Assassination of James A. Garfield

James A. Garfield was shot at the Baltimore and Potomac Railroad Station in Washington, D.C., on July 2, 1881, less than four months after taking office, when Charles J. Guiteau attacked him at close range. Guiteau, a delusional office seeker angered by repeated rejection, claimed partisan motives and was seized immediately. Garfield survived the shooting but suffered for more than two months as doctors repeatedly probed his wound with unsterilized instruments, worsening infection and sepsis, before he died in New Jersey on September 19, 1881. His death made Chester A. Arthur president and exposed both the dangers of patronage politics and the harm caused by contemporary medical treatment.

Washington, District of Columbia · United States