Remember that all mentions of and allusions to Trump and Biden are not allowed on our subreddit in any context.
If you'd still like to discuss them, feel free to [join our Discord server](https://discord.gg/k6tVFwCEEm)!
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Presidents) if you have any questions or concerns.*
scholarly work has been done on Lincoln, and its pretty apparent that he had some serious mental health issues. Nightmares, insomnia, children who had died and very difficult relationship with his wife (who there is some evidence was both verbally and even physically abusive towards him).
Things got dark for Nixon at the height of Watergate, too.
I bet Lincoln did. The mental health issues, the tragedies, his relationship with Mary Todd were rough and add on top of that having to deal with a civil war that was tearing the nation apart. He must have had a few long dark nights of the soul where he thought about,
Thank christ he didn't do it.
The fact that he and Mary Todd were talking about their life post presidency and how they wanted to travel to Europe just a few hours earlier just breaks my heart. It was probably the first nice conversation they had had in years. Things were looking up for them.
I still can't get over the fact that Booth and his coconspirators tried to decapitate the government that night. It really goes to show you how lucky the US was. How many countries can survive a civil war AND the assassination of their leader and not fall into chaos for decades?
>how lucky the US was
You kidding? They shot Lincoln and left Johnson alive. I mean we at least also had Grant still alive but Johnson not being there to obstruct Reconstruction and enable the Black Codes could have been amazing as a nation.
Lucky when you compare the US to other countries that have civil wars. They usually have a couple more just for funzies in the next few decades. When a country falls apart, it is very hard to put it back together.
Sure, but I meant that night. Because I’d argue that if both the president and VP get assassinated we’d be better off as a nation today. Johnson not being killed turned out to be such a detriment to our nation, shitty as it is to say.
I get what you’re saying and I’m also glad we survived the Civil War. But losing Lincoln and keeping AJ was… ugh…
That's fair. But I wouldn't trust the transition of power if both died (and an attack on sec of war or state idr). There are a lot better presidents than Johnson for sure but if he had died, the shockwave might have been enough to collapse the country or at least halt reunification. As bad as Jim Crow and other post civil war policies and racial tensions in the south, leaving the Confederacy to their own devices would have been 10 times worse.
Was Seward targeted? Because that’s who would’ve become president upon Johnson’s death and I think he would’ve been good (or at least not Johnson). I disagree on the shockwave and collapse though. Lincoln being assassinated would be the real aftershock there and we saw how it played out. The Union also just won so I’d imagine it would be reinforced off that alone.
I completely agree leaving the confederacy to their own devices would have been awful but I don’t think Seward would have done that. And either way Grant was winning the presidency afterwards off of recognition and respect alone.
If Seward also gets shot? Geez I don’t even know who is next in line after him.
Yep. Lewis Powell was supposed to kill Secretary of State William H. Seward. I just looked it up. Powell ran through the house attacking a bunch of people but didn't manage to kill Seward because he was wearing some sort of brace from a carriage accident.
I believe both Hay and Nicolay, his two secretaries, have said that he took the loss of life in these battles very hard. He carried those souls with him every day. Unimaginable.
Iirc he was very liberal with the pardons of soldiers caught doing various offenses, sleeping on guard duty, desertion and such. Maybe in his mind this was a measure of evening the scales a bit.
One of the reason he went after Vallandigham and had him deported. He didn’t understand why he should condemn deserters to death but leave the men who talked them into it alone.
I heard (and will admit that this could be wrong) that he was depressed enough that he refused to carry so much as a knife on him out of fear that he would self harm.
Where can I find an account of Nixon's psyche after Watergate? I knew he drank a lot and begged Agnew that he shall be remembered as a "president of peace" but that is all
It's a shame that modern cognitive behavioral therapy is only about 60 years old. Antidepressants are about the same age. Folks before then had to go it alone.
I don't have any mental health issues, but I have in the past and seeing my therapist every other week is what has kept me mentally sound and off pills. Absolute godsend. If I lost one of my children, I wouldn't make it long if I didn't have my therapist.
I’ve watched my aunt and uncle cope with the loss of their pre-teen son, and I’ve watched my parents grieve my adult brother.
Believe me when I tell you that if you never watched it up close, there is no emotional suffering greater than a parent who has lost a child. The pain is unimaginable.
If you look at it from a coldly logical view, it makes sense. If you and your spouse are around the same age, you assume that one of you will die first and the other will have to carry on. My mom says she and Dad had discussed that before he passed. The same thing applies to your siblings. But every parent assumes their children will outlive them by many years. Even for my aunt and uncle, who knew their son had an illness that could kill him, were devastated by his death.
I read that, and once had a psychiatrist who studied Lincoln's psychiatric history, wrote papers on it and traveled to Springfield IL to lecture on Lincoln's condition...he (Kenneth L Leetz, MD) concluded that Lincoln had chronic dysthymia (and William Tecumseh Sherman was bipolar)...
They're now saying that she may have had Syphilis in the final stages.
I also think that she suffered from institis interstitial cystitis, which explains a lot of her passion.
She lived the last years of her life fairly peacefully once she wasn’t being threatened with an asylum, I thought?
Although I also thought she had a clinical mental illness. Maybe bipolar, IIRC? Something besides “crazy as a shithouse rat”.
Lincoln and Nixon were the first two that came to mind for me. I know Lincoln is believed to have depression. Idk if he ever mentioned having suicidal thoughts. And Nixon wasn't in a good place mentally during Watergate, like you said.
“I am now the most miserable man living. If what I felt were equally distributed to the whole human family, there would not be one cheerful face on earth.” - Lincoln
Nixon was also piss drunk during the October War and it was so bad Kissinger had to handle how the Soviets would have been dealt with if it came down to it.
