Good Satirical Journalism

The first president caught a sore throat in the sleet and was bled into the grave by three of the finest physicians in Virginia


MOUNT VERNON, VIRGINIA, 14 December 1799 - George Washington, the man who beat the British Army, refused a crown and handed back power after two terms, died at home on a Saturday night aged sixty-seven. He'd had a sore throat for about a day and a half. It is difficult to imagine a smaller illness or a more thorough response. By the time the three doctors in attendance had finished, they had taken from him somewhere between five and seven pints of blood, a loss that would put a modern patient into shock.


The Ride in the Sleet


On Thursday 12 December, Washington spent several hours riding round his farms in freezing rain, snow and hail. He came in late for dinner, refused to change out of his wet clothes because he didn't want to keep his guests waiting, and went to bed as usual. In the small hours of Saturday he woke his wife Martha with difficulty breathing and a raw throat. He could hardly speak. The standard account, available in the article on George Washington, says he asked for one of his overseers, George Rawlins, to bleed him first thing, before the doctors had even arrived.


What Was Actually Wrong With Him?


Modern medical opinion leans towards acute epiglottitis, a swelling of the flap of tissue that sits at the back of the tongue and guards the windpipe. When it becomes inflamed, it can close off the airway altogether. The disease is nasty, but a modern emergency team treats it as a straightforward airway problem: oxygen, intravenous antibiotics, steroids to reduce the swelling and, if necessary, a breathing tube. Most patients are home in a week. The official line at Mount Vernon, which you can read about on the Mount Vernon website, is that three physicians attended him. All three believed that the best thing was to bleed him.


The Bleeding Marathon


The doctors were Dr James Craik, an old friend and army surgeon, Dr Gustavus Richard Brown, and Dr Elisha Dick. Over about twelve hours they bled him several times, drawing off about forty per cent of his blood by most estimates. They gave him calomel, a mercury compound that purges the bowels, and applied blisters to his throat. They had him gargle molasses, vinegar and butter, which can't have helped him breathe. By the afternoon Washington was gasping, exhausted and pale. At one point he reportedly murmured that the doctors should let him go in peace, and a few hours later he did.


The Doctor Who Wanted to Try Lamb's Blood


Here's the detail that makes you wonder. A fourth doctor, William Thornton, arrived late in the day. Thornton, a gifted man who also happened to be the architect of the US Capitol, suggested a radical solution: cut open Washington's windpipe and attempt a transfusion of lamb's blood. The other doctors refused, and Washington died before anyone could stop arguing. The tracheotomy was in fact a sensible idea, and modern emergency doctors do something very like it in cases of airway blockage. The lamb's blood was mad, but that was 1799 for you.


What a Modern ER Would Have Done


Picture Washington walking into an American emergency room with a hoarse voice and a fever. The triage nurse takes one look, hears the strained breathing, and moves him straight to resus. An anaesthetist sedates him, a doctor passes a tube down his throat, and the antibiotics begin to flow. Within hours, the swelling goes down. A day later he's sitting up in bed, asking whether they'll have to cut the grass at Mount Vernon without him. The president of a young nation, saved by a few vials and a handful of strangers. It's hard to think of anything less dramatic, and the history books would be very short on tragedy.


The Last Words and the Last Fear


Washington's final act, according to his secretary Tobias Lear, was to ask that his body not be put in the tomb until three days after his death. He feared being buried alive, a real worry in the era before reliable ways of confirming death. His final words, whispered in the late evening, were "'Tis well." The Britannica biography of George Washington records the day. It is a very dignified death for a man who had just had half his blood drained for no good reason.


What If He Had Lived?


An alive Washington in 1800 is a fascinating prospect. He'd refused a third term and retired to his farm, so there's no reason to think he'd have returned to office. But he might have been a steadying voice during the bitter election of 1800 and the early years of Jefferson's presidency, a living reminder that Americans could hand over power peacefully. Instead, a whole generation grew up without him, and the great tradition of the two-term limit, honoured for 150 years, rested on a gentleman who happened to die quickly. It's a thin thread to hang a republic on.


The Verdict: Fixable, and Made Worse by the Fixers


Modern medicine would almost certainly have saved Washington. The sad truth is that his illness was far less deadly than his treatment. If you take one thing from this chapter, let it be this: the next time a doctor advises you to do something drastic, ask for a second opinion, and perhaps a third. Washington's doctors were not fools, but they were enthusiasts, and enthusiasm is a dangerous thing in a surgery.


Humorous Observations

- He survived a war against the largest empire on earth and then lost a fight with a sore throat.


- Gargling molasses, vinegar and butter is, at least, a recipe for a very odd dessert.


- The doctors drew off so much blood that the bucket, if it had survived, would have been a national monument.


- Thornton designed the Capitol and suggested lamb's blood in the same career, which is a range.


- Washington asked not to be buried for three days, which is the most polite instruction ever issued by a corpse.


- If the British had known the sleet would do the job, they'd have saved a fortune on muskets.


- "'Tis well" is the shortest and most statesmanlike bit of last-minute reassurance ever offered to a medical team.


- The first president of the United States never saw the nineteenth century, and the doctors never saw the bill. https://prat.uk/?p=51084