Systemic Septicemia Overwhelms Late Nineteenth Century NonLethal Abdominal Gun Shot Wounds (GSW): President James A. Garfield (1831-1881) & Vincent Van Gogh (1853-1890)

Authors: Arenberg K*, Ferraro BA and Krier L

DOI: 10.23880/ijfsc-16000282

Volume 7, Issue 4

Abstract

U.S. President James A. Garfield (1831-1881) was a well-known and accomplished federal government servant who became the Twentieth President of the United States. Unfortunately, his presidency was interrupted by an assassin’s bullet six months after assuming the highest office in the land. Although the assassination attempt failed, it was sepsis that sealed his fate, not the assassin’s bullet. On September 19, 1881, after a seventy-nine-day battle to survive a non-lethal gunshot wound, President Garfield succumbed to septicemia which was caused by flagrant medical incompetence and hubris. Vincent van Gogh (1853-1890), now the most widely recognized and iconic artist, was an unknown artist at the time of his untimely death which occurred less than a decade later after President Garfield’s demise. Although President Garfield and Vincent van Gogh traveled significantly different pathways in their lives, the common thread that united them was their survivable GSW to their abdomens. This clinical scenario included bad medical wound management, motivation, and hubris which resulted in their deaths due to overwhelming systemic septicemia. President Garfield’s demise was the result of medical malfeasance and malpractice from all medical perspectives as understood from his medical history and detailed four-hour autopsy. Unsterilized multiple medical hands and unsterilized probing medical instruments facilitated the introduction of pathogens into the President’s body. In contrast, the septicemia associated with van Gogh’s death was the result of an acute infection due to the presence of an intra-abdominal bullet without an exit wound. The digital probing of van Gogh’s abdominal wound was conducted by Dr. Paul Gachet who harbored questionable motives against the artist. Nothing was mentioned if Dr. Gachet observed sterile procedures while digitally examining Vincent’s abdominal wound. Moreover, Dr. Gachet has been implicated by The Killing Vincent Project as a person of interest [1]. Did Dr. Gachet purposely facilitate Vincent van Gogh’s rapid demise to acquire Van Gogh’s, then unknown master artworks, for his collection while serving as the impetus to form the nucleus of the Gachet clandestine art forgery ring to copy these masterpieces? This question remains unanswered.

Keywords: Assassination; Autopsy; Antisepsis Machine; Gunshot Wound (GSW); Induction Balance; Systemic Septicemia

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