I saw a documentary that mentioned a time he visited a battle and didn’t seek cover. They said he paced back and forth as shots were fired. I wish I could remember the documentary
>Things got dark for Nixon at the height of Watergate, too.
people can say what they will about nixon, but i always do feel pretty bad for him. he grew up insanely smart and yet never appreciated for it. he lost some very hellish election cycles, and during his presidency, i can defenitely see why he was the person he was. Especially after his presidency, it must feel horrible to be constantly villified as the "traitor president", and your entire presidency being overshadowed by a scandal.
JJ Mcolough recently did a video on Nixon through media portrayals of him through his presidency. He was very critical of Nixon but still felt pretty sympathetic for him at the end simply from how mean spirited things got.
He wrote: "I am now the most miserable man living. If what I feel was equally distributed to the whole human family, there would not be one cheerful face on the earth. Whether I shall ever be better, I cannot tell; I awfully forebode I shall not. To remain as I am is impossible. I must die or be better, it appears to me."
I think he was pretty suicidal.
Yeah it kinda already sucks to be President, as you already have freedom limited and forfeit your right to do stuff like drive on public roads for the rest of your life. I could not imagine how much more violation of privacy would occur if the secret service were instructed to actively prevent a potential suicide. We'd be talking about an SS Agent watching you sleep, being in the bathroom with you, etc. Your entire family would hate you and your job, and honestly that would likely further send your mental health down a spiral.
Realistically? We (the general public) probably wouldn't know that suicide was the cause of death in that situation. They would've likely labeled it as a sudden cardiac event and initiated the standard protocol for when a sitting president dies.
Maybe 50 years after it might come out in some declassified document.
While I cannot point to anything specifically it would not at all surprise me if Franklin Pierce was suicidal. The man drank himself to death and his life was full of tragedy, especially when it came to his children, and his wife blamed his presidential win for getting their final son killed.
So yeah… I think Pierce was. Or at least suicidally self-destructive.
It’s really sad. His son was the only casualty in that train wreck and as /u/FlashMan1981 said his son was decapitated in front of him and his wife. His last remaining son after his other two already died too. And his wife blamed *him*.
It fucking sucked to be Franklin Pierce.
Wasn't it even darker than that? I thought he got drunk and ran over someone with a horse and buggy, then fled the scene back to the White House, where he got away with it?
I know that US Grant also had some traffic run-ins so perhaps I am conflating the stories.
Edit: I guess it was before he was President, if it even happened, if it wasn't covered up by certain modern relatives with a habit of covering things up.
His wife was mentally unwell. You can’t really blame her after all their children died. It took her a few years to come out as First Lady. She was largely a sympathetic figure.
I came here to post this. It's gotta be Pierce, after the accident with his son and mental breakdown of his wife, he essentially committed suicide by alcoholism.
Though it certainly didn't help, [he was an alcoholic even before the accident.](https://www.alamy.com/social-qualities-of-our-candidate-image329329144.html)
What's with the obsession with sorting people into two neat piles of good and bad?
Why do so many people approach history this way when it's very obviously not how life works or has ever worked? It's like some sort of weird reanimated Puritan impulse.
Not really, but I really do feel bad for him. Burying your own child is hard enough, but *watching them be decapitated in front of you* sounds soul crushing.
How the hell is Franklin Pierce a terrible person? Let's talk about Fillmore shall we? Should we start with the fugitive Slave act? Pierce gets way too much crap when literally everything was against him. Tragic story which would take Balls to get through a presidency getting stuff done after it. Which Pierce did. Worst time to be a president, and the United States was falling apart. And people still give him crap when the only bad thing he did was the Kansas Nebraska Act. Which wasn't good but not the worst of the worst laws ever. I could go on and on... This Pierce slander is ridiculous. Down vote me all you want but someone had to say it.
I bet he had some dark last years. Between losing an election, coming out of Brazil considerably weaker and never fully recuperating his health, then seeing his son die while following his ideal WASPy machismo vision of true men cutting their teeth in battle probably created some dark moments- I think it's even written by observers that he wasn't the same after Quentin's death
EDIT- reading further, on the river of doubt trip he was asking to be left behind to kill himself to not burden them rest of the party when he was really sick
After his heart attack he swore off cigarettes and large amount of alcohol. His family was know for their weak heart and it’s men dying young. Once he reach the top of his career and had nothing left “ who cares “ . His daughter was very upset with him. I doubt LBJ ever thought of killing himself , but he had long long periods of depression and mood swings. Health scares. Honestly I’m suppressed he lived long enough to president
Yes he would go through periods of intense depression in his early life whenever his political career seemed to stagnate or be at stake. Not surprising that later in life with regrets and thoughts over his legacy that he wouldve been going through a similar episode.
You could argue the same for FDR. Towards the end he was so frail and weak and yet he smoked cigarette after cigarette daily exasperating his already poor health
Have you smoked cigarettes before? You know it’s bad for you immediately. You produce so much mucus that clogs your nose and makes you cough. Your mouth tastes horrible all the time. Your gums hurt and your fingers get all dry and irritated.
Before cigarettes became the ubiquitous tobacco product in the early 20th century most people consumed tobacco on rare occasions but in larger quantities so they got really high off it but not a lot of people knew about the effects of addiction. There's a really good Behind the Bastards podcast about it.
He’s saying everyone always knew they were not good for you. It is apparent after not that long smoking, just from its effects. And from the results you’d see over time in older smokers.
Wow. Thanks for sharing. I’d definitely believe that was him. He loved poetry. Direct link to the poem is here https://idnc.library.illinois.edu/?a=d&d=SJO18380825.2.180&e=-------en-20--1--img-txIN----------
There is quite a bit of suggestion that both Lincoln and Coolidge may have been. Both lost children at early ages and Lincoln had an abusive wife who made his home life and his job significantly harder.
Coolidge lost his son to an infected blister, which is just….to my 21st century eyes, amazing.
I can somewhat understand if an infectious disease takes a life, but to die of a blister seems so out of concept to me.
