I used to believe Grover Cleveland did, but some of the evidence I have seen lately suggests he was merely trying to help out a single mother in desperate straits.
Also Warren Harding was said to have a daughter - her mother even wrote a “tell all” style book in the late 1920’s I believe. But I am not sure if that story has held up since.
What other presidents have had these sorts of stories? On TV years ago was a woman who often claimed to be the mother of LBJ’s “love child”, but that account sounded very fishy (and her son died young). And I nearly forgot Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemmings, but has that been proven or not?
Edmund Morris, in The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt (which I’m reading now), contends that Cleveland did have a child out of wedlock, in Buffalo, NY, IIRC. Maybe that contention will change by the time I finish the book.
As I understand it, Cleveland was one of several men who MIGHT have been the father of Maria Halpin’s baby. To his credit, far from denying everything, Cleveland admitted sleeping with Miss Halpin, and took responsibility for fathering her child.
Whatever Cleveland’s sins may have been, he behaved honorably in this affair, which is a big part of the reason he won the 1884 election, despite the Republicans’ attempts to make hay of the scandal.
It is not at all proven that Thomas Jefferson fathered any children by Sally Hemings. If you read Cecil’s column all the way through, you’ll see that he’s iffy on the findings himself.