If the #MeToo movement has taught us anything,
it’s that perverts are everywhere.
The pages of history are no exception.
Below are 10 historically notable perverts,
who run the gamut from “midly kinky” to
“extreme sexual predator.”
There is always difficulty in applying modern
standards to actions of the past, but these
10 men all engaged in sexual behavior that
was (or would have been) considered outside
the norm, even in their own times.
10.
CS Lewis was into spanking, and an older woman
he called “mother”
Author CS Lewis wrote extensively on Christianity,
though he is perhaps best-known for the seven
children’s books he authored, which make
upThe Chronicles of Narnia.
But before he wrote beloved classics like
The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, Lewis
also wrote (in letters to a friend) about
his sadistic desires.
He dubbed himself “Philomastix,” meaning
“lover of the whip” in Greek, and wrote
to his friend, Arthur Greeves, detailing women
he thought would be “a suitable subject
for the lash,” including Greeves’ own
sister.
In another letter he also confides that, “There’s
no special virtue in a whip—hundreds of
other methods of mild torture are just as
good.”
And it wasn’t just women that Lewis wanted
to whip.
While visiting Exeter, Lewis was kicked out
by the Dean for getting “royally drunk”
and “imploring everyone to let me whip them
for the sum of 1s. a lash!”
Another odd quirk of Lewis’ life is his
relationship with Jane King Moore.
While being trained for the Army, Lewis made
a pact with his roommate Edward Moore to take
care of the other’s family, if either was
killed in the war.
Sadly, Moore died in action, and 18-year-old
Lewis formed a special bond with 45-year-old
Jane King Moore while recovering from his
own wounds, eventually moving in with her
and her family.
Lewis called Moore “mother,” but many
have suggested the relationship went well
beyond a familial bond.
A long-time friend of Lewis’ wrote of the
pair, “After conversations with Mrs. Moore’s
daughter, Maureen, and a consideration of
the way their bedrooms were arranged…
I am quite certain they were lovers.”
9.
Joseph Smith Jr. had up to 40 wives, some
in their teens
Joseph Smith Jr., the founder and prophet
of Mormonism, believed that polygamy was divinely
commanded.
Despite the on-and-off disapproval of his
first wife, Emma, Joseph Smith married a number
of additional wives—the Mormon church estimates
30-40 women were “sealed” to Joseph Smith.
Some of these marriages were unconsummated,
representing an eternal union of souls, while
some included all the earthly pleasures of
marriage.
Some were to single women, while others were
to women who already had husbands.
Smith’s youngest bride, Helen Mar Kimball,
was only 14 at the time of her marriage to
him.
While she initially found the idea of plural
marriage “improper and unnatural,” Kimball
was talked into the marriage by her father,
and by Smith.
In Kimball’s retelling, Smith persuaded
her to agree with the promise of heaven, recalling,
“[Smith] said to me, ‘If you will take
this step, it will ensure your salvation & exhaltation
& that of your father’s household & all
of your kindred.’
This promise was so great that I willingly
gave myself to purchase so glorious a reward.”
It is unclear whether Kimball and Smith’s
marriage was merely “celestial” or was
consummated.
What is clear is that Kimball was one of four
teenage brides Smith married in a single month—May
1843.
8.
Hans Christian Andersen wasn’t into sex,
but he liked to visit brothels and kept a
log of his masturbation sessions
Hans Christian Andersen may be best known
for his beloved children’s literature, including
such tales as The Little Mermaid and The Emperor’s
New Clothes.
However, in person, the Danish author was
not the jovial, grandfatherly figure many
might imagine.
Rather, he was awkward and neurotic.
Some of his quirks included dramatic behavior
when confronting rejection (he threw himself
facedown on Charles Dickens’ lawn and bawled
after reading a negative review) and some
phobias around death (when sleeping, he would
put up a note to indicate that he was sleeping
and not dead).
Some of Andersen’s oddest behavior had to
do with sex.
He visited brothels on numerous occasions,
but professed that he never had sex with the
women there, just looked and talked to them.
