Leon Czolgosz
Leon Czolgosz (
1873 -
October 31,
1901) was the assassin of
US president William McKinley.
Leon Czolgosz shoots President McKinley with a concealed revolver, at the Pan-American Exposition.
One of seven children of
Russian-
Polish immigrants, Czolgosz lived in conditions of brutal poverty for most of his life. He left his family farm in
Cleveland, Ohio at the age of ten to work at American Steel and Wire Company with two of his brothers. At the height of his employment he was making $4 a day, but after the workers of his factory went on strike (with no
union to protect them), they were fired. In
1898, after witnessing a series of similar strikes (many ending in police confrontation), Leon suffered a mental breakdown and had to return home, where he was constantly at odds with his family's
Roman Catholic beliefs, and with his stepmother (his mother had died during childbirth when he was twelve). He became a recluse, and spent much of his time alone, reading
socialist and
anarchist newspapers. He frequented the speeches of
Emma Goldman.
In 1901, he moved to Buffalo, New York and rented a room near the site of the Pan-American Exposition. On September 6, 1901 Czolgosz went to the exposition with a pistol in his hand, concealed in a bandage. He shot and killed president McKinley.
Leon Czolgosz was executed by electrocution on October 31, 1901. His last words were "I killed the President because he was the enemy of the good people - the good working people. I am not sorry for my crime."
The gun used by Czolgosz was an Iver-Johnson "Safety Automatic" revolver in .32 S&W caliber, serial number 463344.
