The Presley Family’s Most Heartbreaking Tragedies Through the Years: Elvis and Lisa Marie’s Deaths and More

Elvis Presley was a music icon through the years, and his family became just as legendary.

The “Jailhouse Rock” crooner, who rose to fame in 1950s, died in August 1977 at the age of 42. His only daughter, Lisa Marie Presley, had been the one to discover his passing before calling his ex-girlfriend Linda Thompson. The former model recalled via Instagram in August 2022 that Lisa Marie, then 9, had told her: "My daddy’s dead!” 

“I think it gets locked in forever and nothing can change it,” Lisa Marie, whom Elvis shared with ex-wife Priscilla Presley, told Variety in August 2017 of her father’s legacy. “And then, on the other side, I’m going through what I’ve dealt with, and I know what he’s gone through, and the older I get, the more I can relate to the obstacles that he had and the trepidations that he had. I can relate to them more, way more. I understand more as I get older. He was quite young [when he passed away]. So I can’t say I knew a whole lot at 42, or that I know a whole lot now. But what I know is that I don’t know everything.”

Both the “Storm & Grace” songstress and Priscilla — who was married to the King of Rock N’ Roll between 1967 and 1973 — have continued to honor his memory through the years. In August 2018, Lisa Marie released a cover of Elvis’ “Where No One Stands Alone” and used her dad's archival audio as background vocals.

“I just felt really emotional. It’s never pleasant to sing and cry,” she said during an interview on the U.K.’s Lorraine at the time. “I had to keep my composure, but I felt very connected to him and to the song. I felt very connected to him and to the song.”

[sendtonews type="float" key="v5fr9Dx4iP-2828387-14453"]

She added at the time: “I just felt like a hand came down to me [while I was recording] because I read [the lyrics] and thought, ‘I know his struggles.’ I had the same struggles the last few years, it was like the perfect thing.”

Both Elvis and Lisa Marie had struggled with addiction during their musical careers. “[I used] cocaine, sedatives, pot and drinking — all at the same time. I just couldn’t be sober,” she recalled Paper Magazine in 2003. "I don’t know how I lived through it.”

Lisa Marie, for her part, died in January 2023, nearly 46 years after Elvis’ death, after going into cardiac arrest.

“It is with a heavy heart that I must share the devastating news that my beautiful daughter Lisa Marie has left us,” Priscilla said in a statement to People at the time. “She was the most passionate strong and loving woman I have ever known. We ask for privacy as we try to deal with this profound loss. Thank you for the love and prayers. At this time there will be no further comment.”

Lisa Marie is survived by Priscilla and her daughters Riley Keough, whom she shared with ex-husband Danny Keough, and twins Harper and Finley, whom she coparented with former spouse Michael Lockwood. The late songwriter and Danny also shared son Benjamin Keough, who died by suicide in 2020.

Scroll below for the Presley family’s most heartbreaking tragedies:

Elvis Presley was a music icon through the years, and his family became just as legendary.

The “Jailhouse Rock” crooner, who rose to fame in 1950s, died in August 1977 at the age of 42. His only daughter, Lisa Marie Presley, had been the one to discover his passing before calling his ex-girlfriend Linda Thompson. The former model recalled via Instagram in August 2022 that Lisa Marie, then 9, had told her: "My daddy’s dead!” 

“I think it gets locked in forever and nothing can change it,” Lisa Marie, whom Elvis shared with ex-wife Priscilla Presley, told Variety in August 2017 of her father’s legacy. “And then, on the other side, I’m going through what I’ve dealt with, and I know what he’s gone through, and the older I get, the more I can relate to the obstacles that he had and the trepidations that he had. I can relate to them more, way more. I understand more as I get older. He was quite young [when he passed away]. So I can’t say I knew a whole lot at 42, or that I know a whole lot now. But what I know is that I don’t know everything.”

Both the “Storm & Grace” songstress and Priscilla — who was married to the King of Rock N’ Roll between 1967 and 1973 — have continued to honor his memory through the years. In August 2018, Lisa Marie released a cover of Elvis’ “Where No One Stands Alone” and used her dad's archival audio as background vocals.

