BABY PATRICK DIES 39 HOURS AFTER BIRTH
Boston, Massachusetts (JFK+50) On August 9, 1963, Patrick Bouvier Kennedy, son of President and Mrs. John F. Kennedy, died after just 39 hours of life of complications from hyaline membrane disease. The disease, characterized by the structural immaturity of the infant's lungs, is the leading cause of death in premature births.
David Powers writes that Patrick had been transferred to the Harvard School of Public Health "where he was placed in a high-pressure chamber, where oxygen was forcibly fed to him." Dave said the President visited four times during the day and spent the night with Dave and Bobby on the hospital's fourth floor.
A secret service agent awakened JFK at 2 a.m. and told him that his son's condition had "taken a turn for the worse." Baby Patrick died at 4:04 a.m. His father said quietly, "He was a beautiful baby. He put up quite a fight." Dave says that the President then went back upstairs "and wept."
SOURCE
"Johnny We Hardly Knew Ye: Memories of John Fitzgerald Kennedy," by Kenneth P. O'Donnell and David F. Powers with Joe McCarthy, Little Brown and Company, Boston, 1970, 1972.
