23/09/2026
On this day in 1939, Sigmund Freud died peacefully in his final home at 20 Maresfield Gardens, London. He was 83 years of age.
Rather than on a bed, Freud died on a specially made "invalid couch", installed in his study downstairs. He told his physician, Max Schur: “My dear, you promised you would help me when I could no longer carry on. Now it is only torture, and it makes no sense.” He was administered substantial doses of morphine and passed peacefully on 23rd September 1939.
By his bedside Freud kept this book, "La Peau de Chagrin", by Honore de Balzac - the last book he would ever read. It tells the story of a young man and his conflict between longevity and desire, and Freud remarked to his doctor, “This was the proper book for me to read; it deals with shrinking and starvation.” Freud's very own copy of "La Peau de Chagrin" is a key object in our current exhibition, "40 Objects, 40 Years", allowing you to see the book up close.
Freud, a refugee from N**i-occupied Vienna, arrived in London in June 1938 and settled into his final home in September of that year. Despite the progression of his jaw cancer effectively confining him to the downstairs rooms and garden of the house, Freud remained busy, seeing patients, friends, writers, and colleagues, completing "Moses and Monotheism", and working on "An Outline of Psychoanalysis".
At his funeral, his lifelong friend and colleague, Ernest Jones, said:
“A great spirit has left the world… Freud inspired us with his personality, character and ideas, and his creative spirit infused us all… Thus we bid farewell to a man of whom we shall never know the like again.”
Photo 1: Freud at his desk.
Photo 2: Freud's copy of "La Peau de Chagrin".
Photo 3: Freud's "invalid couch", where it likely stood in the last weeks of his life.
Photo 4: Freud with his daughter Anna.
