Editor’s note: This article contains spoilers about events related to the Netflix limited series Death By Lightning.
U.S. President James A. Garfield was less than four months into his presidential term when tragedy struck in the form of an assassin’s bullet.
More than 120 years later, the ramifications of that shot—fired by a disgruntled supporter named Charles Guiteau—still loom heavily over politics and medicine. The new Netflix limited series Death By Lightning, premiering on Thursday, November 6, explores the tragedy of Garfield’s death and its pivotal place in U.S. history.
The four-part Netflix series, which stars Michael Shannon and Matthew Macfadyen as Garfield and Guiteau, respectively, examines the events preceding to the deadly attack on the 20th president, as well as the misguided attempts of doctors to save him.
Here’s everything we know Guiteau’s motive, doctors’ haphazard efforts to treat Garfield, and the events of Netflix’s Death by Lightning.
Charles Guiteau shot James A. Garfield after his rejection for a White House job
Born in Freeport, Illinois, in 1841, Charles Julius Guiteau experienced a tumultuous childhood. His mother Jane suffered from psychosis and died when he was around 7 years old, leaving his abusive father Luther to raise him.
Eventually, Charles Guiteau set off on his own, attending college at the University of Michigan and even joining a religious commune in Oneida, New York. His peers found him egotistical and prone to rapid mood swings, leading some to question his own sanity.
Guiteau attempted to start his own newspaper and passed the Illinois bar exam to practice law, but rarely participated in trials and mostly worked as a bill collector.
Guiteau thought his fortunes might turn with his vehement support of Ulysses S. Grant and the Stalwart faction of Republicans in the 1880 presidential election. When Garfield won the nomination instead, Guiteau gave a rambling, but passionate speech in front of only two dozen spectators in support of the candidate.
Despite the incredibly small crowd, Guiteau believed himself largely responsible for Garfield’s eventual win over Winfield Scott Hancock and hoped the new president would give him a patronage job. But after Garfield rejected him for a consulship to Paris and other positions, Guiteau turned on the president and his promise to reform the civil service system.
According to the James A. Garfield National Historic Site, a broke Guiteau borrowed money from an acquaintance and purchased an ivory-handled pistol. After following the president for weeks, he shot Garfield at the Baltimore and Potomac train station on July 2, 1881.
Doctors repeatedly probed Garfield’s wound with unsanitized instruments
Secretary of War Robert Todd Lincoln, the son of Abraham Lincoln, enlisted the help of Dr. D. Willard Bliss, a former Army surgeon who had responded to the shooting of his father 16 years prior, to care for the wounded president.
The unconventional Bliss, whose first initial stood for “Doctor,” immediately took control of Garfield’s case—insisting on finding the bullet lodged inside his abdomen and forming his own team of physicians to treat the president at the White House. As it turned out, this likely sealed Garfield’s doom.
While treating the president, Bliss ignored or outright disregarded two key medical discoveries of the era. Although removing the bullet was standard medical practice, surgeons gained new knowledge treating gunshot wounds during the Civil War and found that patients could live years with lodged bullets or shrapnel inside their bodies. This meant much of Bliss’ probing might have been unnecessary.
More importantly, Bliss didn’t properly clean his hands or instruments. Although British surgeon Joseph Lister had discovered antiseptic methods 16 years earlier and continued to promote them, many American doctors refused to accept the revolutionary change in medicine. Others that did often used unsterilized bandages and towels.
“They thought it was useless, maybe even dangerous. And the doctors who were treating the president, you know, the fact that he was president, they thought, we’re not going to take any chances,” author and journalist Candice Millard, whose 2011 book Destiny of the Republic inspired Netflix’s Death By Lightning, explained to NPR. “We’re going to use the most traditional medical methods of the time. I think had he been just an average man, he would have had a better chance of surviving.”
Bliss also mistakenly insisted the bullet was stuck inside the right side of the president’s body. Although he allowed Alexander Graham Bell to search for the bullet with his new “induction balance” device, Bliss only permitted the inventor to examine the wound area where the bullet entered. Staff also failed to remove a mattress with metal springs, which skewed the results.
All the while, Garfield continued languishing in the oppressive summer heat.
