The Fathers and Saviors of Our Country: A Presidential Sale

BARNES, Mary D. Autograph letter signed ("Mar") to "My dearest Peggy." [Buffalo, New York]. 8 September [1901]. 4pp., 8vo (267 x 203 mm), creasing at folds, light toning. On "Medical Bureau" stationery from "Pan-American Exposition 1901 / Buffalo N.Y. U.S.A." with accompanying "Pan-American Exposition" cover from the same year. Cover addressed to "Miss Margaret Barnes" at San Francisco, CA. Handstamped "Buffalo, N.Y. / September 9 / 1901."

Barnes writes, in small part: "I have had the greatest honor possible. I assisted with President McKinley's operation and was one of the special nurses with him the first night after the operation. Of course you have read all the particulars concerning the shooting. It was a horrible thing. I shall never forget it - such excitement. Our ambulance was sent & he was brought right to the emergency hospital and operated upon in our operating room. Miss Norris and I happened to be the only nurses on duty at the time and we had to hustle. Of course we were not fully prepared for such operations and he was a long time under the ether. I can safely say I never saw such grand work under the circumstances. I know I never worked so hard before."

She later continues: "We two nurses were alone with him all night. Two doctors were in and out all of the time and on call. We took his pulse every ten minutes all night and his temperature every hour... I never saw such a beautiful character as President McKinley, and his every thought all night was for others - not to alarm the nation. And for the prisoner he expressed nothing but sorrow." Barnes closes her comments regarding McKinley with an ominous and seemingly prescient observation, "If he only gets well. So far it is hard to tell, but from my experience it would seem almost impossible. Peritonitis or blood poisoning seems almost unavertable."

[With:] ESMOND. Darwin W. (1845-1923). Typed letter signed ("Darwin W. Esmond") in type. Addressed to President McKinley. Newburgh, New York. 5 December 1900. Esmond exhorts the president to put an end to anarchist gatherings and plotting in New Jersey, Chicago, and other places, noting "Every day we fear some attempt on your own life or some assassination of a ruler in the old world by a plot concocted in America...."

On 6 September 1901 while visiting the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, New York, President William McKinley was shot twice at point blank range by Leon Czolgosz, an anarchist with whom McKinley was shaking hands in a receiving line at the "Temple of Music." The President was rushed to the Exposition’s hospital, which was equipped with a rudimentary operating room. No fully qualified doctor was on site; the Exposition’s medical director, Roswell Park, was away at the time. 

Reports made in the aftermath of McKinley's assassination identify the nurses and doctors on call at every stage of caring for President McKinley. Cross-referencing assassination reports and details contained in this letter, it is almost certain that the nurse "Mar" is Mary D. Barnes (erroneously identified in some post-assassination reports as "Miss A.D. Barnes"). Barnes is referenced and quoted in multiple sources including “Medical and Surgical Report of the Case of the Late President of the United States” (Report of the Surgeon-General, U. S. Navy. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1901) and in the article "An Interview with the President's Nurses" (Trained Nurse and Hospital Review, October 1901).

For nearly a week after the shooting, McKinley seemed to be getting better, but by September 12, he developed abdominal pain and, unbeknownst to his doctors, gangrene had begun to grow on the walls of his stomach. McKinley died eight days later, despite the efforts of the Pan-Am Exposition Medical Bureau employees who struggled to save him. Questions have lingered for over a hundred years as to whether or not McKinley might have survived if he had a different doctor. This letter offers an assessment from a trained medical professional who was witness to the President's fight for life, and her answer seems to be no.