10 Outrageous Historical Homosexual Scandals

Homosexual activity has always carried some level of risk as, if discovered, it was often used as a means to attack those involved. The results of being accused of homosexuality could range from simple mockery to social isolation to legal charges. Throughout history, there have been a number of scandals that were triggered by or involved accusations of acts that some considered to be unnatural.

Here are ten times when homosexual affairs turned into affairs of state.

Related: Top 10 Scandals with British Intelligence

10 Caesar, Queen of Bithynia

Julius Caesar had a pretty extraordinary career before he met his end at the point of assassins’ daggers. However, even at the height of his domination, people still mockingly referred to Caesar as the “Queen of Bithynia.”

This nickname came from a youthful dalliance while on an early military campaign. As a minor officer serving in Asia, he was dispatched to the court of King Nicomedes IV of Bithynia to ask for the loan of a fleet of ships. Caesar was successful in his mission—but rumors persisted that he had only managed to get the fleet in return for sexual favors to the king.

The Romans were fairly unfazed by a discreet bit of homosexuality as long as you played the active role in the act. Many of Caesar’s enemies said that he gave his virginity to the king and played the role of a queen. Even Caesar’s soldiers got in on the fun when they sang a bawdy verse about the homosexual adventures of their general.^[1]

9 The Lavender Scare

The 1950s were not a great time to be gay in the United States, with gay bars being raided by police and social ostracism ruining lives.

Things got worse when homosexuals were dragged into the Red Panic that was gripping the nation with fears of communist spies everywhere. It was soon labeled the Lavender Scare after homosexual men were called “Lavender Lads.” It was thought that gay men were a threat to national security as they were both morally suspect and open to blackmail. It never seemed to occur to anyone that they were only able to be blackmailed because of the legal peril and shame society attached to homosexuality.

At various congressional committees, witnesses claimed there were hundreds of gay men working in the government and thousands more in various departments. There were hopes that all gays could be rooted out with witnesses being asked if there was a “quick test like an X-ray that discloses these things?”

With no way to tell who was gay and who was not, investigations were widespread and operated on innuendo. President Eisenhower authorized dismissing federal employees for “sexual perversion.” Many gay men were fired and found it hard to find further employment because of the suspicions around them.^[2]

8 Dublin Castle Scandal

By 1884, there was a strong political lobby arguing for home rule for Ireland, which for centuries had been under the domination of the English. Dublin Castle was the center of the English government in Ireland, so when rumors of homosexual activity among the officials who worked there began to spread, William O’Brien, a politician and journalist, decided to print the rumors. One of those accused was Gustavus Cornwall, head of the post office.

Cornwall could not afford to allow his reputation to be damaged by these reports, so unwisely, he decided to sue for libel. This proved to be a mistake because, during the trial, three men who Cornwall had slept with gave testimony against him. They revealed a thriving gay scene in Dublin, which included dances where men dressed as women and casual sex could be found in the botanical gardens.

Cornwall was apparently known by the name Duchess among his gay friends, whose names were also revealed. Cornwall lost the case and fled Ireland, but others who had been outed found themselves on trial for “gross indecency.”

James “Pa” Pillar was a respectable grocer in the city, but he was named in many of the subsequent trials. He was charged with buggery, and when he was found guilty, he was sentenced to 20 years in prison.^[3]

7 Liber Gomorrhianus

Those who set themselves up as moral guardians must always be careful not to be seen as hypocrites. In the Middle Ages in Europe, there was no organization more powerful than the Catholic Church, and they could not even escape suspicion. There was something about celibate men living together that made some people question what was really going on behind monastery walls.

In the 11th century, a monk called Peter Damien wrote a text called Liber Gomorrhianus (The Book of Gomorrah), which exposed the homosexuality rampant at various levels of the Catholic Church. Damien helpfully set out the various levels of sexual deviancy among sodomites “I distinguish four types of this nefarious sin. Some pollute themselves [masturbation], others are soiled by fondling each other’s male parts, others fornicate between the thighs or in the rear, and these ascend by grades, such that each one is worse than the previous.”

Damien denounced any priests who had committed sodomy because their impure hands were incapable of giving blessings. By listing the many sexual failings of clergy and monks, Damien spread the notion that even the holiest members of society might be committing the most outrageous sins behind closed doors.^[4]

6 Cleveland Street

In 1889, a homosexual brothel on Cleveland Street, London, was uncovered when police found a post office messenger with a suspiciously large sum of 14 shillings on him. They questioned how he had so much money, and he revealed he earned it through male prostitution at Cleveland Street. He also named other male prostitutes, and when they were arrested, they started to name their high-class customers.

Among those who were accused of soliciting gay sex at the brothel were Lord Arthur Somerset and the Earl of Euston. Several of the accused enjoyed close links to the royal family. Somerset fled the country, and the newspapers hinted that Prince Albert Victor, second in line to the throne, had gone on a visit to India to be conveniently out of the country as he was also a visitor to the brothel.

