Bulletin: Woodrow Wilson Was a Sick Man!

An article in Saturday's Washington Post detailed the illnesses that afflicted the twenty-eighth president (read the article here on the Wilson Library site). The severity of Wilson's debilitation came to light in the correspondence of the Wilson's personal physician, Cary T. Grayson (seen here at right with Wilson), which was recently donated to the Woodrow Wilson Presidential Library in Staunton, VA.

The correspondence revealed that Wilson underwent an operation for a breathing disorder in 1918, at the height of World War I. The operation detailed the removal of polyps from the president's nose. Only Grayson, Edith Wilson, a nurse, and a White House usher were privy to the operation.

The Grayson papers came to the library from the Grayson family and make the first major donation of papers to the library. Grayson met Wilson on Inauguration Day 1913 and was a constant companion of Wilson's until the day Wilson died in 1923. After Wilson's debilitating stroke in October 1919, Grayson was one of the few people that still saw Wilson regularly.

The stroke, suffered as Wilson was trying desperately to secure passage of the Treaty of Versailles and ensure the US entrance into the League of Nations, changed the course of the nation. The treaty was ultimately rejected by the Senate in March 1920.

Wilson's incapacitation came at a point in history when the 25th Amendment (dealing with presidential succession) did not yet exist. Many historians believe that Edith Wilson ran the country as she controlled access to her husband after the stroke. Now it seems that Grayson, who literally had his finger on the pulse of the president, may have wielded a great deal of influence as well.