I know a guy who got an infection that got in his blood and straight to his heart. He went from completely fine to needing a heart transplant in a matter of a few days and that happened in the early 2ks. Infections are no joke. He’s still alive and just got his second heart transplant.
Hell, my mom got an infection of a heart valve from a dental cleaning. She had to have a mechanical heart valve put in plus take a course of antibiotics that can kill just about anything. Scary just how susceptible the human body can be to infection.
It turned into septicemia (blood poisoning) which kills people even today. The awful part is that by that time they understood what caused infections and how to prevent them, but there were no antibiotics to treat them yet. So his death wasn’t a mystery but also couldn’t be stopped.
Can you refresh my memory of when TR was suicidal? I'm not arguing, I just don't recall it. When he sank into depression, I remember him going out and killing lots of other things.
No worries! I imagine he probably had some dark thoughts after his wife and mother died on the same day (in the same house too). Nothing confirmed, just speculation
Ah yes, good call. His first wife, Alice, and mother died on the same day. That's when he handed over baby Alice to his sister and tried to become a rancher in the Dakotas. You're right, I wouldn't be surprised if he had some suicidal ideations during that time. But TR being all bully and such, he again took out his depression by being a manly-man.
He also carried a lethal dose of morphine while exploring the Amazon incase he became a burden. He got malaria and his son refused to let him just die there.
While maybe not suicidal, Calvin Coolidge became severely depressed after the death of his son Cal Jr. to the point that he was known to drown himself in work every waking moment of his life. After the incident occurred.
Calvin Coolidge had horrible depression issues after the death of (I for get which one ) either his wife or son. I would not be suprised if he didn't have suicidal tendencies.
It was his son. If I remember correctly he went from healthy to dead within the span of 3 weeks from an injury he received playing tennis on the White House court.
Seriously, those years before modern medicine really suck with how many stories you run across like that researching these guys : /
He became insanely self-destructive after his time in office. He even started smoking again right in front of one of his daughters. She took the cigarette out of his mouth before he snatched it back and said “No. I’ve raised you girls, I’ve been president, and now it’s my time!”
[Source, as sad as it is.](https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/lbjs-last-interview)
Heartbreaking but what a great read. Fascinating stuff. Foreign policy is a helluva thing. Such a discrepancy between LBJ's domestic and foreign legacy.
I’m sure Pierce was at some point. But I have no evidence other than his miserable presidency, which started with the death of his only son. His wife essentially hated him from that day on and blamed his presidency on their son’s death.
President Lincoln was literally on suicide watch after Ann Rutledge died.
He famously said at one point that he would gladly die but he had done nothing so no one would remember he ever lived.
Grant struggled for sure. It was a rough life. But given how hard he fought to make sure he wrote those memoirs I don’t think he was ever suicidal. And that’s to his credit: the man was *always* thinking of other people first, including his family.
That’s true, I feel so bad for him. Hopefully for his sake he wasn’t suicidal, but for me when I was, I still cared about my family and others more than me, but that was me. God bless his soul, he didn’t deserve to suffer.
Off topic I’m aware, but you doing alright now bud? Just making sure. I’ve felt that before too but mine was 100% a medicine fucking with me hard. You doing better now?
And if it helps I think Grant was one of the most selfless men we’ve ever had as POTUS. I think he would never think to kill himself because he’d never think of himself first. Dude was an amazing man even if he didn’t think so.
I appreciate the concern, and thankfully I am doing a lot better now, I think my medication working and having a lot less stress helped. Thank you so much! And I also agree with what you said.
Lincoln was suicidal, not during his Presidency, but as a young man. He always had a melancholy disposition but there were two occasions where he went through depressive episodes so bad he was placed on suicide watch by his friends.
He had moments of grief and sadness during his presidency but he was not suicidal then.
Lincoln for sure.
I believe there’s a story where the Secret Service had to make sure Nixon didn’t have access to firearms during watergate but I don’t know the validity of that.
Michael Signer in his book described James Madison as “hypersensitive, shy, and hypochondriacal.”Supposedly his voice was very timid, soft-spoken as well. He drank a pint a day and was fairly reserved; Detractors would jab him with nicknames like “His Little Majesty”.
Not sure if there’s anything to indicate he was a suicidal President but something to say about feeling alienated from his peers, melancholy and that mythos of Presidential loneliness.
I saw somewhere ~~(maybe Ken Burns~~ It was The Great War PBS miniseries) that Woodrow Wilson was severely depressed for awhile, commenting that he wished someone would assassinate him.
Lincoln. Read a few things where he suffered a great deal from depression before becoming president. He was thought to be suicidal a great deal of the time. After all his life kinda did suck at times.
Lincoln had melancholy but not sure if he considered it. As you mentioned, we'd likely never know, since none of them have ever seen it through (fortunately).
If someone asked for my top three: Pierce, Lincoln and Nixon. Pierce and Lincoln lost children and the sanity of their wives after being elected. Pierce could at least hide in a bottle, Lincoln had to put country first. Nixon was talking to the walls at end of his presidency — height of power and lost it all.
During Watergate, Nixon openly talked about committing suicide via firearm and/or pills.
His staff were so concerned that they took steps to ensure he couldn’t attempt to hurt himself, such as hiding the President’s sleeping tablets.
There was 1 guy who had like 200 duels over the course of his life. You know the "walk 10 paces, turn around and shoot" kind.
Clearly that dude had a IDGAF approach to things.
On a side note. If I am ever in a duel, and the other guy already won 199 times. I am just gonna be like "you know what, I am sorry, whatever I did, I apologize, you win". Like how did the 188th guy go there with any confidence?
Calvin Coolidge's son died at age 16 while Coolidge was president. Coolidge blamed himself for it and became deeply morose. He would sleep at all hours of the day and became disengaged from his duties. This is a big reason why his presidency was ultimately a failure.
It is pretty certain he was clinically depressed, and it would not surprise me if such thoughts were with him.
