A True Western Anecdote
DOCTOR GOODFELLOW OF TOMBSTONE

Charles Whipple

One bullet grazed the President's arm, the other plunged into his back and came to rest under his pancreas. The police marched Guiteau off to jail, and the President, who never lost consciousness, was taken to the White House, where he received the attentions of 16 doctors. Eighty days later, the President died — killed by his doctors.

Dr. William Bliss stuck his unwashed finger into President Garfield's wound. So did the Army surgeon general. They never found the bullet, and assumed it was lodged in the liver, which meant surgery would not help.

After all the unwashed probing, the track of the bullet abscessed. Unwashed fingers were often used to clean out the pus. And when the President died, the doctors thought the cause was peritonitis.

As usual, the White House medical corps was wrong.

The autopsy showed that Guiteau's bullet had nicked the splenic artery, weakening the vessel's wall and causing an aneurysm. Ultimately, the aneurysm burst and President Garfield bled to death, two months after being shot.

The facts of the Garfield assassination can be easily found on the World-Wide Web.

But the facts of the shooting of Tombstone miner Jack Smith on July 13, 1881, come to us via an article by Michael Crane in the NOLA Quarterly, the research journal of the National Association for Outlaw and Lawman History. Smith was shot pointblank in the guts, with the bullet entering an inch below and to the left of the navel, ranging upward, and exiting the back. Smith was carried to the office of Dr. George Goodfellow, who operated on him.

The doctor made an incision parallel to the mid-line and to the left of the entry wound. He pulled the intestines out through the opening, examined them for wounds, trimmed and sutured each hole, cleansed the abdominal cavity thoroughly with warm water, and closed up the incision.

Dr. George Goodfellow

Smith walked out of the hospital in Tombstone on August 19, 1881. President Garfield died on September 19, the same year. Smith was saved by the skill of one western surgeon. Garfield was killed by the best eastern medicine the government had to offer.

Dr. Goodfellow was a contemporary of Dr. John "Doc" Holliday. Both were known for their tempers. Goodfellow liked the ladies, was a championship boxer, and an excellent surgeon. His favorite hideout weapon was an Italian poniard, a triple-edged 4" dagger with which he killed more than once. But, according to Crane, Dr. Goodfellow possessed the blend of competence, arrogance, and supreme self-confidence that made him the best of the frontier surgeons in 19th century America.