A history of US presidents who have been assassinated

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The President of the United States has the most elite security protection apparatus in the world. Over the course of 46 presidencies, 4 presidents have been assassinated while in office.  

Presidential assassinations, both successful and unsuccessful, were usually politically motivated; however, some assassins were mentally ill or acted without a known purpose. Almost every presidential assassin were captured after their attempt and executed or imprisoned.    

Who are the 4 assassinated presidents?

Abraham Lincoln

On April 20, 1865, President Abraham Lincoln became the first U.S. president assassinated in the history of the country. Lincoln was shot in the back of the head by John Wilkes Booth while watching a play Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C. days after the end of the Civil War.  

After being shot, Lincoln was rushed to doctors at a nearby residence where he remained in a coma for eight hours before passing away the next morning. 

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The assassination of President Lincoln by John Wilkes Booth is depicted in this drawing. (Getty Images)

Booth was a confederate sympathizer enraged by the South's capitulation to the Union along with Lincoln's intention to give black Americans the right to vote and abolish slavery. Two weeks after Lincoln's assassination, Booth was cornered by Union troops at a Virginia farm where he was shot dead

James Garfield

Less than four months after taking office, President James Garfield was shot by Charles Guiteau at a railroad station in Washington DC on July 2, 1881. Garfield was hit twice, once in the back and another bullet enter through his back. Three months later, after improper medical examinations, Garfield died from the injuries he sustained during the assassination attempt on September 19, 1881.

Charles Guiteau assassinated President Garfield in 1881. (Three Lions/Getty Images)

His assassin, Guiteau, was found and sentenced to death by hanging. The trial found that he was mentally unwell and wanted to kill the president for not appointing as the Ambassador to France. 

William McKinley

On September 6, 1901, President William McKinley was shot twice by polis anarchist Leon Czolgosz while attending musical event in Buffalo, New York. The first bullet failed to cause any injury, but the second shot enter his stomach. McKinley died 8 days later on September 14, 1901, due to the gangrene that had developed around his wound. 

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President William McKinley was assassinating in September 1901, only six months into his second term as the 25th President of the United States. (Universal History Archive/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

Czolgosz was captured at the shooting and taken into custody. Weeks later he was found guilty and sentenced to death by the electric chair. 

John F. Kennedy

President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas on November 22, 1963, in his presidential motorcade while riding alongside his wife, Texas Governor John Connally and his wife Nellie. Former Marine Lee Harvey Oswald Kennedy fired upon Kennedy's vehicle from a sixth floor building where struck the president in the back and head.

John F. Kennedy and his wife, Jackie Onassis Kennedy, moments before the president was assassinated in 1963. (Bettmann / Contributor via Getty Images)

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Kennedy was rushed to the hospital and pronounced dead 30 minutes after the assassination took place. Oswald was captured and arrested for murder but was himself assassinated on November 24, 1963, by Dallas nightclub owner Jack Ruby. A clear motivation for Kennedy's assassination or Oswald's murder has never been conclusively determined.