When the young men were sentenced to what the public considered to be light jail terms, suspicion arose that a deal had been made to protect their well-connected customers. The Cleveland Street scandal also gave rise to the idea that the wealthy and noble were preying on poor people for sex.^[5]

5 Oscar Wilde

The Cleveland Street scandal brought the idea of a homosexual menace to the British public, and accusations of homosexuality were taken very seriously. In 1895, the Marquess of Queensbury strode into a gentleman’s club and left a card on which he had scrawled “For Oscar Wilde, posing Somdomite [sic].” When this was given to Wilde, he decided to sue Queensbury for libel.

This was a terrible mistake. Wilde had been involved in a long-term affair with Bosie Douglas, son of the Marquess of Queensbury, and was well known among the male prostitutes of London. All that Queensbury had to do was produce some of the many gay men who Wilde had slept with to win the case. Wilde knew how dangerous his taste for members of the lower classes was—he called it “feasting with panthers”—yet he persisted in his case.

At the trial, a parade of witnesses produced incriminating testimony against Wilde, and the libel case was thrown out. However, a criminal case for gross indecency was soon arranged. Despite a spirited and typically witty defense of “the love that dare not speak its name,” Wilde was sentenced to two years in prison. The scandal ruined Wilde’s reputation and literary career but had a wider influence on negative views of homosexuality in British culture.^[6]

4 Wildeblood Scandal

In 1953, Lord Montagu hosted a gay summer retreat for two of his friends, Michael Pitt-Rivers and Peter Wildeblood. All three were wealthy and well-connected, but they also invited two young RAF airmen and, by all accounts, had a lovely time in a house by the sea.

There were suspicions about the sexual behavior of Montagu before this, and in 1954, authorities convinced the RAF airmen to give evidence against the others who had attended. All three faced trial for “conspiracy to incite certain male persons to commit serious offenses with male persons,” and much was made of their social superiority and corrupting influence on men of a lower class. Montagu was sentenced to 12 months in prison, while the others received 18 months each.

This scandal was wildly different from Wilde’s earlier trial, however, in that the harsh treatment of the three led to questions about the fairness of the law criminalizing homosexuality. While most men who had been accused of homosexuality had denied it and, once convicted, disappeared from sight, Wildeblood admitted he liked men and wrote a book about his experiences. This trial paved the way for a government inquiry into homosexuality, which led to decriminalization in 1957.^[7]

3 The Thorpe Affair

In 1979, the British press covered the extraordinary details of a trial involving Jeremy Thorpe, former leader of the Liberal Party. At its heart, the case involved the homosexual relationship between Thorpe and a man called Norman Scott, which was alleged to have begun in 1961. Thorpe was well known among his friends to be gay, having written to one, “Certainly it is the one city where a gay person can let down his defenses and feel free and unhunted… If I’m ever driven out of public life in Britain for a gay scandal, then I shall settle in SF!”

Scott tried to tell people about his affair with Thorpe, but no one would believe him. Allies of Thorpe arranged for payments to Scott and got him a passport in hopes he would move to America. Scott did not go and continued to bother Thorpe. It was at this point that it was alleged Thorpe snapped and tried to arrange for Scott to be murdered – though it was a bungled attempt. The only one who died was Scott’s dog, Rinka, who was accidentally shot.

At the trial for attempted murder, Thorpe and his accomplices were acquitted. The outcome may have been influenced by the judge’s summing up of the case, where he talked of Thorpe’s distinguished record while he referred to Scott in less glowing terms. “He is a sponger. He is a whiner. He is a parasite.”^[8]

2 Röhm Scandal

Among the many victims of the Nazis were thousands of homosexual men. The Nazi party declared openly and loudly that it had no place for homosexuals—despite the fact that one of their leading members, Ernst Röhm, was an enthusiastic and active homosexual.

The party could deny this for a number of years, but in 1932, a pamphlet was published that contained copies of Röhm’s letters in which he was explicit about his sexual activities with men. Röhm was head of the Nazi stormtroopers with important connections, so for a while, Hitler ignored calls to throw him out of the party. Röhm seemed safe in his position despite his hypocrisy.

In 1934, once safely in power, Hitler struck during the Night of the Long Knives. Röhm and 300 of his allies were rounded up and killed. The Nazi party said that Hitler had only just learned of Röhm’s homosexuality and that the gays were trying to murder him. The purge that followed Röhm’s downfall included the targeting of many more gay men.^[9]

1 The Eulenburg Affair

Hitler was not the first German leader to suffer a homosexual scandal. In the early 20th century, the associates of Kaiser Wilhelm II were widely rumored to include a large number of gay men—with Philipp, Prince of Eulenburg among the most infamous.

A journalist called Maximilian Harden had used evidence of Eulenburg’s proclivities to force him from various diplomatic posts, but Eulenburg remained a favorite of the Kaiser. In 1907, Harden went public and openly accused the men around the Kaiser of homosexuality and being more willing to commit treason because of their sexuality. The public had a field day making fun of the coterie of suspected gays around their ruler and hardened opinions against homosexuals.

The idea that the Kaiser was surrounded by decadent aristocrats was not helped when General Dietrich Graf von Hülsen-Haeseler appeared at a party for Wilhelm in 1908 dressed in a pink tutu and danced around for the amusement of the other guests. When he dropped dead in the middle of the performance, the circumstances of his death had to be hushed up.^[10]