On this day in history, July 23, 1885, former U.S. President and Civil War hero Ulysses S. Grant died of throat cancer at the age of 63. His death, though anticipated after a long illness, sent shockwaves through the nation. But what many may not realize is that this solemn moment in American history also gave rise to a peculiar and lesser-known “first”—a form of medical documentation that some now jokingly refer to as the world’s first “autopsy selfie.”

Dr. Shrady, Grant’s attending physician, was so determined to document the president’s final moments and the ravages of his disease that he invited an artist to sketch Grant on his deathbed and post-mortem. The results were a series of drawings that eerily resemble today’s obsession with visual documentation—even at life’s end. One image in particular, now housed at the Library of Congress, shows Grant shortly after his death, surrounded by pillows, bathed in natural light, with careful anatomical precision. It was neither macabre nor exploitative in its original intent—it was, for its time, an act of reverent scientific observation. Still, the image caused a stir when it was later reproduced in newspapers and medical journals, igniting early debate on the ethics of photographing or illustrating the deceased.

This moment, strange and morbid as it may seem by today’s standards, symbolized the late 19th century’s fascination with both death and progress. Photography was in its infancy, and deathbed portraits—both drawn and photographed—were not uncommon in Victorian households. But the Grant drawings were among the first examples of a public figure’s death being medically documented for educational purposes and public consumption. They bridged art, medicine, journalism, and a growing national obsession with hero worship and mourning.

President Grant’s funeral itself was a monumental event. Over 1.5 million people lined the streets of New York City for the largest funeral procession in the country’s history at the time. His body was placed in a temporary tomb in Riverside Park until the construction of his mausoleum—now known as Grant’s Tomb—was completed in 1897. The illustrations created immediately after his death, however, remain a strangely intimate piece of the historical record, tucked between heroism and humanity.

While historians have long noted the significance of Grant’s military campaigns and presidency during Reconstruction, the strange side note of his post-mortem portraits remains a curious footnote—a Victorian precursor to today’s digital oversharing and visual documentation of every stage of life (and death).

In retrospect, the drawing of Grant on July 23, 1885, may not have been a “selfie” in the modern sense, but it represents one of the earliest known instances where a personal and scientific image of a death became part of public record. It was a moment when mourning, medicine, and media collided—and a strangely appropriate reflection of a man whose life was lived so publicly, from the battlefields of the Civil War to the highest office in the land.

So while July 23 marks the death of one of America’s most revered figures, it also quietly marks the birth of a new way of recording history: not just through words and monuments, but through visual moments frozen in time—no matter how private or strange.