While visiting Paris, he noted in his journal
that the 18-year-old prostitute he engaged,
“undressed completely and seemed surprised
that I only looked at her.”
Andersen’s journals also contain detailed
records of his masturbatory sessions, indicating
what inspired them.
Particularly good sessions were marked “++”
and he even included such information as “penis
sore.”
Andersen’s sessions were inspired by both
men and women, and his letters show infatuations
with individuals of both sexes, though there
is no evidence that he ever consummated any
of his love affairs.
7.
Henry VIII needed a lot of women to keep him
happy, and the Pope wasn’t going to stand
in his way
Henry VIII is perhaps best known for his string
of wives—6 in total—and the way the unions
ended.
Two marriages ended in annulments, two ended
when Henry had his wives beheaded, one ended
when the wife died of natural causes, and
the last ended when Henry himself died.
However, even 6 wives weren’t enough to
keep the king satisfied.
He also had a string of mistresses, two of
whom bore him children.
One of the mistresses, Mary Boleyn, was the
sister of Anne Boleyn, who would become Henry’s
wife before being executed for adultery.
In order to land Anne Boleyn, Henry first
had to figure out a way to be rid of his first
wife, Catherine of Aragon (Catherine was also
keeping it in the family, having previously
been married to Henry’s brother, though
the marriage was never consummated).
Not only was Henry desperate to bed Anne Boleyn,
he was also seeking a healthy male heir, which
Catherine, who was pushing 40, had been unable
to produce.
When the Pope declined to annul the marriage,
Henry declared himself the head of the Church
of England and forever separated it from Papal
authority.
Henry VIII grew disenchanted with Anne Boleyn
and had her and several men of his court sentenced
to death for adultery (in the case of the
men, the charge was treason).
In the run-up to Boleyn’s execution, Henry
embarked on the party circuit, determined
to find a new bride and expressing his mood
as one of a man who ditches “a thin old
vicious hack in the hope of getting soon a
fine horse to ride.”
The new horse was Jane Seymour, and he married
her less than two weeks after Anne Boleyn’s
death.
Despite being prone to obesity himself, Henry
was picky about the appearance of his women.
When Anne of Cleves (his 4th wife) proved
to be less attractive than her portrait had
suggested, Henry couldn’t perform in the
marital bed, calling her body “disordered”
and saying “he could never in her company
be provoked and steered to know her carnally.”
The marriage was eventually annulled.
By the time he had beheaded wife #5 for behaving
like a “common harlot,” Henry’s sex
drive seemed to be on the wane.
Young women were reluctant to marry a king
who kept beheading his wives and Henry was
nursing a painful jousting injury, so he finally
settled down with a two-time widow who he
viewed as “a nursemaid rather than a bedmate.”
6.
Charlie Chaplin was into underage girls
Charlie Chaplin has been called “the first
global celebrity,” rising to fame through
his comic portrayal of “The Little Tramp,”
an Everyman character he embodied in more
than 80 films.
Known for the outsized pants and shoes and
signature moustache of the character he portrayed,
Chaplin was famous all over the world.
He was also known in a lot of women’s bedrooms,
once claiming to have slept with over 2,000
women.
At least some of the many women Chaplin bedded
were underage.
Three of his four wives were teenagers when
he married them; the other was in her 20s,
though she had claimed to be younger when
she met Chaplin.
Charlie’s first wife, Mildred Harris, was
a child star who was 15 when Chaplin met her,
and 16 when he married her, believing that
she was pregnant.
They divorced acrimoniously 2 years later.
Chaplin’s second wife, Lita Grey, was also
underage, just 15 when she became pregnant
with his child, and 16 at the time of their
marriage.
The marriage, which took place in Mexico,
came about when Grey refused his offers of
money and demands that she get an abortion,
and after her shotgun-wielding uncle reminded
Chaplin that Grey’s age would support charges
of statutory rape.
Grey, who has said of Chaplin, “He enjoyed
being the first person in a girl’s life,”
claimed that on their honeymoon, Chaplin told
her that marrying her was better than going
to prison.
