Assassination!: The Brick Chronicle of Attempts on the Lives of Twelve US Presidents (16 page)

The day before the president arrived, Czolgosz went into a hardware store and purchased a .32 caliber Iver Johnson revolver.

Nine days after McKinley died, Czolgosz’s trial was held and took only eight hours. He did not speak a word at the trial save for his plea: “Guilty.” His defense attorneys spent more time praising McKinley than defending their client. The jury sentenced him to death.

Just over a month later, Czolgosz was brought to the electric chair at Auburn Prison. Once strapped in, he declared, “I killed the president for the good of the laboring people, the good people. I am not sorry for my crime.”

The full current of 1,700 volts was then sent through his body for forty-five seconds, and Leon Czolgosz was dead.

After winning election to a second term by a wide majority in 1904, Roosevelt chose not to run for a third term. Instead, he supported his friend William Howard Taft, and then departed for an extended African safari in which he and his companions hunted and trapped thousands of animals, large and small.

In 1912, however, Roosevelt returned to politics, forming the Progressive Party, which was popularly known as the Bull Moose Party. He ran for a third term as president, challenging his former friend Taft and Democratic candidate Woodrow Wilson. Roosevelt traveled around the country giving up to thirty speeches per day.

The strain on his throat was considerable. While in Milwaukee on October 14, Roosevelt’s doctor, Scurry Terrell, tried in vain to get him to rest rather than meet for dinner with party supporters at the Hotel Gilpatrick before delivering a speech that night.

Just after 8 PM, Roosevelt exited the hotel and was greeted by the cheers of hundreds who had gathered on the sidewalk and street. Accompanied by local party leader Henry Cochems and some staff, the former president strode quickly toward his waiting automobile.

Before seating himself, Roosevelt held his hat aloft to acknowledge the crowd. Just then, a thirty-six-year-old man named John Schrank reached his arm out between two bystanders and fired a revolver at Roosevelt, hitting him in the chest.

Schrank was immediately knocked to the ground as the crowd began to shout, “Lynch him! Kill him!” Roosevelt, momentarily knocked into his seat, but then able to stand, commanded, “Don’t hurt him. Bring him here. I want to see him.”

Taking Schrank’s head in his hands, Roosevelt said to his would-be assassin, “What did you do it for?”