Billy Greene

First, there was William G. Greene, also known as Billy Greene. Lincoln worked with him in a general store owned by Denton Offutt in New Salem, Illinois. During this time, Lincoln and Greene shared a small cot.

Greene himself described their sleeping arrangements in an 1865 letter: “Mr. Lincoln and I clerked together for Offutt about 18 months and slept in the same cot. And when one turned over the other had to do likewise.”

Now, some academics argue that simply sharing a bed with another man was not out of the ordinary in the 1800s, when mattresses were expensive and beds were scarce.

But those in favor of the idea that Lincoln and Greene were romantically involved argue that they could have found a way to avoid sharing such a small cot, likely only about two and a half feet wide, if they had not wanted to bunk together.

“There almost certainly was the option to not share the cot,” historian Dr. Thomas Balcerski, author of  Bosom Friends: The Intimate World of James Buchanan and William Rufus King, says in the documentary.