Rose and Evangeline continued to live together in the village of Bagni di Lucca in Tuscany, Italy. "I believe they felt a connection to Italy, where people can love freely, have a relationship without anyone else interfering," Ehrenhalt commented.

When World War I broke out in 1914, Rose and Evangeline organized and funded relief efforts, especially for the refugees who flooded into Tuscany in 1917. Then the Spanish flu pandemic hit. While caring for a sick friend, Rose contracted the virus. She died on November 22, 1918, at the age of 72.

Evangeline wrote to Bishop Whipple's daughter to tell of her grief: "The light has gone out. The loss of this noble and great soul is a pain I cannot overcome."

Evangeline lived another 12 years. She wrote a book about Tuscany and dedicated it to Rose. Evangeline died of pneumonia and kidney failure in London in 1930.

In 1969, a descendant of Bishop Whipple donated a collection of family papers to the Minnesota Historical Society. When staff discovered the love letters, a memo was issued warning that many of the letters “indicated a homosexual relationship existed between the two women” and should be kept from the public.

That secrecy order was lifted in 1978. Historians have talked about the letters for years, but they had never been fully published before Ehrenhalt and co-author Tilly Laskey's 2019 book.

“There have always been women who loved other women in every period of history,” Ehrenhalt writes.

Vu Hoang (According to Washington Post )

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