“I just felt really emotional. It’s never pleasant to sing and cry,” she said during an interview on the U.K.’s Lorraine at the time. “I had to keep my composure, but I felt very connected to him and to the song. I felt very connected to him and to the song.”

[sendtonews type="float" key="v5fr9Dx4iP-2828387-14453"]

She added at the time: “I just felt like a hand came down to me [while I was recording] because I read [the lyrics] and thought, ‘I know his struggles.’ I had the same struggles the last few years, it was like the perfect thing.”

Both Elvis and Lisa Marie had struggled with addiction during their musical careers. “[I used] cocaine, sedatives, pot and drinking — all at the same time. I just couldn’t be sober,” she recalled Paper Magazine in 2003. "I don’t know how I lived through it.”

Lisa Marie, for her part, died in January 2023, nearly 46 years after Elvis’ death, after going into cardiac arrest.

“It is with a heavy heart that I must share the devastating news that my beautiful daughter Lisa Marie has left us,” Priscilla said in a statement to People at the time. “She was the most passionate strong and loving woman I have ever known. We ask for privacy as we try to deal with this profound loss. Thank you for the love and prayers. At this time there will be no further comment.”

Lisa Marie is survived by Priscilla and her daughters Riley Keough, whom she shared with ex-husband Danny Keough, and twins Harper and Finley, whom she coparented with former spouse Michael Lockwood. The late songwriter and Danny also shared son Benjamin Keough, who died by suicide in 2020.

Scroll below for the Presley family’s most heartbreaking tragedies:

On January 8, 1935, Elvis' mother, Gladys, suffered complications while birthing twins. Elvis' twin brother, Jessie Garon Presley, was stillborn. He is now buried at Graceland.

Gladys and Elvis maintained a close relationship throughout their lives, but his mother struggled when her son was on tour. She developed hepatitis and died of a heart attack in August 1958. She was 46 years old. Like her sons, husband Vernon and granddaughter Lisa Marie, she is buried at Graceland.

Nearly three years after Elvis and Priscilla finalized their divorce, the “Heartbreak Hotel” singer died at the age of 42 after going into cardiac arrest.

Since his death, both the former soap star and Lisa Marie have continued to keep his memory alive. They even worked alongside director Baz Luhrmann on his 2022 Elvis biopic, which starred Austin Butler as the musical legend.

“I have been involved with Baz. He has come to my home and he has been emailing me,” Priscilla exclusively told Us Weekly in September 2019, three years before the movie’s release. “He’s keeping me on top of everything. It’s been wonderful. He is a genius.”

Priscilla, Lisa Marie and Riley frequently attended premieres and awards shows on behalf of Elvis.

Two days after the late singer attended the 2023 Golden Globes with her mother to celebrate Butler’s victory, she died at the age of 54. Lisa Marie had suffered cardiac arrest in her Los Angeles home earlier that day.

 

Lisa Marie’s only son died by suicide in July 2020. He was 27.

“[Lisa Marie] is entirely heartbroken, inconsolable and beyond devastated but trying to stay strong for her 11-year-old twins and her oldest daughter Riley,” her rep, Roger Widynowski, told Us in a statement in July 2020. “She adored that boy. He was the love of her life.”

Us later confirmed that the late musician had died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

Following his death, Lisa Marie and the Daisy Jones & The Six actress had been candid about their grief process.

“I’ve dealt with death, grief and loss since the age of 9 years old. I’ve had more than anyone’s fair share of it in my lifetime and somehow, I’ve made it this far,” Lisa Marie wrote in an August 2022 essay for People. “But this one, the death of my beautiful, beautiful son? The sweetest and most incredible being that I have ever had the privilege of knowing, who made me feel so honored every single day to be his mother? Who was so much like his grandfather on so many levels that he actually scared me? Which made me worry about him even more than I naturally would have? No. Just no.”