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mahatmakanejeeves

(59,748 posts)
Tue Jul 2, 2024, 11:17 AM Jul 2

On this day, July 2, 1881, Charles J. Guiteau shot and fatally wounded President Garfield.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/July_2

• 1881 – Charles J. Guiteau shoots and fatally wounds U.S. President James A. Garfield (who will die of complications from his wounds on September 19).

James A. Garfield

James Abram Garfield (1831–1881) was the 20th president of the United States, serving from March to September 1881. On July 2, 1881, four months into his presidency, Garfield was shot at the Baltimore and Potomac Railroad Station in Washington, D.C., by Charles J. Guiteau, a disappointed and delusional office seeker. Garfield died two months later from infections caused by his doctors. He remains the only sitting member of the United States House of Representatives to be elected to the presidency.

{snip}

There's a plaque at that site now.

LOCAL NEWS | NOV 20, 2018

President Garfield Was Shot On The National Mall. The Site Only Just Got A Plaque.
Mikaela Lefrak https://twitter.com/mikafrak


From left: James A. Garfield, III, the National Park Service’s Paul Ollig and Todd Arrington, and Tom Garfield unveil the new wayside signs.

National Park Service

President James A. Garfield was the only one of the four assassinated U.S. presidents without a marker at the site he was shot.

That changed on Monday, when the National Park Service unveiled two new interpretive signs near the National Gallery of Art. The first explains Garfield’s life, and the second focuses on his untimely death in Washington.



The 49-year-old President had only been in office four months when he decided to take a trip to New England to escape the swampy summer heat. Right after he arrived at the Baltimore and Potomac rail station on July 2, 1881 to catch his train, an unstable attorney named Charles Guiteau shot him with an ivory-handled pistol. ... Garfield developed a terrible infection and died Sept. 19.

The Baltimore and Potomac rail station is, of course, no longer there. The building and tracks were demolished in 1908 during a redesign of the National Mall, and the National Gallery of Art’s West Building now stands in its place. The changes to the urban landscape complicated the process of building a proper memorial.



{snip}

Sun Jul 2, 2023: On this day, July 2, 1881, Charles J. Guiteau shot and fatally wounded President Garfield.

Sat Jul 2, 2022: On this day, July 2, 1881, President Garfield was shot.
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On this day, July 2, 1881, Charles J. Guiteau shot and fatally wounded President Garfield. (Original Post) mahatmakanejeeves Jul 2 OP
Garfield could have been a great President Doc Sportello Jul 2 #1

Doc Sportello

(7,893 posts)
1. Garfield could have been a great President
Tue Jul 2, 2024, 11:22 AM
Jul 2

From the history I've read. He was a greatly respected commander in the Civil War and beloved by his men.

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