Their thirteen-year relationship, with King posing as a black man named James Todd when they were together, was the subject of a substantial lawsuit and the book Passing Strange: A Gilded Age Tale of Love and Deception Across the Color Line by Martha Sandweiss.
[1] In about 1887,[2] she became involved with Clarence King, an upper-class white man who presented himself to her as a light-skinned black Pullman porter under the name of James Todd.
Given the long history of slavery in the United States, many African Americans had European ancestry.
King said that he was West Indian and that he worked as a railroad porter, explaining why he was so frequently away, but also how he could support their family.
[3] After King died, Copeland embarked on a thirty-year battle to gain control of the trust fund he had promised her.