Kevin R. Loughlin
Boston, Massachusetts, United States

For decades, historians have commented on the coincidences of the Lincoln and Kennedy assassinations. They both suffered mortal head wounds and were shot on a Friday. It is speculated that conspiracies were involved in both assassinations. Both men were elected in a year ending in 60 and were succeeded by a man named Johnson.

The similarities between the assassinations of James Garfield and William McKinley are just as striking.

Wounds

Both men were shot twice, but in each case only one bullet remained in the torso; the other only grazed the skin.^1-3 And unlike Lincoln and Kennedy, who sustained fatal wounds, Garfield and McKinley would have survived their wounds with the advantages of modern medical care.

Assassins

Both Garfield and McKinley were shot by a single gunman with small revolvers at close range. Each assassin had evidence of mental illness. Charles Guiteau, a disappointed office seeker, shot Garfield and called it a “divine command.”

Leon Czolgosz was an anarchist who regarded McKinley as a symbol of oppression and was convinced that it was his duty to kill him. Both Guiteau and Czolgosz were apprehended quickly, underwent a speedy trial, received the death penalty, and were executed within a year of their crimes. Guiteau shot Garfield on July 2, 1881 and was hanged on June 20, 1882. Czolgosz shot McKinley on September 6, 1901 and was executed in the electric chair on October 29, 1901.

Lack of security

Neither Garfield nor McKinley were surrounded by adequate security when they were assassinated. When Guiteau shot Garfield in the Baltimore and Potomac Railroad Station, the president was accompanied by Secretary of State James G. Blaine; his two sons, James and Harry; and his Secretary of War, Robert Todd Lincoln, Abraham Lincoln’s son.¹

When Czolgosz shot McKinley on the grounds of the Pan-American Exposition in the Temple of Music in Buffalo, New York, he was accompanied by a sparse, inadequate security detail. McKinley’s personal Secret Service agent George Foster and two other agents had been assigned to him during the Buffalo trip. McKinley’s personal secretary, George B. Cortelyou, had been concerned about McKinley’s safety throughout the trip. In addition to the three secret service agents, Cortelyou had arranged for a dozen artillerymen to attend the presidential reception in full dress uniform. None of these men had any training in police work.²

In any case, Guiteau and Czolgosz were able to approach their intended victims and shoot them, unimpeded, at close range.

Murder weapons

Both the assailants, Guiteau and Czolgosz, used hand-held revolvers that delivered small to medium caliber bullets. Guiteau borrowed money from George Maynard, a relative by marriage, to purchase a .442 caliber Webley British Bulldog revolver with an ivory grip. He chose the ivory grip as he thought it would look better as a museum exhibit after the assassination.³

A few days before McKinley’s appearance in Buffalo, Czolgosz went to a local hardware store and purchased a .32 caliber Iver Johnson revolver. Neither Guiteau nor Czolgosz had any prior experience or knowledge of firearms.

Inadequate medical care

It can be persuasively argued that the deaths of Garfield and McKinley resulted, in large measure, from the inadequate medical care they received after their injuries. Doctor D.W. Bliss was already a controversial figure before he became involved with Garfield’s care. He had been a Union soldier during the Civil War and it was alleged that during the Battle of Bull Run, when 1,124 Union soldiers were wounded and 460 were killed, he turned coward and ran.⁴ In April 1863, Bliss was arrested for taking a $500 bribe to use a certain stove in a hospital. But he had friends in high places and eventually the charges were dropped. Bliss was also involved in the promotion of the sale of “condurango,” a fake cancer cure, which led the Medical Association of the District of Columbia to charge him with “quackery.”⁵

Nonetheless, Bliss had been peripherally involved with the care of Lincoln after his assassination and was known to and trusted by Robert Todd Lincoln. He had also met Garfield when they were both in their twenties and Garfield welcomed his involvement in his care. Garfield was never transferred to a hospital, but was cared for in the White House in the absence of sterile conditions. Bliss probed Garfield’s wound, without sterility, repeatedly throughout his time at the White House.

After McKinley’s shooting, he was taken to the hospital at the Exposition, which was a temporary, rudimentary medical facility. Unfortunately, for McKinley, the best surgeon in the city and the Exposition’s medical director, Roswell Park, was in Niagara Falls performing a delicate neck operation.⁶ When he was asked to return to Buffalo to treat the president, he declined as he felt that he could not leave his patient in Niagara Falls.

In a cruel irony, it was reported that two weeks later, Park saved the life of a woman who had suffered injuries very similar to McKinley’s.⁶ In Dr. Park’s absence, the responsibility for operating on McKinley fell to Matthew D. Mann, a prominent gynecologist in the area who had minimal experience with intra-abdominal surgery. Mann performed the surgery and removed a small piece of cloth that had been embedded in the flesh. The surgical equipment was so inadequate that not even retractors were available, and the lighting was poor. Mann identified an entry and exit wound in the stomach, which he repaired, but he could not find the bullet.

Alexander Graham Bell and Thomas Alva Edison

Another striking coincidence was the role that two of the most prominent inventors in each respective era played in the care of each president.

