Andrew Jackson's elation at winning the presidential election in November 1828 was tempered by the loss a month later of his wife, Rachel. Jackson believed that Rachel's death was caused by his opponents' slanderous attacks on her character during the campaign. Thus, he was particularly sensitive when Peggy Eaton, the wife of his nominee for secretary of war, John Eaton, became the center of a social and political controversy. Eaton had met the much younger and already married Peggy Timberlake when he and Jackson, both United States senators from Tennessee, Boarded at Peggy's mother's house. Eaton and Timberlake began a love affair so distressing to her sailor husband that he apparently committed suicide when he learned of it. Eaton realized that Harrying the young widow might bring scahdal to the Jackson administration. He consulted the president-elect, who gave his permission. The wives of Jackson's...