Listen to discretion as advised.

In the early morning of December 13, 1799, George Washington woke in a panic, waking his

wife as well.

The night before, the first president of the United States, now two years retired, had

been complaining of a sore throat.

But in this moment, woken in a cold sweat.

His throat was so swollen, he was having trouble breathing.

His wife, Martha, sprung into action, and she sent someone at the Mount Vernon estate

where they lived to go fetch the local doctor.

But George's throat was closing up fast, and Martha knew she would need more than just

a general doctor.

So before the aid left to fetch help, she asked him to fetch them someone else as well.

Someone who practiced one of the more common healing techniques at the time.

But also, the person who would ultimately lead to her husband's death, a blood letter.

Bloodletting was the practice of, well, exactly what it sounds like, removing blood from

a person in order to balance out their body chemistry.

After the next few hours, Washington would be drained of 40% of his blood supply.

That's like if he gave blood back to back four times in a row.

By that evening, he was dead.

Today, we have tools that could have saved the president.

We would have known if what he was experiencing was bacterial or viral.

We would have been able to intubate him and give him fluids to buy time while finding

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