Did Van Gogh cover up his own accidental murder?

Interesting, if true:

http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/44930330/ns/today-today_news/t/experts-unconvinced-new-van-gogh-death-theory?gt1=43001

To sum up the article, a new biography presents the theory that Van Gogh's death could not have been a suicide, because the angle of the bullet isn't right for a suicide. Instead, the author thinks that Van Gogh was shot by accident by one of his neighbor's teenage son, who used to tease Van Gogh and would often carry his loaded shotgun around in the woods near Van Gogh's property, and in order to keep the kid from going to prison (since it was an accident, after all) Van Gogh claimed it was suicide.

Would make Van Gogh even cooler in my book, if it turns out to be true. There is already talk of using forensics to test the theory, so who knows, this might be settled in a few months.

One flaw in the theory. Van Gogh could have survived the gunshot easily if he had just seen a doctor.

Doctors in the 1800s were pretty terrible; he wouldn't have survived being shot in the head even if he took his corpse to the doctor rather than pretending to kill himself.

...Van Gogh got shot and died, but he then claimed it was suicide to help the kid who shot him by accident? Does no one seriously see the blatant, blatant flaw in that?

edited 20th Oct '11 9:31:17 AM by Deuteronomy

It wasnt in the head. It was in the gut. and lots of historical evidence we have makes art historians think had he simply gotten ahold of some antibiotics instead of insisting on using Holistic medicine, he would have been fine. and given antibiootics had been in use in folk remedies for 2000 odd years and the actual process of antibiosis had been discovered 20 some years before van gogh bit it...

edited 20th Oct '11 10:02:14 AM by Midgetsnowman

I'm confused, the article says he never left a suicide note and there's no evidence of a gun. In that case, why is Van Gogh's death considered a suicide and how would he cover up being shot?

Van Gogh lived long enough to talk to a few people before succumbing to septecemia. On his deathbed he insisted he had done it to himself, but the circumstances are a bit fishy - especially because shooting yourself in the gut is a rather difficult thing to do in the first place, especially with a shotgun.