Tragedy has stalked the Kennedy family for generations.
The heartbreak mounted again this week after Tatiana Schlossberg, President John F. Kennedy’s granddaughter, revealed she is battling a rare and aggressive form of leukemia.
Her terminal diagnosis adds to a staggering list of deaths, disasters and sudden losses that have long fueled talk of a “Kennedy curse,” shadowing America’s most famous political dynasty from warplanes and assassinations to overdoses, fatal crashes and heartbreaking illness.
2025
Caroline Kennedy’s daughter, Tatiana Schlossberg, 35, announces in a New Yorker essay terminal cancer diagnosis and less than a year to live.
2020
Maeve Kennedy Townsend McKean, 40, the granddaughter of Robert F. Kennedy, and her son Gideon, 8, drown in a canoe accident on Chesapeake Bay.
2019
RFK’s granddaughter, Saoirse Kennedy Hill, dies at 22 of an accidental overdose at the family compound in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts.
2012
RFK Jr.’s wife, Mary Richardson Kennedy, dies by suicide at age 52 at her Bedford, NY home amid a bitter divorce fight.
2011
Ted Kennedy’s eldest daughter, Kara, 51, collapses and dies of a heart attack after a workout at a Washington, DC health club. She had previously undergone aggressive treatment for lung cancer years earlier.
1999
JFK’s only son, John F. Kennedy Jr., 38, his wife Caroline Bessette and her sister Lauren, die when the small plane he was piloting plunges into the Atlantic off Martha’s Vineyard.
1997
RFK’s son Michael, 39, is killed in a skiing accident in Aspen, Colo.
1984
RFK’s son David, 28, is found dead of a drug overdose in a Palm Beach hotel.
1969
Sen. Ted Kennedy drives off a bridge on Chappaquiddick Island, Mass., and aide Mary Jo Kopechne, 28, is found dead in the submerged car.
1968
President John F. Kennedy’s brother, Robert, is assassinated by Sirhan Sirhan at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, just after winning the California presidential primary
1963
President John F. Kennedy, 46, is assassinated while riding in a Dallas motorcade by Lee Harvey Oswald
1963
Patrick Bouvier Kennedy, JFK and Jackie’s premature son, dies 39 hours after birth.
1948
Kathleen “Kick” Kennedy, Joe and Rose Kennedy’s free-spirited daughter, 28, dies in a plane crash in France.
1944
Joseph P. Kennedy Jr., 29, the eldest Kennedy son, is killed when his explosives-laden Navy bomber blows up midair during a secret WWII mission.
