Grover & Frances Cleveland: Cleveland Writes To His Bride-To-Be About Their Wedding

Background

Entitled “The President’s Sweetheart,” the article in the April 27, 1886 issue of the New York Times put the question succinctly: “I suppose the main question of interest is, ‘Is there any doubt that President Cleveland is going to marry Miss Folsom?” The answer, at least to Grover Cleveland and his bride-to-be, was absolutely no doubt at all. In fact, even as the press speculated, Cleveland was writing Frances “Frank” Folsom, heretofore his public ward but now his secret fiancée, to plan the wedding…

I have been thinking to-day of writing to the four members of our families and my intimate friends and the Cabinet families General Sherman and his wife Admiral Porter and his wife Chief Justice White and wife & daughter. We could very easily muster up a list of fifty or sixty. I don't want you to hesitate a moment to tell me just what you want, and I much desire you to have some friends personal and all your relatives if you think it best. I think I should like to invite beside Bissell [his old Buffalo law partner] Goodyear & his wife & Sicard [an ex-Buffalo law partner] and his wife. I shall wait anxiously to hear your views….I love you very much Dearest and I do so much want all as you desire. 

Cleveland, who in addition to being twice his bride’s age, had initially been her legal guardian, becoming so when her father was killed in an accident. And while as a bachelor, though notably drawn to feminine charms, he was not tempted to marry any but young “Frank.” Indeed, when asked, during his long bachelorhood, why he did not marry, Cleveland was wont to reply "I am waiting for my wife to grow up."

Some twenty people, ultimately, witnessed the marriage ceremony of, as it happened, the only sitting president to wed in the White House itself. And Frank too, set a record, becoming at 21 the nation’s youngest First Lady. The marriage yielded five children, lasting 22 years, until Cleveland’s death in 1908. It was a notable alliance, not just for its unique beginning in the White House, or her youth, but for the happiness both husband and wife found in it. 

Autograph Letter Signed (“G.C”), as president, 3 pages, quarto, Executive Mansion, Washington. To “My Darling,” Miss Frank Folsom; with Autograph Executive Mansion Envelope, addressed to Folsom in Paris.