MISSY LEHAND's OTHER MAN : WILLIAM BULLITT and THE CHOICE

Known for her dedication to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt,  Missy LeHand seems to have one known serious beau, a man named William "Bill" Bullit who happened to be a State Department staffer and speechwriter for FDR, and then Ambassador to France. He was in her life for about seven years. Missy had a charm bracelet for which Bullitt was one beau who brought her symbolic gold charms.

Missy is said to have lived for Bill's visits. They wrote each other letters. Their last trip together was when they went to Philadelphia with FDR, not long after her 45th birthday.  Bill was about 50 then. It's said that she both broke off the romance and was devastated to have broken it off.  And so Bill's existence in her life makes us wonder if chose FDR over him.

After weeks of 18 hour days, Missy suffered a "health crisis."  What was wrong with her? Though supposed to be related to workaholic stress and the effects on her heart, perhaps it had something to do with FDR's other Mistress, now a married woman, Lucy Mercer, then about 50, who made her first trip to visit FDR at the White House while Missy LeHand was installed there. Lucy was the Mistress who had threatened FDR's marriage and yet he had not left his wife, First Lady of the United States, Eleanor, for her.

Was Missy's chest pain and irregular pulse due to emotional stress?  Her emotions were on a roller coaster.  After her strokes, angry outbursts and hysteria now characterized the woman. Were these emotions part of mitral valve infection?  Did she take opiates or sulfa drugs?  It was 1941, pre penicillin, and Missy's health would soon end her relationship and influence on the President and his administration.