Early life and career of Bill Clinton Bill Clinton was born William Jefferson Blythe III on August 19, 1946, at Julia Chester Hospital in Hope, Arkansas. He was the son of William Jefferson Blythe Jr. (1918–1946), a traveling salesman who had died in an automobile accident three months before his birth, and Virginia Dell Cassidy (later Virginia Kelley: 1923–1994). His parents had married on September 4, 1943, but this union later proved to be bigamous, as Blythe had never divorced his third wife and was therefore still married to her. Soon after Bill was born, Virginia traveled to New Orleans, Louisiana to study nursing. She left her
William Jefferson Blythe Jr. He married for the first time in December 1935 to Virginia Adele Gash; they were divorced only thirteen months later. Although no child was born to the couple during their marriage, they later had a son together. After the divorce, Virginia moved to California and married first a man named Coffelt, then a man named Charles Ritzenthaler. However, she and Blythe remained friends, and she visited him on occasion. A son was conceived during these visits, and Henry Leon Blythe was born in Sherman, Texas on June 17, 1938, some eighteen months after his parents had been divorced. Henry's parents