Page "Strom Thurmond" Paragraph 3

Six months after Thurmond's death in 2003, it was revealed that at age 22, he had fathered a mixed-race daughter, Essie Mae Washington-Williams, with his family's maid, Carrie Butler, a 16-year-old black girl.

Although Thurmond never publicly acknowledged Essie Mae, he paid for her education at a historically black college and passed other money to her for some time.

His children by his marriage eventually acknowledged her.