George Washington fell ill after riding through snow and rain on his estate, developing acute epiglottitis that swelled his throat shut. Contemporary doctors bled him repeatedly, draining an estimated 40 percent of his blood in a desperate but misguided treatment. He died at Mount Vernon surrounded by family and aides, reportedly telling his secretary, 'I am just going. Have me decently buried, and do not let my body be put into the vault in less than three days.'
Washington had spent December 12, 1799, inspecting his farmland on horseback in a cold, wet snowstorm, refusing to change out of his damp clothes for dinner because he did not want to keep guests waiting. By the next morning he had a severe sore throat and hoarseness; by the following day, breathing had become agony.
Three physicians attended him, employing the standard treatments of the era: bloodletting, blister-inducing poultices, and enemas. In total they drained roughly five pints of blood from a man already struggling to breathe, a treatment modern doctors believe likely hastened his death rather than curing him. Washington bore the ordeal with characteristic stoicism, at one point examining his own pulse.
He died between 10 and 11 p.m. on December 14, 1799, with his wife Martha seated at the foot of the bed. His last words concerned his own burial arrangements, reflecting a fear, common at the time, of being mistakenly interred alive. News of his death traveled slowly by horse and ship, and Congress did not learn of it for four days. Henry Lee's eulogy—'first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen'—became the epitaph history remembers him by.
Key people: George Washington, Martha Washington