Alexander Graham Bell was visiting his in-laws in Boston in early July 1881, when he learned of the shooting of Garfield and that his physicians could not locate the bullet. In Boston, Bell thought his metal detecting device, which he called an “induction balance,” might be helpful.⁷ Bell contacted Bliss through an intermediary, Simon Newcom, and offered his services. After several weeks of unsuccessful attempts to locate the bullet and with his patient spiking intermittent fevers, Bliss consented to have Bell come to the White House to discuss using the “induction balance” on the President.

Bell arrived at the White House and set up his machine, which included a wooden handle, a battery, a condenser, and a telephone receiver that Bell held to his ear to listen for the sound made when the machine detected metal. Bliss would not permit Bell himself to pass the device over Garfield’s body, although Bell had previously used the device successfully to locate bullets in Civil War soldiers.⁷ Bliss wanted to hold the device himself. As the test began, Bliss passed Bell’s device over the President’s back while Bell held the receiver to his ear. The test was unsuccessful, as Bell only detected sounds that were “uncertain and indefinite.” Bell could not locate the bullet.

He returned home disconsolate and the next morning, realized that he had assembled his machine incorrectly at the White House. As Garfield’s condition deteriorated, Bliss summoned Bell back to the White House on August 1.

Upon repeating the test, Bliss insisted that only the right side of Garfield’s body, where he thought the bullet was, be examined. The results were again inconclusive. It was later learned that the President was lying on a mattress composed of steel wires, which caused interference. At autopsy, it was found that Bliss was wrong again; the bullet was on the left, not the right side of the abdomen.

In another ironic twist, a primitive X-ray machine was on display at the Exposition but was not used on McKinley. As with Garfield, physicians could not locate the bullet in McKinley’s abdomen but determined that the X-ray machine on display was too primitive to use on the President. Thomas Edison was notified, and quickly sent his most modern machine from New Jersey to Buffalo, but aides to the President refused to use it for fear of radiation exposure. McKinley ultimately died on September 14, with Edison’s machine sitting nearby, still unused.⁸

Robert Todd Lincoln

Although Abraham Lincoln’s eldest son, Robert Todd Lincoln, was not at Ford’s Theater on the night that Lincoln was shot, he was at his father’s bedside the next morning when he died. After the death of his father, Robert Todd Lincoln avoided running for office or becoming involved in public life.⁹ However, early in 1881, he relented and agreed to serve as Garfield’s Secretary of War. He was in the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Station walking toward Garfield when Guiteau approached and shot the President. Lincoln personally attended and spoke with Garfield as he lay on the train station floor. He would later comment, “How many hours of sorrow I have passed in this town.”¹⁰

By 1901, Lincoln was in his late fifties and had become president of the Pullman Car Company. President McKinley invited him to the Pan-American Exposition and he took a train from New Jersey to Buffalo to join the President. When he arrived, he was handed a telegram by a Pullman employee who was waiting on the platform for him. The telegram read: “President McKinley was shot down by an anarchist in Buffalo this afternoon. He was hit twice in the abdomen. Condition serious.”¹¹

One can argue persuasively that the similarities between the assassinations of Garfield and McKinley are even more striking than those of Lincoln and Kennedy. Unlike Lincoln and Kennedy, whose injuries would have been fatal in any era, Garfield and McKinley both should have survived if they had received appropriate medical care.

References

1. Assassination of James A. Garfield. Wikipedia. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_James_A_Garfield. Accessed April 20, 2025.
2. Assassination of William McKinley. Wikipedia. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_William_McKinley. Accessed April 20, 2025.
3. Millard, Candace. Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President. Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group (2011), p. 117.
4. Rosen F. Murdering the President: Alexander Graham Bell and the Race to Save James Garfield. Potomac Books, an Imprint of the University of Nebraska Press (2016), pp. 26-27.
5. Getlen L. The inept doctor who killed President Garfield, NY Post, September 22, 2016.
6. William McKinley: Could Roswell Park Have Saved Him? Doctor Zebra. Doctorzebra.com/prez/z_x25roswell_g.htm
7. Carlson P. Alexander Graham Bell tried to save James Garfield with a bullet- deflecting medical invention. History Net December 7, 2015. https://www.historynet.com/alexander-graham-bell-james-garfield/. Accessed April 22, 2025.
8. Kent DJ. Nikola Tesla, Thomas Edison and the assassination of President William McKinley, July 27, 2015. Davidjkent-writer.com/2015/07/27/nikola-tesla-thomas-adison-assassination-president-william-mckinley. Accessed April 24, 2025.
9. Arrington T. Robert Todd Lincoln and Presidential Assassinations. National Park Service, James Garfield National Historic Site, July 2014 for the Garfield Observer. Nps.gov/articles/000/Robert-todd-lincoln-and-presidential-assassinations-not-formal-title.htm. Accessed April 25, 2025.
10. Bushnell M. Robert Todd Lincoln, harbinger of presidential doom. VT Digger.
11. Brackell G. He was close to three presidential assassinations, including his dad’s. Washington Post December 19, 2021.