Garfield died after he was moved to New Jersey
After two months of unsuccessful treatment, Garfield’s doctors wanted to relocate him to a cooler climate, hoping it would improve his condition.
On September 3, 1881, they decided to transport him via train to Long Branch, New Jersey—where he and wife Lucretia (played in Netflix’s Death by Lightning by Betty Gilpin) had stayed earlier that summer during her bout with malaria. “The work and worry of Washington seem very far away and I rest in the large silence of the sea air. I have always felt the ocean was my friend and the sight of it brings rest and peace,” Garfield had written about the location.
The move required the construction of temporary railroad tracks and a special car lined with mattresses to keep the president stable, according to the National Park Service.
Although Garfield showed temporary improvement, he soon began to exhibit symptoms including chills, fever, an unshakable cough, and weakness. Then in the late evening of September 19, he reported severe chest pain. Within minutes, Garfield died at age 49.
The ensuing autopsy proved damning to Bliss, as examiners discovered the amount of septic infection in Garfield and the bullet on the left side of his body—which the doctor had vehemently denied—near his spleen. Although they concluded the president died from hemorrhage of the artery leading to the spleen, experts have since hypothesized that infection or heart attack was the true cause.
Charles Guiteau was found guilty of murder and executed in 1882
The negligence of Garfield’s medical team further emboldened Guiteau, who found himself on trial for the president’s murder by November 1881.
Guiteau testified in court that God instructed him to shoot Garfield, comparing himself to “a man of destiny as much as the Savior, or Paul, or Martin Luther.” He concluded doctors were ultimately responsible for killing the president.
Guiteau’s legal team argued he suffered from “hereditary insanity,” as his family had a history of mental illness. Despite his bizarre behavior, including singing “John Brown’s Body” as he made his closing argument, Guiteau was deemed sane and sentenced to death.
On June 30, 1882—two days shy of the anniversary of Garfield’s assassination—Guiteau was hanged at the District of Columbia jail.
American doctors adopted antiseptic techniques after James A. Garfield’s death
Now sworn in as president, Chester A. Arthur (Nick Offerman in Death by Lightning) expressed his commitment to carrying out Garfield’s political agenda—the direct opposite of what Guiteau had hoped. “All the noble aspirations of my lamented predecessor … will be garnered in the hearts of the people; and it will be my earnest endeavor to profit, and to see that the nation shall profit, by his example and experience,” Arthur said.
Meanwhile, the autopsy findings did irreparable damage to Bliss’ reputation. According to American Experience, the doctor died of a stroke in February 1889.
Tragic as it was, Garfield’s death marked a significant turning point in U.S. surgical treatment as antiseptic precautions became the standard. “Because after the autopsy results were released, Americans understood right away that their president didn’t have to die, and they understood why he did,” Millard said. “You know, Dr. Bliss was disgraced, publicly disgraced in newspapers and medical journals. And it was a tremendous advancement in medical science.”
Although his time as president was brief—his term of 199 days in office is still the second-shortest behind William Henry Harrison, who died of illness—James A. Garfield is remembered as a respected statesman and war hero more than a century later. Netflix’s Death By Lightning is expected to highlight these adjacent parts of his legacy.
Watch Death By Lightning on Netflix starting November 6
Michael Shannon and Matthew Macfadyen recently spoke to Today about their roles, with both revealing they knew little to nothing about Garfield and Guiteau, respectively.
For Shannon, 51, Netflix’s Death by Lightning sheds light on a crucial time in American history following the Civil War—and an important figure who helped shape it in Garfield. “He really embodied what it means to be a civil servant,” Shannon said. “He wasn’t hunting for power or control, or anything like that. He just wanted to help make America genuinely a better place for all its citizens.”
The four-part Death By Lightning begins streaming Thursday, November 6, on Netflix. The cast also includes Betty Gilpin, Nick Offerman, Bradley Whitford, and Shea Whigham.
Tyler Piccotti joined the Biography.com staff as an Associate News Editor and is now the News and Culture Editor. He previously worked as a reporter and copy editor for a daily newspaper recognized by the Associated Press Sports Editors. In his current role, he shares the true stories behind your favorite movies and TV shows and profiles rising musicians, actors, and athletes. When he's not working, you can find him at the nearest amusement park or movie theater and cheering on his favorite teams.
