<style="font-size: 8pt"="">Charles Julius Guiteau<style="font-size: 8pt"=""> (September 8, 1841 – June 30, 1882) was an American lawyer with a history of mental illness who assassinated President James Garfield on July 2, 1881 (Garfield died of complications following the shooting, on September 19).
Born in Freeport, Illinois, Guiteau was routinely beaten by his father as a child and left home at an early age. He inherited $1000 from his grandfather as a young man and went to Ann Arbor, Michigan, in order to attend the university there. Unfortunately, due to inadequate academic preparation, he failed the entrance examinations.
After some time trying to do remedial work in the necessary Latin and algebra, during which time he received numerous letters from his father haranguing him to do so, he quit and joined the controversial religious sect, the Oneida Community.
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