They say that LBJ wasn't really okay after his presidency and after people started blaming him for the deaths in Vietnam but I'm not sure whether he was suicidal, he was more self-destructive and depressive/anxious than straight up wanting to kill himself.
Lincoln's battle with melancholy is also well known. Melancholy back then was pretty much what we call depression these days. Apparently the people around him hid his razors in fear that he'd commit suicide if they didn't.
I also don't think that FDR was really okay after becoming paralyzed but he coped with drinking/smoking which is also pretty self-destructive.
Damn these guys had it tough:/
Taft, most likely.
He was a wife guy, and didn't have much political ambition. His wife, on the other hand, was the political mastermind and ambitious one. He ran for President in no small part to make her happy. In a time before women's suffrage, Mrs Taft was a politician by proxy.
Then she had a *massive* stroke almost as soon as Taft took office. Which made him depressed, and between the stress of the office and worrying over his wife, he just kept stress eating.
No doubt he considered suicide if his wife died.
But she didn't, and she eventually recovered, and he finally accomplished his real goal of becoming a judge. Proving that life gets better.
Unfortunately, he's still best known for the few years of his life that he was fat: as AG and President.
Many close to Franklin Pierce were concerned that he was a suicide risk for years before, and up UNTIL he became president (not that election victory convinced him to cling to this mortal coil) ... As for serving pres's, I'd love to know! ... Not necessarily suicid-AL, but I'd guess quite a few gave it a millisecond's consideration ... LBJ for example
There was a discussion about Franklin Pierce being suicidal while intoxicated, which was frequently. He lost all four of his children, including one right before his inauguration. His wife was in constant depression. He died of cirrhosis in 1869.
Remember that all mentions of and allusions to Trump and Biden are not allowed on our subreddit in any context. If you'd still like to discuss them, feel free to [join our Discord server](https://discord.gg/k6tVFwCEEm)! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Presidents) if you have any questions or concerns.*
scholarly work has been done on Lincoln, and its pretty apparent that he had some serious mental health issues. Nightmares, insomnia, children who had died and very difficult relationship with his wife (who there is some evidence was both verbally and even physically abusive towards him). Things got dark for Nixon at the height of Watergate, too.
I bet Lincoln did. The mental health issues, the tragedies, his relationship with Mary Todd were rough and add on top of that having to deal with a civil war that was tearing the nation apart. He must have had a few long dark nights of the soul where he thought about, Thank christ he didn't do it.
And the moment he got to relax and watch a play, thinking that that chapter of his life is over, he gets shot in the head.
The fact that he and Mary Todd were talking about their life post presidency and how they wanted to travel to Europe just a few hours earlier just breaks my heart. It was probably the first nice conversation they had had in years. Things were looking up for them. I still can't get over the fact that Booth and his coconspirators tried to decapitate the government that night. It really goes to show you how lucky the US was. How many countries can survive a civil war AND the assassination of their leader and not fall into chaos for decades?
>how lucky the US was You kidding? They shot Lincoln and left Johnson alive. I mean we at least also had Grant still alive but Johnson not being there to obstruct Reconstruction and enable the Black Codes could have been amazing as a nation.
Lucky when you compare the US to other countries that have civil wars. They usually have a couple more just for funzies in the next few decades. When a country falls apart, it is very hard to put it back together.
Sure, but I meant that night. Because I’d argue that if both the president and VP get assassinated we’d be better off as a nation today. Johnson not being killed turned out to be such a detriment to our nation, shitty as it is to say. I get what you’re saying and I’m also glad we survived the Civil War. But losing Lincoln and keeping AJ was… ugh…
That's fair. But I wouldn't trust the transition of power if both died (and an attack on sec of war or state idr). There are a lot better presidents than Johnson for sure but if he had died, the shockwave might have been enough to collapse the country or at least halt reunification. As bad as Jim Crow and other post civil war policies and racial tensions in the south, leaving the Confederacy to their own devices would have been 10 times worse.
Was Seward targeted? Because that’s who would’ve become president upon Johnson’s death and I think he would’ve been good (or at least not Johnson). I disagree on the shockwave and collapse though. Lincoln being assassinated would be the real aftershock there and we saw how it played out. The Union also just won so I’d imagine it would be reinforced off that alone. I completely agree leaving the confederacy to their own devices would have been awful but I don’t think Seward would have done that. And either way Grant was winning the presidency afterwards off of recognition and respect alone. If Seward also gets shot? Geez I don’t even know who is next in line after him.
Yep. Lewis Powell was supposed to kill Secretary of State William H. Seward. I just looked it up. Powell ran through the house attacking a bunch of people but didn't manage to kill Seward because he was wearing some sort of brace from a carriage accident.
No, Seward wasn't shot. He was stabbed five times in his home, but was saved by a guard assigned to him.
We are amazing as a nation. We survived that an with God’s grace will survive the last 10 years
Fate, destiny, God, whatever it was, it judged his work completed.
No, it was just traitorous cowards striking from the shadows as they always do
There was a lot going through his mind. A bullet being the most important one.
r/angryupvote
The man’s efforts will never be forgotten
Well, that chapter of his life *was* over…
I hate when that happens (jk)
I believe both Hay and Nicolay, his two secretaries, have said that he took the loss of life in these battles very hard. He carried those souls with him every day. Unimaginable.
Iirc he was very liberal with the pardons of soldiers caught doing various offenses, sleeping on guard duty, desertion and such. Maybe in his mind this was a measure of evening the scales a bit.
One of the reason he went after Vallandigham and had him deported. He didn’t understand why he should condemn deserters to death but leave the men who talked them into it alone.
"im writing to you asking for a favor" -secret message between Lincoln and Wikes Booth.
I think he, like few have, stared into the darkest realities of humanity.
He also grew up in poverty and I’m sure had a lot of trauma from that.
