A child of a poor family, he worked as a canal driver before attending college at Ohio's Western Reserve Eclectic Institute. One of the pleasures of the book is the chance to learn more about Garfield, who appears as a fully realized historical figure instead of a trivia answer. By keeping a tight hold on her narrative strands, Millard crafts a popular history rich with detail and emotion. The murder serves as a lens through which to examine Garfield's life, Guiteau's peripatetic existence, the fortunes of the Republican Party, the political spoils system, the role of scientific invention, and the state of the American medical profession. In "Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine, and the Murder of a President," Candice Millard reconstructs the events leading up to and following Garfield's assassination. Whether they were prompted by insanity or simple desperation in the face of his looming, almost inevitable execution, there was element of truth in Guiteau's ravings. "I deny the killing, if your honor please," he said. Instead, Garfield died as a result of the care he received from his doctors. As part of his erratic defense, Guiteau argued that he should not be charged with murder, because the bullets he fired from his ivory-handled revolver didn't kill the president. In November 1881, Charles Guiteau, a charlatan suffering from mental illness, stood trial for the assassination of President James Garfield.
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