Robert F Kennedy Jr revealed that his niece’s tragic death in 2019 was caused by a fentanyl overdose as he paid tribute to her on the anniversary of her passing.
The Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary shared a touching tribute to his late niece Saoirse Kennedy Hill on Friday – but revealed never-before-reported details of how she passed away in 2019 aged 22.
Kennedy wrote: ‘Remembering my beloved niece Saorsie (sic) Kennedy Hill, a luminous soul who died 7 years ago this week of an accidental fentanyl overdose.’
The post featured several photographs of Saoirse from her childhood, including beaming family photos and lavish yachting vacations.
Kennedy promptly deleted the Instagram post soon after sharing it to his millions of followers, however it is unclear if he was aware of revealing her cause of death.
The Daily Mail has contacted the HHS for comment.
At the time of Saoirse’s passing in August 2019, toxicology reports found methadone, fluoxetine, norfluoxetine, diazepam, nordiazepam and alcohol in her system.
Fluoxetine is an anti-depressant, and diazepam is medication to treat alcohol withdrawal symptoms and alcohol withdrawals.
Robert F Kennedy Jr. revealed that his niece Saoirse Kennedy Hill’s tragic death in 2019 was caused by a fentanyl overdose, as he paid tribute to her on the anniversary of her passing
Kennedy shared a touching tribute, but released never-before-reported details of how she passed away in 2019 aged 22
Kennedy wrote on Friday that his late niece was ‘a luminous soul who died 7 years ago this week of an accidental fentanyl overdose’
Saoirse – the granddaughter of assassinated presidential candidate Robert F Kennedy – was found unresponsive at the Kennedy family compound in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts on the night of August 2, 2019.
She was the daughter of Courtney Kennedy Hill and Paul Michael Hill, who was imprisoned in Ireland for 15 years after being falsely accused of involvement in Irish Republican Army (IRA) bombings.
Aged just 22, the heir to the Kennedy dynasty was at home with many of her family members, including grandmother Ethel Kennedy, when she overdosed.
She was raced to Cape Cod Hospital, and she was pronounced dead soon after.
Ethel Kennedy, then-91, shared a heartbreaking statement following Saoirse’s death, saying that ‘the world is a little less beautiful today.’
Saoirse had been open about her struggles with mental illness, depression and anxiety, including sharing an op-ed in her student newspaper at the prestigious Deerfield Academy in 2016.
She wrote at the time that her depression ‘took root in the beginning of my middle school years and will be with me for the rest of my life.’
The political scion indicated that the weight of her family name wore on her, as she said she suffered from ‘deep bouts of sadness that felt like a heavy boulder on my chest.’
Saoirse’s sudden death seven years ago marked one of the most heartbreaking chapter’s in the Kennedy family’s long list of tragedies, which have become commonly known as the ‘Kennedy curse.’
Saoirse’s uncle RFK Jr. shared several photographs of his late niece from her childhood, including beaming family photos and lavish yachting vacations
Kennedy family members at Saoirse Kennedy Hill’s funeral on August 5, 2019 in Massachusetts
The so-called ‘Kennedy curse’ began with the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963, when he was gunned down in Dallas, Texas by Lee Harvey Oswald.
Just months before the assassination, the president’s son Patrick – who was born prematurely – died at just 40-hours-old in August 1963.
In the decades since, the family has suffered numerous tragedies and unexpected deaths, including another assassination, four fatal plane crashes, and several overdoses.
Five years after JFK’s shock assassination, his brother and then-presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy was also assassinated in 1968 in California.
The next year in July 1969, the presumed heir to the Kennedy throne, brother Ted Kennedy, was involved in a controversial car wreck on Chappaquiddick Island in Massachusetts.
While Ted Kennedy survived the crash, his friend Mary Jo Kopechne died inside the car when it crashed into a pond, and his political reputation never fully recovered.
In 1994, former First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis passed away aged just 64, following a battle with lymphoma.
In 1997, JFK’s son Michael, a lawyer and activist, was killed in a skiing accident after smashing in to a tree while playing football on skis without any protective equipment on. He died aged just 39.
The family’s troubles hit the headlines yet again in 1999, when JFK’s son, John F Kennedy Jr., died alongside his wife Carolyn Bassette and her sister Lauren in a plane crash off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard.
Saoirse Kennedy Hill is also not the only family member to die by drug overdose, as Robert F Kennedy’s son David, then-28, passed away in a Palm Beach hotel in 1984.
The most famous death in the Kennedy family was that of President John F Kennedy who was shot by Lee Harvey Oswald in Dallas on November 22, 1963
Robert F Kennedy was killed on June 5, 1968, at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles shortly after he won the California Democratic presidential primary (pictured in March 1968)
JFK Jr crashed his small plane into the ocean around seven miles from Martha’s Vineyard in 1999, killing his wife Carolyn Bessette Kennedy and her sister Lauren Bessette
Robert F Kennedy’s son David, 28, was found dead of an overdose in a Palm Beach hotel in 1984 (pictured in New York in 1984). Right: Saoirse Kennedy Hill, the granddaughter of RFK died following an accidental overdose in 2019 at the family compound in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts
Tatiana Schlossberg, 35, was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia, a type of blood cancer, in May 2024, and she died last year
In 2020, Maeve Kennedy Townsend McKean, 40, the granddaughter of RFK, and her son Gideon, 8, drowned.
The pair disappeared as they were canoeing in Chesapeake Bay, Maryland, when they climbed into the canoe to retrieve a lost ball from a waterfront home, but failed to return to shore.
In 2011, Ted’s daughter Kara died from a sudden unexpected heart attack while working out at a health club in Washington DC.
It’s believed that the heart attack may have been brought on by the aggressive cancer treatment she was undergoing at the time.
Last year, the family was struck by its latest heartbreak as Tatiana Schlossberg, John F. Kennedy’s granddaughter – died from cancer aged just 35.
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