Was Horatio Alger a pedophile?

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Horatio Alger festival roiled by charges

Do these charges have any truth to them?

RE this Story (via Fark)

Horatio Alger quietly resigned as a Unitarian minister at a church on Cape Cod after he was accused of assaulting two boys — an incident that is old news to literary scholars but came as a surprise to some civic leaders in Marlborough

Horatio Alger wiki

In 1860, Reverend Alger took a position as minister of the First Parish Unitarian Church of Brewster on Cape Cod, but left for New York City rather suddenly, ostensibly to pursue a career in writing. Church records uncovered after Alger’s death indicate that he was quietly dismissed for having sexual relations with several teenage boys in his parish (as a result, the New York City chapter of the North American Man/Boy Love Association is named after him).

Later in life, Alger wrote a poem, “Friar Anselmo’s Sin” which seems to be somewhat autobiographical. It begins:

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Here are several of his books in downloadable ebook format (free) via Project Gutenberg.

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Hmmm… unfortunately looks like it’s probably true

In letters now housed at the Harvard Divinity School, Brewster church officials wrote to church higher-ups in Boston, complaining of Alger’s “abominable and revolting crime of unnatural familiarity with boys,” according to Swarthmore College professor Carol Nackenoff, who has studied Alger. Alger’s father, himself a Unitarian minister, promised that his son would resign and never again work in the church.

“I believe the complaint was not baseless,” Nackenoff said

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Well, it’s nice of them to bring this up long after the dude has died and can’t defend himself.

Sure, there’s a “complaint”, and it could be legit. But no actual conviction, note. Perhaps HA resigned to avoid a scandal but was completely innocent. Or, *perhaps * he was a perv of the worst sort. We really don’t know, and we’ll never know.