John Von Neumann - Death

Death

In 1955, von Neumann was diagnosed with what was either bone or pancreatic cancer. A von Neumann biographer, Norman Macrae, has speculated: "It is plausible that in 1955 the then-fifty-one-year-old Johnny's cancer sprang from his attendance at the 1946 Bikini nuclear tests." On his death bed, he entertained his brother with word-for-word recitations of the first few lines of each page of Goethe's Faust. Von Neumann died a year and a half later, at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C. under military security lest he reveal military secrets while heavily medicated. He was buried at Princeton Cemetery in Princeton, Mercer County, New Jersey.

While at Walter Reed, he invited a Roman Catholic priest, Father Anselm Strittmatter, O.S.B., to visit him for consultation. Von Neumann is reported to have said in explanation that Pascal had a point, referring to Pascal's wager. He is said to have been an 'agnostic Catholic' due to his agreement with Pascal's wager. Father Strittmatter administered the last sacraments to him. Some of Von Neumann's friends believed that his religious conversion was not genuine since it did not reflect his attitudes and thoughts when he was healthy. Even after his conversion, Strittmatter recalled that Von Neumann did not receive much peace or comfort from it as he still remained terrified of death.