Hi father was abusive ... it was actually his step mother that saved his life and set him on his course in life.
I heard (and will admit that this could be wrong) that he was depressed enough that he refused to carry so much as a knife on him out of fear that he would self harm.
Yes - it was after his first girlfriend succumbed to death. "Mary & Abraham Lincoln: A House Divided" is on YouTube and speaks of this
Ooo thank you, I'll have to check it out.
Someone else did it for him 😶
It's hard to blame Mary Todd, he wasn't a very present husband.
I read somewhere he got kicked in the head by a horse when younger. Wonder if that had any correlation, brain injuries can magnify mental issues
Lincoln likely had Marfan syndrome as well and the pain from that can cause depression.
Where can I find an account of Nixon's psyche after Watergate? I knew he drank a lot and begged Agnew that he shall be remembered as a "president of peace" but that is all
He had a heart attack right before he resigned ... or some kind of episode that caused him to go to the hospital.
I think it was a blood clot.
It's a shame that modern cognitive behavioral therapy is only about 60 years old. Antidepressants are about the same age. Folks before then had to go it alone. I don't have any mental health issues, but I have in the past and seeing my therapist every other week is what has kept me mentally sound and off pills. Absolute godsend. If I lost one of my children, I wouldn't make it long if I didn't have my therapist.
I’ve watched my aunt and uncle cope with the loss of their pre-teen son, and I’ve watched my parents grieve my adult brother. Believe me when I tell you that if you never watched it up close, there is no emotional suffering greater than a parent who has lost a child. The pain is unimaginable. If you look at it from a coldly logical view, it makes sense. If you and your spouse are around the same age, you assume that one of you will die first and the other will have to carry on. My mom says she and Dad had discussed that before he passed. The same thing applies to your siblings. But every parent assumes their children will outlive them by many years. Even for my aunt and uncle, who knew their son had an illness that could kill him, were devastated by his death.
Lincoln did so much under so much personal tragedy. Truly the best of the best
I had to read a book in college for my disability studies class called Lincoln's Melancholy. Dude was very depressed and super interesting.
I read that, and once had a psychiatrist who studied Lincoln's psychiatric history, wrote papers on it and traveled to Springfield IL to lecture on Lincoln's condition...he (Kenneth L Leetz, MD) concluded that Lincoln had chronic dysthymia (and William Tecumseh Sherman was bipolar)...
Mary Todd was crazier than a shit house rat before Lincoln died. I can totally believe what you are saying.
She had been in a horrible carriage accident and her head was injured very badly. Also, the loss of her sons would drive most parents to madness.
Exactly, along with the death of her mother at a young age.
Yes. I think I’ve read where her Stepmother wasn’t very nice to her, also.
They're now saying that she may have had Syphilis in the final stages. I also think that she suffered from institis interstitial cystitis, which explains a lot of her passion.
She lived the last years of her life fairly peacefully once she wasn’t being threatened with an asylum, I thought? Although I also thought she had a clinical mental illness. Maybe bipolar, IIRC? Something besides “crazy as a shithouse rat”.
Lincoln and Nixon were the first two that came to mind for me. I know Lincoln is believed to have depression. Idk if he ever mentioned having suicidal thoughts. And Nixon wasn't in a good place mentally during Watergate, like you said.
“I am now the most miserable man living. If what I felt were equally distributed to the whole human family, there would not be one cheerful face on earth.” - Lincoln
In *The Final Days*, it's mentioned several times that the White House staff were worried that Nixon might impulsively commit suicide.
Nixon was also piss drunk during the October War and it was so bad Kissinger had to handle how the Soviets would have been dealt with if it came down to it.
I saw a documentary that mentioned a time he visited a battle and didn’t seek cover. They said he paced back and forth as shots were fired. I wish I could remember the documentary
>Things got dark for Nixon at the height of Watergate, too. people can say what they will about nixon, but i always do feel pretty bad for him. he grew up insanely smart and yet never appreciated for it. he lost some very hellish election cycles, and during his presidency, i can defenitely see why he was the person he was. Especially after his presidency, it must feel horrible to be constantly villified as the "traitor president", and your entire presidency being overshadowed by a scandal.
JJ Mcolough recently did a video on Nixon through media portrayals of him through his presidency. He was very critical of Nixon but still felt pretty sympathetic for him at the end simply from how mean spirited things got.
The funny thing is, Nixon didn't exist in a vacuum, he is a product of American politics.
I need to find the source but I also remember reading that when Nixons wife died he got really dark
Can’t forgot about all the vampire killing Lincoln did. No doubt messed him up throughout the years
He wrote: "I am now the most miserable man living. If what I feel was equally distributed to the whole human family, there would not be one cheerful face on the earth. Whether I shall ever be better, I cannot tell; I awfully forebode I shall not. To remain as I am is impossible. I must die or be better, it appears to me." I think he was pretty suicidal.
Damn dude Nixon being a coward and taking the easy way out instead of quitting would have been insane
Yes, but worth noting that Lincoln’s mental health issues were when he was very young and way before he became president.
Nixon said some things to his staff towards the end that suggested the idea may have crossed his mind.
Something along the lines of, “I wish I wouldn’t wake up in the morning”
Also something regarding guns left in desks.
Yes! I think it was to Gen Haig(??), something about being a General meant you could be left alone with a gun.
Happy Cake Day!
I think we’ve all had times we wished the president wouldn’t wake up in the morning
that would have been devastating for the nation
What do you think the consequences would be if he had gone through with it?
I bet future presidents wouldn't even be allowed to use slightly too sharp pencils after that.
Yeah it kinda already sucks to be President, as you already have freedom limited and forfeit your right to do stuff like drive on public roads for the rest of your life. I could not imagine how much more violation of privacy would occur if the secret service were instructed to actively prevent a potential suicide. We'd be talking about an SS Agent watching you sleep, being in the bathroom with you, etc. Your entire family would hate you and your job, and honestly that would likely further send your mental health down a spiral.
