The New Yorker, February 28, 1994 P. 54

FAMILY TREE about the contested paternity of Timothy Lincoln Beckwith, who may or may not be the last surviving descendant of Abraham Lincoln. Traces the sordid history of the president's descendants. Robert, the only Lincoln child to live to adulthood, had his mother committed to an insane asylum; there is evidence that he did so in order to gain control of her money. Robert's daughter, Jessie, was briefly married to one Warren Wallace Beckwith. Their children--Mary Lincoln Beckwith (called Peggy) and Robert Todd Lincoln Beckwith--were the last uncontested descendants and the last heirs of the substantial Mary Harlan Lincoln Trust, established by their grandmother. Peggy was apparently a lesbian; she became an eccentric recluse on the family estate in Vermont. Her brother married three times and lived on a Vermont farm left to him by his mother. Declared sterile by his doctor, Beckwith denied paternity of Timothy, born to his German second wife, Annemarie. The beneficiaries of the Trust--the American Red Cross, Iowa Wesleyan College, and the First Church of Christ Scientist--agreed that a considerable sum of money would go to Timothy after Robert Todd Lincoln Beckwith's death, so that their legacy would be free and clear.

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