RMS Lusitania, New York City, 1907
Here's another small slice of LGBT history -- the relationship of two men, Henry Sonneborn and Leo 'Lee' Schwabacher, between the years of 1900 and 1915. I have one reservation about the story I'll mention at the end, but no doubts about the truthfulness. Because the two lives involved were connected to a well-known historical event, there has been abundant research and documentation by historians. Court records exist of the eventual monetary settlements by the German government to the families of those who lost family members when the Lusitania was torpedoed and sunk at sea. Public records, census records, port of entry records and wills have been found and examined. Websites are devoted to this sole purpose of the lives of the passengers.
The story of Henry and Lee can be found here.
http://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/...
A long, worthwhile read includes many more details and tangents than I will provide. Unfortunately, the postcard collection, except for three small thumbnails, has been deleted from the site.
Other links
Claims Commission court summary for Henry Sonneborn here
http://www.rmslusitania.info/...
Claims Commission court summary for Leo Schwabacher here
http://www.rmslusitania.info/...
more after the waves
Henry Sonneborn (left) and Leo 'Lee' Schwabacher (right)
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I'll summarize the indisputable facts relevant to their relationship. Henry Sonneborn was born in Baltimore, MD in 1872. His family owned a tavern in Baltimore, they lived above it and also took in boarders. Henry and his brother had a coal distribution business. Leo 'Lee' Schwabacher was born in Peoria, IL in 1873. Lee's family amassed a fortune as liquor merchants, very well-off with servants. Lee became the bookkeeper for Henry's family's tavern in 1900 and he also became one of the boarders. When Henry's father died in 1903, his mother moved the family to grander house and Lee moved in with the family. Shortly after the move, Lee's father died in Illinois and left each child including Lee an annual income of $10,000. In 1906, Henry and Lee traveled to Europe together for the first time. They went to Europe again in 1908. Henry sold his portion of the coal business in 1910. They moved to Paris in 1911 and lived together there until 1914, but returned to the US for a visit in 1913, staying with Henry's family. World War I broke out in the summer of 1914. Both returned to Baltimore in 1914 and again stayed at Henry's mother's house. While in Baltimore both Henry and Lee had their wills redrawn naming each other as sole beneficiary. Lee purchased a mausoleum in which they both intended to be interred. Despite a last minute plea from Henry's mother to cancel the voyage, Henry and Lee boarded the Lusitania to return to Europe in May 1915. The Lusitania, a British ship, was torpedoed by a German U-boat and sank 11 miles off the coast of Ireland. Henry and Lee were both lost at sea. Neither body was ever recovered or identified.
As well-documented as these facts are, researchers still felt the need to mention "no concrete evidence survives to indicate that Henry Sonneborn and Lee Schwabacher were more than friends".
http://www.rmslusitania.info/...
Reading between the lines: Lee mysteriously turned up in Baltimore from a well-heeled life in Peoria in 1900 and took a job as a bookkeeper at a tavern. It's unclear whether there was tension with his family or Lee felt the need of geographical separation and a larger city to live his life. After his death, his family claimed in court that Lee had not moved to Baltimore until 1911. Either they genuinely didn't know where he was or hoped to diminish the length and importance of the relationship between Henry and Lee and make it appear that Henry and Lee did not meet until after Lee's substantial inheritance. During this period, Henry's younger brother lived in New York City pursuing an acting and singing career. Hmmm. Henry and Lee stayer with the brother before their departures abroad. Presumably, Henry and Lee met after the start of Lee's employment at the tavern. Their relationship seemed to progress to a new level of acceptance after the death of Henry's father.
The researchers didn't see the entire picture at first, seemingly biased toward prejudicial, sinister and tawdry conclusions rather than a meaningful relationship. A still-living family descendent then stepped forward with family stories, photographs, newspaper clippings and an invaluable collection of postcards from the deceased couple that provided new information and caused the researchers to reassess their findings in a new light.
As I correlated the information I already had with that supplied by Mark, and dug a bit deeper into Henry Sonneborn’s history through public records, I came to the conclusion that 99% of the story as it is commonly told is either inaccurate or flat-out wrong, that I had helped perpetuate a rather nasty fallacy, and that a belated apology is owed.
http://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/...
One instance of misinformation gleaned from survivors of the tragedy was that the two secretive male passengers who kept to themselves and both had German surnames were thought to be German spies by the passenger rumor mill. Another, promoted by judges in the settlement cases was that if the relationship between Henry and Lee was indeed of a homosexual nature, one of them must have been in it purely for financial gain.
Henry and Leo sent many postcards from across Europe during their European travels and stays to Henry's nephew, Herman, in Baltimore. Some postcards to the nephew were in Henry's handwriting, some in Lee's. Most cards were signed, "Love, Uncle Henry and Lee." The nephew, his mother (Henry's sister) and father also lived in the house owned by Henry's mother. Even though the nephew was a child at the time, 29 of the postcards survive to this day, cherished and saved by Herman until his death in 1972. The nephew's grandson is now in possession of the postcard collection.
Postcards from Paris. March 1912 and April 1914
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Note the two different styles of handwriting.
text(L): Write me what time Grandma got out cable messages. Paris Mar. 7. 14 Had a fine trip over and we are both well but busy looking for an apartment and it is no easy task to find something to suit us. The weather is ideal like our May days. Hope your Mother and Father are well. love to them and all at home. from Uncle Henry and Lee
text (R): April 5/14 This will give you an(d) idea of the cafe life. Boulevards in Paris. This is on the side walk. How do you like your shirts if you send me Carrol's address I will send him a card. With love from Uncle Henry
In full disclosure, the family descendent who came forward is a friend of mine I've known for 40 years. He is gay, as am I. I had heard the story of Henry and Lee many times before the age of the internet. If heterosexual historians fail to see a meaningful gay relationship in plain sight, the gay historian could also be accused of wishful thinking and bias as well. I don't think that is the case here, however.
In that historical era, short of autobiographies published after death, love letters, arrest records or admissions of orientation put in a time capsule, how exactly does one prove what a relationship was? In this particular aggregation of facts, Henry and Lee living together at Henry's mother's house, their travels together and the shared apartment in Paris, the postcards, their wills and the purchase of a joint mausoleum, I am quite convinced that their relationship was what we now would call gay. If there are any skeptics, a niece of Henry's who lived to a ripe old age, told younger generations at a family gathering she remembered seeing the "beautiful china" Henry and Lee were taking to Europe. If you need more proof that that, I can't help you. :)
My reservation is this: How typical is the story of the era? The two men involved were affluent. They crossed the Atlantic many times together and maintained an apartment in Paris. Aside from their demise at sea, they had a rather idyllic existence. They had attained some level of acceptance with one of the families. No one was cut out of the family will, no arrest records for lewd behavior or fired from jobs. I will speculate that, given the mores and social conventions of the era, their story isn't very typical at all. But the facts of their lives are the facts. It happened. Still, these two managed to find each other, have a long-term relationship, pursue their interests as they wished and be happy. They found a way. I have to admire that, typical or not.