THE FINAL STEP? –
May 20, 2024 – Historical accounts and credible sources corroborate the online claim that Wilson, who was a New York stockbroker prior to getting sober and co-launching AA, did ask for whiskey but was denied his requests on several occasions in the final days of his life. Commonly known as Bill W. (as part of AA’s tradition of anonymity), Wilson co-founded the abstinence-based recovery fellowship alongside Dr. Bob Smith in 1935. Having struggled with alcoholism until 1934, Wilson maintained his sobriety until his death in 1971 from pneumonia and emphysema caused by his decades-long smoking habit.
According to a profile of author Susan Cheever in the The Washington Post in 2004, she was given access to the archives of Wilson’s historic home, Stepping Stones, while researching her biography “My Name is Bill: Bill Wilson.” The nursing records kept by the medical attendants who looked after Wilson prior to his death hid among the artifacts. These logs recounted that Wilson did request whiskey on his deathbed, but the medical staff denied him, as The Washington Post reported.