Unsurprisingly, though it produced two children,
the marriage did not last, ending in a nasty
and public divorce, in which Grey accused
Chaplin of infidelity and “degenerate sexual
desires, too revolting… to set forth in
this complaint.”
Grey, who called Chaplin “a destroyer of
girls,” garnered a settlement of over $800,000,
the largest in US history at the time.
Charlie’s fourth marriage, when he was 54,
was also to a teenager—Oona O’Neil, who
was 18 at the time.
While the marriage took place over the objections
of O’Neil’s father, it was Chaplin’s
final marriage, enduring until his death in
1977.
5.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau wanted to be punished
like a little boy
Rousseau is credited with seminal contributions
to the development modern political thought;
his philosophy influenced the Enlightenment
and the French Revolution.
However, in addition to exploring the importance
of civil society and reason in human development,
Rousseau’s writings touch on another theme—his
enthusiasm for spanking and being dominated.
This fetish dates to being spanked by his
guardian when he was 11, an experience where,
“a degree of sensuality had mingled with
the smart and shame, which left more of a
desire than a fear of repetition.”
Rousseau was also into submission, writing,
“To fall at the feet of an imperious mistress,
obey her mandates, or implore pardon were
for me the most exquisite of enjoyments.”
Taking this fetish to the extreme, he called
an older woman with whom he had a long-term
affair “Maman” (“Mother”), and she
called him “petit” (“little one”).
Rousseau was also an exhibitionist, exposing
his bare butt to strangers, behavior that
was greeted with laughter and screams.
4.
King Edward VII earned the nicknames “Edward
the Caresser” and “Dirty Bertie”
Edward VII was 59 when he finally became the
King of England.
He used the long wait to engage in all kinds
of debauchery.
Edward’s long string of scandals began with
an affair with a prostitute when he was 19.
Edward’s parents, Queen Victoria and Prince
Albert, were horrified, and Albert chewed
Edward out during a long walk in the rain.
Shortly after this altercation, Albert came
down with typhoid and died.
Victoria, who never really liked her son,
blamed Edward’s inability to keep it in
his pants for his father’s death.
Albert’s death and Edward’s marriage did
nothing to curb the future king’s sexual
drive.
He often attended country house parties where
“corridor creeping” was a central activity.
Edward also kept an apartment in Paris, and
worked his way through the city’s brothels.
He was also an avid patron of the city’s
bars and restaurants and his expanding girth
(another of his nicknames was “Tum-Tum”)
began to constrain his sexual escapades.
Rather than give up either appetite, Edward
commissioned a special sex chair that supported
his weight and allowed him to receive the
“royal treatment” from two women at once.
When he was finally named king, Edward designated
a pew at Westminster for his “special ladies.”
Even on his deathbed, one woman wasn’t enough
to please Edward.
In addition to his wife, his mistress was
present, and Edward even requested the two
women kiss before his long-suffering wife
ordered the mistress removed.
3.
Caligula was into absolute power… and maybe
his sisters
Caligula ruled as Roman emperor for only four
years, from AD 37 to AD 41, but managed to
spark an astounding array of rumors during
that short time, before he was assassinated
by members of the Praetorian guard.
Reports of his initial rule, which included
elaborate public spectacles, including gladiatorial
games, were largely positive.
However, after recovering from an illness
(or perhaps a failed poisoning), Caligula’s
behavior changed dramatically.
He took on wasteful and pointless construction
projects, eliminated his political enemies,
and sought to be worshiped as a god.
Contemporaneous Roman historians, including
Seneca the younger, suggest he was a man prone
to many vices, with a vicious temper and a
penchant for cruelty.
Seneca describes how Caligula bedded another
man’s wife and then publicly, “at the
top of his voice, reproached this man with
the way his wife behaved in bed.”
However, the most extreme charges about Caligula’s
behavior were leveled by two Roman historians
who were born after Caligula’s death, Cassius
Dio and Suetonius.
The passage of time suggests these salacious
accounts may not be entirely accurate, but
they do show the depths of perversion with
which Caligula is associated.
Cassius Dio accuses Caligula of incest with
his sisters, saying that, “after ravishing
them all, he confined two of them to an island,
the third having already died.”