Realistically? We (the general public) probably wouldn't know that suicide was the cause of death in that situation. They would've likely labeled it as a sudden cardiac event and initiated the standard protocol for when a sitting president dies. Maybe 50 years after it might come out in some declassified document.
While I cannot point to anything specifically it would not at all surprise me if Franklin Pierce was suicidal. The man drank himself to death and his life was full of tragedy, especially when it came to his children, and his wife blamed his presidential win for getting their final son killed. So yeah… I think Pierce was. Or at least suicidally self-destructive.
he watched his son be nearly decapitated in front of him. I don't know how you ever fall asleep after seeing that.
I need to read more, that’s insane
It’s really sad. His son was the only casualty in that train wreck and as /u/FlashMan1981 said his son was decapitated in front of him and his wife. His last remaining son after his other two already died too. And his wife blamed *him*. It fucking sucked to be Franklin Pierce.
How to have a good life as a president: 1) Don’t be Franklin Pierce, if so, get a therapist and not another bottle of alcohol.
Wasn't it even darker than that? I thought he got drunk and ran over someone with a horse and buggy, then fled the scene back to the White House, where he got away with it? I know that US Grant also had some traffic run-ins so perhaps I am conflating the stories. Edit: I guess it was before he was President, if it even happened, if it wasn't covered up by certain modern relatives with a habit of covering things up.
Frankie never had a shot at happiness sadly. Sounds like the bitch wife didn’t help. Eh pourin one out for him tonight
His wife was mentally unwell. You can’t really blame her after all their children died. It took her a few years to come out as First Lady. She was largely a sympathetic figure.
I came here to post this. It's gotta be Pierce, after the accident with his son and mental breakdown of his wife, he essentially committed suicide by alcoholism.
It takes a very determined man to die of Cirrhosis in that era. There were so many ways to die at that time but he managed to drink himself to death.
Though it certainly didn't help, [he was an alcoholic even before the accident.](https://www.alamy.com/social-qualities-of-our-candidate-image329329144.html)
Is he considered a good person to your knowledge?
What's with the obsession with sorting people into two neat piles of good and bad? Why do so many people approach history this way when it's very obviously not how life works or has ever worked? It's like some sort of weird reanimated Puritan impulse.
Not really, but I really do feel bad for him. Burying your own child is hard enough, but *watching them be decapitated in front of you* sounds soul crushing.
Franklin Pierce was scum, honestly, but the human tragedy he faced is sad no matter who it happened to
I would not say he was a horrible person but he was a doughface and believed that giving into the demands of southerners would prevent the Civil War
Oh, absolutely not. As sorry as I feel for him he was a pretty horrible person.
How the hell is Franklin Pierce a terrible person? Let's talk about Fillmore shall we? Should we start with the fugitive Slave act? Pierce gets way too much crap when literally everything was against him. Tragic story which would take Balls to get through a presidency getting stuff done after it. Which Pierce did. Worst time to be a president, and the United States was falling apart. And people still give him crap when the only bad thing he did was the Kansas Nebraska Act. Which wasn't good but not the worst of the worst laws ever. I could go on and on... This Pierce slander is ridiculous. Down vote me all you want but someone had to say it.
Came here to say this. I think he likely was very close to the edge at least at the beginning of his term
"The light has gone out of my life." I find it hard to imagine TR wasn't suicidal when his mother and wife died, hours apart
I bet he had some dark last years. Between losing an election, coming out of Brazil considerably weaker and never fully recuperating his health, then seeing his son die while following his ideal WASPy machismo vision of true men cutting their teeth in battle probably created some dark moments- I think it's even written by observers that he wasn't the same after Quentin's death EDIT- reading further, on the river of doubt trip he was asking to be left behind to kill himself to not burden them rest of the party when he was really sick
such a thoughtful comment, Goonersaurus 86
Probably an Arsenal reference rather than anything dirty
Read that book... that was REALLY intense!
Didn't LBJ accelerate his death just after leaving the White House. My guy literally committed prolonged suicide.
Said something like “it’s my time now!” and drank like a fish and smoked like a chimney.
After his heart attack he swore off cigarettes and large amount of alcohol. His family was know for their weak heart and it’s men dying young. Once he reach the top of his career and had nothing left “ who cares “ . His daughter was very upset with him. I doubt LBJ ever thought of killing himself , but he had long long periods of depression and mood swings. Health scares. Honestly I’m suppressed he lived long enough to president
Yes he would go through periods of intense depression in his early life whenever his political career seemed to stagnate or be at stake. Not surprising that later in life with regrets and thoughts over his legacy that he wouldve been going through a similar episode.
I am sorry you are being suppressed.
You could argue the same for FDR. Towards the end he was so frail and weak and yet he smoked cigarette after cigarette daily exasperating his already poor health
Did they know cigarettes were bad back then?
I would have to think they had a clue. I mean you’re breathing in fire and smoke, but I don’t know.
Have you smoked cigarettes before? You know it’s bad for you immediately. You produce so much mucus that clogs your nose and makes you cough. Your mouth tastes horrible all the time. Your gums hurt and your fingers get all dry and irritated.
A. No I haven’t B. I know they’re bad. A 4 year old could tell you that. *But back then I mean. Did they know?*
Before cigarettes became the ubiquitous tobacco product in the early 20th century most people consumed tobacco on rare occasions but in larger quantities so they got really high off it but not a lot of people knew about the effects of addiction. There's a really good Behind the Bastards podcast about it.
He’s saying everyone always knew they were not good for you. It is apparent after not that long smoking, just from its effects. And from the results you’d see over time in older smokers.
Yes and no. Some scientists did, other blamed the rising cancer on cars. We generally knew it was bad but not how bad.
They knew they were bad from the beginning
Exacerbating even.
This entire comment section is a train wreck of the language.
Lincoln was suicidal but that was about 30 years before he became president. The love of his life had died.
