← Back to the front page

Atypical Deaths of these Historical Figures

Khalid Elhassan July 14, 2020 34 min

Gouverneur Morris - Founding Father of the United States

37. Losing a Leg to Adultery

Gouverneur Morris’ risk-taking with a married woman in France was remarkable, considering his past negative track record when it came to affairs with married women. By the time Morris was assigned as a diplomat to France, he was hobbling around on just one leg, having lost the other because of an adulterous escapade.

It had happened a decade earlier in 1780, in Philadelphia, while fleeing from an angry husband livid at having been cuckolded by Morris. Running for his life, Morris got into an accident with a carriage that ran over and mangled his left leg, leading to its amputation above the knee.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.