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Hannah Hoes Van Buren Biography

U.S. First Lady

Hannah Hoes Van Buren was the wife of U.S. president Martin Van Buren, but died long before he reached the presidency and never served as First Lady. The barest facts are known about her: she was brought up in the same Dutch community in New York as Van Buren, and they married in 1807. She followed him to Hudson, then to Albany as he got more involved in government and politics. She gave birth to five children, four of whom -- all sons -- lived to adulthood. She got tuberculosis and died just before her 36th birthday, in 1819. Eighteen years later her husband and "the Van Buren boys" moved into the White House. After 1838 the duties of First Lady fell to Angelica Singleton Van Buren, the wife of Van Buren's oldest son, Abraham.

Extra credit: Hannah Van Buren was the first president's wife to be born a U.S. citizen.