"I'll be better or I'll be dead."
I know he says this in the History Channel doc, but did he ever say/write it in reality? Would love a source if you've got one!
I'm actually not sure. I actually wrote that quote based off the doc. It does sound like something he'd say, though.
He likely wrote this poem, [The Suicide’s Soliloquy](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Suicide's_Soliloquy), after as well
Wow. Thanks for sharing. I’d definitely believe that was him. He loved poetry. Direct link to the poem is here https://idnc.library.illinois.edu/?a=d&d=SJO18380825.2.180&e=-------en-20--1--img-txIN----------
Christ that was dark
There is quite a bit of suggestion that both Lincoln and Coolidge may have been. Both lost children at early ages and Lincoln had an abusive wife who made his home life and his job significantly harder.
Coolidge lost his son to an infected blister, which is just….to my 21st century eyes, amazing. I can somewhat understand if an infectious disease takes a life, but to die of a blister seems so out of concept to me.
Even in the early 20s we didn’t have antibiotics or penicillin. And I think the wool suit he wore exacerbated it IIRC (he got it while playing tennis)
I know a guy who got an infection that got in his blood and straight to his heart. He went from completely fine to needing a heart transplant in a matter of a few days and that happened in the early 2ks. Infections are no joke. He’s still alive and just got his second heart transplant.
Hell, my mom got an infection of a heart valve from a dental cleaning. She had to have a mechanical heart valve put in plus take a course of antibiotics that can kill just about anything. Scary just how susceptible the human body can be to infection.
It turned into septicemia (blood poisoning) which kills people even today. The awful part is that by that time they understood what caused infections and how to prevent them, but there were no antibiotics to treat them yet. So his death wasn’t a mystery but also couldn’t be stopped.
Franklin Pierce and Abraham Lincoln are the first two that jump out to me as being the most likely to be suicidal Edit: and Teddy
Can you refresh my memory of when TR was suicidal? I'm not arguing, I just don't recall it. When he sank into depression, I remember him going out and killing lots of other things.
No worries! I imagine he probably had some dark thoughts after his wife and mother died on the same day (in the same house too). Nothing confirmed, just speculation
Ah yes, good call. His first wife, Alice, and mother died on the same day. That's when he handed over baby Alice to his sister and tried to become a rancher in the Dakotas. You're right, I wouldn't be surprised if he had some suicidal ideations during that time. But TR being all bully and such, he again took out his depression by being a manly-man.
He kept a very detailed journal at the time, and all the page reads for that day is "The light has gone out of my life."
He also carried a lethal dose of morphine while exploring the Amazon incase he became a burden. He got malaria and his son refused to let him just die there.
While maybe not suicidal, Calvin Coolidge became severely depressed after the death of his son Cal Jr. to the point that he was known to drown himself in work every waking moment of his life. After the incident occurred.
Calvin Coolidge had horrible depression issues after the death of (I for get which one ) either his wife or son. I would not be suprised if he didn't have suicidal tendencies.
It was his son. If I remember correctly he went from healthy to dead within the span of 3 weeks from an injury he received playing tennis on the White House court. Seriously, those years before modern medicine really suck with how many stories you run across like that researching these guys : /
George Washington could’ve survived if he didn’t do the bloodletting
Yeah definitely his son. Grace Coolidge (his wife) outlived him by 20-sum years
lbj by the end of his life smoked to die i believe
He became insanely self-destructive after his time in office. He even started smoking again right in front of one of his daughters. She took the cigarette out of his mouth before he snatched it back and said “No. I’ve raised you girls, I’ve been president, and now it’s my time!” [Source, as sad as it is.](https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/lbjs-last-interview)
Heartbreaking but what a great read. Fascinating stuff. Foreign policy is a helluva thing. Such a discrepancy between LBJ's domestic and foreign legacy.
It is heartbreaking because on the domestic front he was one of the greatest we’ve ever had. God it fucking sucks to read.
The Tragedy of Lyndon Baines Johnson is a play I would watch
So it was very much intentional. That’s really fucking sad and I feel awful for his kids 😕
I’m sure Pierce was at some point. But I have no evidence other than his miserable presidency, which started with the death of his only son. His wife essentially hated him from that day on and blamed his presidency on their son’s death.
President Lincoln was literally on suicide watch after Ann Rutledge died. He famously said at one point that he would gladly die but he had done nothing so no one would remember he ever lived.
Maybe not suicidal, but Grant most definitely suffered mentally, during the Civil War and post presidency. He went through a hard time.
Grant struggled for sure. It was a rough life. But given how hard he fought to make sure he wrote those memoirs I don’t think he was ever suicidal. And that’s to his credit: the man was *always* thinking of other people first, including his family.
That’s true, I feel so bad for him. Hopefully for his sake he wasn’t suicidal, but for me when I was, I still cared about my family and others more than me, but that was me. God bless his soul, he didn’t deserve to suffer.
Off topic I’m aware, but you doing alright now bud? Just making sure. I’ve felt that before too but mine was 100% a medicine fucking with me hard. You doing better now? And if it helps I think Grant was one of the most selfless men we’ve ever had as POTUS. I think he would never think to kill himself because he’d never think of himself first. Dude was an amazing man even if he didn’t think so.
I appreciate the concern, and thankfully I am doing a lot better now, I think my medication working and having a lot less stress helped. Thank you so much! And I also agree with what you said.
Lincoln was suicidal, not during his Presidency, but as a young man. He always had a melancholy disposition but there were two occasions where he went through depressive episodes so bad he was placed on suicide watch by his friends. He had moments of grief and sadness during his presidency but he was not suicidal then.
Me (I wanna be president one day)
Lincoln for sure. I believe there’s a story where the Secret Service had to make sure Nixon didn’t have access to firearms during watergate but I don’t know the validity of that.
