Charles J. Guiteau

Charles Julius Guiteau was an American office seeker who assassinated 20th United States president James A. Garfield in 1881. A failed lawyer suffering from mental illness, Guiteau delusionally believed he had played a major role in Garfield's election victory, for which he should have been rewarded with a consulship. Guiteau felt frustrated and offended by the Garfield administration's rejections of his applications to serve in Vienna or Paris to such a degree that he shot Garfield in Washington, D.C., on July 2, 1881. Garfield died on September 19 from infections related to the wounds. Caught immediately after shooting Garfield, Guiteau was tried, convicted, and publicly executed by hanging on June 30, 1882.