← Back to the front page

What Lincoln’s Pockets Held When he Died and Other Presidential Oddities

Khalid Elhassan July 15, 2021 36 min

Secret Service agents bust counterfeiters in 1879. United States Secret Service

Nan Britton and her daughter by President Warren G. Harding. New York Times

6. Warren G. Harding Used Secret Service Agents as Lookouts While He Got it on in White House Closets

Warren G. Harding’s affair with Carrie Fulton Phillips was low key. A more explosive one was with Nan Britton. After Harding’s death, she wrote a tell-all book, The President’s Daughter, in which she alleged that the deceased chief executive had fathered an illegitimate daughter upon her. Britton described salacious details that make the Clinton and Monica Lewinsky affair look like amateur hour. Among other things, Warren G. and Nan got it on in White House closets, with Secret Service agents posted as lookouts.

After she gave birth, Nan alleged that Harding had paid her $500 a month in child support – a considerable sum back then. Harding’s family rushed to defend what was left of his reputation and denied the affair. They painted Britton as a liar, and claimed that the 29^th president had been infertile, and so could not have possibly fathered a child upon her. Things remained in a he-said-they-said standoff until 2015 when a DNA test conclusively proved that the daughter, Elizabeth Ann Blaesing, was indeed, Harding’s child.

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.