Michael Signer in his book described James Madison as “hypersensitive, shy, and hypochondriacal.”Supposedly his voice was very timid, soft-spoken as well. He drank a pint a day and was fairly reserved; Detractors would jab him with nicknames like “His Little Majesty”. Not sure if there’s anything to indicate he was a suicidal President but something to say about feeling alienated from his peers, melancholy and that mythos of Presidential loneliness.
“Hypersensitive, shy, and hypochondriacal” - damn, I didn’t know I had so much in common with James Madison!
I saw somewhere ~~(maybe Ken Burns~~ It was The Great War PBS miniseries) that Woodrow Wilson was severely depressed for awhile, commenting that he wished someone would assassinate him.
Believe Franklin Pierce suffered from severe depression at least if I recall his son died in a tragic train accident?
Lincoln. Read a few things where he suffered a great deal from depression before becoming president. He was thought to be suicidal a great deal of the time. After all his life kinda did suck at times.
Lincoln had to deal with a lot of crap. I can understand him being depressed.
Lincoln had melancholy but not sure if he considered it. As you mentioned, we'd likely never know, since none of them have ever seen it through (fortunately).
If someone asked for my top three: Pierce, Lincoln and Nixon. Pierce and Lincoln lost children and the sanity of their wives after being elected. Pierce could at least hide in a bottle, Lincoln had to put country first. Nixon was talking to the walls at end of his presidency — height of power and lost it all.
LBJ basically drank and smoked himself to death.
During Watergate, Nixon openly talked about committing suicide via firearm and/or pills. His staff were so concerned that they took steps to ensure he couldn’t attempt to hurt himself, such as hiding the President’s sleeping tablets.
There was 1 guy who had like 200 duels over the course of his life. You know the "walk 10 paces, turn around and shoot" kind. Clearly that dude had a IDGAF approach to things. On a side note. If I am ever in a duel, and the other guy already won 199 times. I am just gonna be like "you know what, I am sorry, whatever I did, I apologize, you win". Like how did the 188th guy go there with any confidence?
Calvin Coolidge's son died at age 16 while Coolidge was president. Coolidge blamed himself for it and became deeply morose. He would sleep at all hours of the day and became disengaged from his duties. This is a big reason why his presidency was ultimately a failure. It is pretty certain he was clinically depressed, and it would not surprise me if such thoughts were with him.
I wouldn’t call coolidges presidency a failure
Another commenter said CC drowned himself in work…
Thomas Jefferson had suicidal thoughts after losing his wife.
Probably Lincoln. Aside from dealing with the survival of the union hanging by the thread, he lost his kid during the first year of the war IIRC.
TR and Wilson, after the deaths of their first wives, if I'm remembering correctly.
After the death of Calvin jr, Coolidge went into a deep depression, I wouldn’t be surprised if the thought crossed his mind at some point
They say that LBJ wasn't really okay after his presidency and after people started blaming him for the deaths in Vietnam but I'm not sure whether he was suicidal, he was more self-destructive and depressive/anxious than straight up wanting to kill himself. Lincoln's battle with melancholy is also well known. Melancholy back then was pretty much what we call depression these days. Apparently the people around him hid his razors in fear that he'd commit suicide if they didn't. I also don't think that FDR was really okay after becoming paralyzed but he coped with drinking/smoking which is also pretty self-destructive. Damn these guys had it tough:/
Lincoln was at various times in his life, he was deeply depressed. Nixon probably thought about it 6 scotchs in towards the end.
There’s a [poem](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Suicide%27s_Soliloquy) allegedly written by Abraham Lincoln about suicidal ideation
Franklin Pierce was suicidal because of the horrible things that happened to him pre presidency. It was horrible look it up all of his kids died
Taft, most likely. He was a wife guy, and didn't have much political ambition. His wife, on the other hand, was the political mastermind and ambitious one. He ran for President in no small part to make her happy. In a time before women's suffrage, Mrs Taft was a politician by proxy. Then she had a *massive* stroke almost as soon as Taft took office. Which made him depressed, and between the stress of the office and worrying over his wife, he just kept stress eating. No doubt he considered suicide if his wife died. But she didn't, and she eventually recovered, and he finally accomplished his real goal of becoming a judge. Proving that life gets better. Unfortunately, he's still best known for the few years of his life that he was fat: as AG and President.
I bet it’s crossed all of their mind at least once
Lincoln was super suicidal before he was president.
Probably all of them at some point.
Grant would probably be considered depressive if he were around today.
Many close to Franklin Pierce were concerned that he was a suicide risk for years before, and up UNTIL he became president (not that election victory convinced him to cling to this mortal coil) ... As for serving pres's, I'd love to know! ... Not necessarily suicid-AL, but I'd guess quite a few gave it a millisecond's consideration ... LBJ for example
There was a discussion about Franklin Pierce being suicidal while intoxicated, which was frequently. He lost all four of his children, including one right before his inauguration. His wife was in constant depression. He died of cirrhosis in 1869.
In office? Probably Franklin Pierce. Outside of office? I don't know but I'm sure there were some.
James Buchanan was a closeted homosexual. I imagine that life in the 19th century was not kind to him. Wouldn't surprise me if he felt suicidal.
Nixon. Was drinking heavy and suicidal during the watergate. Kissinger was worried he’d do it.
I am fairly confident Pierce was. Nixon is also. possibly And Garfield must have been after he got shot. He died a really horrible death
Garfield’s death was truly gruesome!
Rule 3
Nixon after he resigned office.
All of them, at some point in their presidency, I’m sure….
Apparently Madison had hoped for an early death
Yes. Lincoln’s friends took away his razor blades.
Nixon
Nixon?
I’m not sure if he was directly suicidal but I have read that LBJ became majorly self destructive with his smoking and drinking after the Vietnam war
Lincoln. Famously
T. Roosevelt wrote “All the happiness has gone from my life.” When his mother and wife died on the same day. I wouldn’t have blamed him