He took me into Jackie's room... I was powerless to resist: Ex-White House intern, 19, describes 'passionate 18-month affair with JFK'

A retired church worker has revealed how John F Kennedy took her virginity during a debauched 18-month affair while she was a teenage White House intern.

Mimi Alford says she felt powerless to resist the late U.S. president as he pulled her into ‘Mrs Kennedy’s room’ and seduced her on his wife’s bed.

Other claims in her newly published autobiography include that he made her inhale a sex drug during a party at Bing Crosby’s ranch and coerced her to perform a sex act on an aide while he looked on.

Alleged affair: Former U.S. President John F. Kennedy, left, and Mimi Alford, right, as a teenager when claims she had an 18-month affair with the leader

When she thought – wrongly – that she was pregnant by the president, that same aide arranged for her to see an abortion doctor, even though abortion was illegal at the time.

Mrs Alford’s claims are the most in-depth account of their liaisons so far published.

They reveal how Kennedy never kissed her and ignored her whenever his wife was around. She never even called him ‘Jack’, always addressing him as ‘Mr President’ – even when they were in bed together.

Their affair began in the summer of 1962, lasting until Kennedy was assassinated the following November. Mrs Alford, then just 19 years old and with the maiden name Beardsley, had begun a job in the president’s press office. After meeting Kennedy she says he asked to give her a personal tour.

Family: JFK and his wife, Jackie Kennedy, hold hands in 1962 close to the time of the 'affair' with Ms Alford

With his staff drinking cocktails just down the corridor, she claims he led her into Jackie Kennedy’s room where he took off her clothes without saying a word.

When she momentarily resisted his advances, Kennedy asked: ‘Haven’t you done this before?’, to which she replied: ‘No.’ He continued anyway, she says, adding: ‘On the ride home, it kept echoing in my head, I’m not a virgin any more.’

Mrs Alford, now a 69-year-old grandmother, also tells of a party at the ranch of Crosby. When a reveller passed around a tray of sex drug amyl nitrate, she writes that the president asked her if she wanted to try it.

‘I said no,’ she recalls, ‘but he just went ahead and popped the capsule and held it under my nose. I ran crying from the room.’

As to why she allowed the affair to happen, she admits: ‘The fact that I was being desired by the most famous and powerful man in America only amplified my feelings to the point where resistance was out of the question.’

Scandal: Ms Alford revealed claims of the affair in a book about her time at the White House

Alford, who ironically went to the same Miss Porter's school as JFK's wife Jackie, described Kennedy as 'playful', the sex as 'varied and fun' and said he could be 'seductive and playful'.

She said they spent a lot of time 'taking baths' and that if they spent the night together, she would wear his own soft-blue cotton nightshirts.

But she also revealed complications in the relationship, saying they never kissed, and that she was often subjected to a 'waiting game' where she was told to stay in her hotel until he called for her.

There is also a dark undertone to some of Kennedy's actions in the book, such as when he 'forced' her to sniff amyl nitrate, commonly known as poppers, during a Hollywood party at Bing Crosby's desert ranch.

She said: 'I was sitting next to him in the living room when a handful of yellow capsules - most likely amyl nitrate, commonly known as poppers - was offered up by one of the guests.

'The president asked me if I wanted to try the drug, which stimulated the heart but also purportedly enhanced sex.

'I said no, but he just went ahead and popped the capsule and held it under my nose. He didn’t try it himself. This was a new sensation, and it frightened me. I panicked and ran crying from the room.'

She also tells of how JFK asked her to 'take care' of his friends Powers who 'looked a little tense' while they were swimming in the White House pool.

'It was a dare, but I knew exactly what he meant. This was a challenge to give Dave Powers oral sex. I don’t think the president thought I’d do it, but I’m ashamed to say that I did... The president silently watched,' she said.

During the October 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, where the U.S. and USSR had a nuclear stand-off, he reportedly told her that: 'I’d rather my children red than dead.'

And Alford, then Mimi Beardsley, also tells of how she erroneously believed at one point she was pregnant with JFK's child, and another moment of when her lover reached out to her following the death of his infant son Patrick Bouvier Kennedy.

'Best friends': Dave Powers, pictured with JFK in 1963, and alone in the Cabinet Room in 1962. The new book claims the former President 'dared' Alford to perform sex acts on Mr Powers while he watched

She wrote: 'I had never seen real grief in my relatively short life. He invited me upstairs, and we sat outside on the balcony in the soft summer evening air. There was a stack of condolence letters on the floor next to his chair, and he picked each one up and read it aloud to me... Occasionally, tears rolling down his cheeks, he would write something on one of the letters, probably notes for a reply. But mostly he just read them and cried. I did, too.'

Alford said she saw President Kennedy for the final time at The Carlyle hotel in Manhattan on November 15, 1963, just a week before his assassination in Dallas.

At this point she was due to be married to her college sweetheart, Tony Fahnestock.

'He took me in his arms for a long embrace and said, "I wish you were coming with me to Texas." And then he added, "I'll call you when I get back." I was overcome with sudden sadness. "Remember, Mr President, I’m getting married."