Emily Chan
On that fateful day of September 6, 1901, an act of violence was inflicted on America’s leader, shattering the nation’s sense of security.
President William McKinley was at an event in Buffalo, New York, when a gunman shot him at close range, leaving him critically injured. About a week later, the 25th president of the United States was dead.
It has been 122 years since the assassination, and now, the original autopsy report for McKinley’s death, along with other rare related documents, are up for sale by the Raab Collection for $80,000.
The Raab Collection is a family-run company located in the suburbs of Philadelphia that deals in important historical manuscripts and helps put them on the market. Over the past 35 years, the company has handled the sales of documents from famous figures, such as Theodore Roosevelt, Albert Einstein, and Amelia Earhart.
The documents that the company is currently offering up once belonged to Herman Matzinger, one of the two Buffalo physicians who performed McKinley’s autopsy after his untimely demise on September 14, 1901.
Among the documents are unpublished medical notes, correspondence with others involved in the investigation, and tickets to the president’s funeral service. The existence of these papers was not known until a direct descendant of Matzinger, who will remain anonymous, discovered them.
“It had never been outside the family,” said Nathan Rabb, president of Raab Collection. “This person found it in a proverbial shoebox, passed down to her by her parents.”
McKinley had been in Buffalo for the Pan-American Exposition, standing on stage in front of hundreds of people when Leon Czolgosz, a former mill worker, shot him twice. The first bullet bounced off a button on his coat, but the other pierced his abdomen. Doctors operated on him immediately, but they were unable to find the bullet.
At first, McKinley seemed to be recovering. However, he succumbed to the injury in the end. Later that day, Vice President Theodore Roosevelt was sworn into office. On October 29, Czolgosz was found guilty and was executed promptly.
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