Suetonius accuses him of “unnatural relations”
with several men, including “certain hostages.”
He also accuses Caligula of “habitual incest
with all his sisters,” forcing them to engage
in threesomes with himself and his wife at
banquets.
Suetonius further notes that the incestuous
behavior with one sister began when Caligula
was a minor, and continued through her marriage
until her death.
According to Suetonius, “The rest of his
sisters he did not love with so great affection,
nor honor so highly, but often prostituted
to his favorites.”
2.
Grover Cleveland married a woman he had practically
raised and fathered an illegitimate child
(allegedly through rape)
When you think of US Presidential sex scandals,
Grover Cleveland may not be the first name
that comes to mind.
Nonetheless, his questionable relationships
with women suggest he may have been the country’s
most perverted president.
Cleveland’s sex scandal, which emerged in
1884, but took place 10 years prior, involved
accusations that he had fathered an illegitimate
child with Maria Halpin.
And it gets worse.
According to the affidavit she signed, Halpin
had been hounded by Cleveland (who was single
at the time) until she agreed to go to dinner
with him.
Afterward, Halpin claimed, the future President
walked her home and violently raped her, threatening
to ruin her if she told anyone.
Unfortunately, Halpin’s ordeal was far from
over.
Weeks later, she learned she was pregnant
and sought Cleveland’s help.
Instead of assisting Halpin, Cleveland arranged
for the baby, a son, to be taken from her
and adopted after it was born and for Halpin
to be committed to a mental asylum.
When the news of Cleveland’s involvement
in the incident emerged in the press, he launched
a smear campaign, admitting the two had been
involved (consensually, in his account), and
suggesting that he hadn’t been involved
in the life of his son because of “doubts
about his fatherhood.”
While the news that Cleveland had fathered
a child out of wedlock, and was likely a rapist,
briefly threatened to derail his Presidential
ambitions, Cleveland was still elected to
the White House in 1884.
Soon his love life would be in the papers
again, this time with his marriage to Francis
Folsom, who at 21 was 28 years younger than
Cleveland and would become the nation’s
youngest First Lady.
While the age difference is a big one, the
truly sketchy aspect of their relationship
was that Cleveland, initially known to Francis
as “Uncle Cleve,” had known his bride
since she was born, even serving as a quasi-guardian
after her father, Cleveland’s close friend,
died when she was 11.
Cleveland reportedly mentioned that he was
going to marry her when she was 8 and sitting
on his lap, and when asked by friends why
he was still a bachelor, responded, “I’m
waiting for my bride to grow up.”
They probably thought he was speaking in jest
(albeit somewhat creepily), but pervy Uncle
Cleve followed through, making the woman for
whom he had once purchased a pram his wife.
1.
The Marquis de Sade
Unlike the other men on the list, who are
famous primarily for other reasons and just
happen to also be perverts, the Marquis de
Sade is known primarily because he was a pervert;
or more accurately, a sexual predator.
“Sadism,” the word for the tendency to
derive pleasure from the pain of others, comes
from his name.
He literally wrote the book (or rather, books)
on it, penning dark pornography themed around
torture and depravity that was considered
so dangerous that France criminalized publication
of several of his works until the 1950s.
Unfortunately, Sade’s twisted fantasies
were not contained merely in his books.
He spent much of his life in prison or mental
hospitals for his various sexual crimes.
His first serious conviction was for tying
up a chambermaid, cutting her, and dripping
hot wax in her wounds.
The next was for, on a trip with his manservant,
poisoning several prostitutes (2 of whom nearly
died) with chocolates laced with aphrodisiacs
to make them more amenable to his deviant
sexual desires.
After escaping from prison, Sade brought his
wife into the act.
The pair recruited some young (15-years-old,
or so) servants and those “Five young females
and one male were trapped in the chateau for
six weeks of depredations, orchestrated in
theatrical fashion by Sade under the indulgent
eyes of his wife.”
This was the last straw for Sade’s mother-in-law,
who had a royal warrant issued for his indefinite
incarceration.
