1760-61 — Winter-Spring, Influenza Epidemic, esp. Natives, esp. CT, MA, ME, PA–Hundreds

— Hundreds. National Library of Medicine. Native Voices. “Timeline. 1761: First known…”

 

Connecticut    (>85)

–40  Bethlehem. Webster. A Brief History of Epidemic…Pestilential Diseases. 1799, p. 248-249.

–34          “          Caulfield. “The Pursuit of a Pestilence.” 1950, p. 49.

–45  East Haven. “…about forty-five men in the prime of life, mostly heads of families.”[1]

—  ?  Hartford. “…it carried off a number of robust men, in two or three days from the attack.” [2]

—  ?  New Haven. Caulfield. “The Pursuit of a Pestilence.” Proceedings…Antiquarian… 1950, p.49-50.

—  ?  North Haven. “…it attacked few persons, but every one of them died.” Webster 1799, 249.

—  ?  Woodbury. Caulfield. “The Pursuit of a Pestilence.” Proceedings…Antiquarian… 1950, 49.

 

Maine             (   ?)

–?  Falmouth. “the end of March [1761] was ‘a sickly, dying, melancholy time.’” (Parson Smith)[3]

 

Massachusetts (  ?)

–?  Weymouth, April-May, 1761. (Doctor Cotton Tufts ltr. to Noah Webster, cited in Caulfield.)

 

Narrative Information

 

Caulfield: “It is generally accepted among medical historians that severe influenza spread throughout most of the country during the winter and spring of 1760-1761. Early in September, 1760, rumors had reached the country towns that as many as twenty persons were dying in Boston daily, but the News-Letter of September 11, in denying such stories, said that there ere not twenty deaths a week, yet acknowledged the prevalence of two diseases, the bloody flux [diarrhea] and colds. Various sources indicate that by late September ‘Great Colds’ were prevalent throughout Massachusetts, and October was ‘a tedious Time for Colds and Caughs [sic]’ among the Massachusetts men in the camps around Ticonderoga. The New London Summary (February 20, 1761) said that ‘Great Colds’ had prevailed in Connecticut throughout the autumn.

 

“The first indication of severe influenza was the outbreak which began in Bethlehem, Connecticut, that November and caused 34 deaths, five of them in the home of Dr. Zephaniah Hull….Other severe epidemics were reported in Connecticut between November, 1760, and March, 1761, particularly in Woodbury, New Haven, and East Haven. It was said that many robust men in the prime of life died after a few days of sickness.

 

“…Parson Smith of Falmouth, Maine…wrote in his diary that the end of March was ‘a sickly, dying, melancholy time.’ Massachusetts had a second round of ‘colds’ during the spring of 1761 when they ‘were never known to prevail so universally.’ Doctor Cotton Tufts sent Webster [Noah] a description of the ‘malignant fever’ which prevailed in Weymouth [MA] during Aril and May, a description which has been quoted as representative of New England influenza, but Tufts said that this disease was fatal only to the aged. In fact there is some doubt about the prevalence of influenza in Massachusetts during the spring of 1761. The May 28 issue of the News-Letter [Boston], in correcting another newspaper’s account of the ‘mortal fever’ in Halifax, said ‘That it was only a Cold, such as has prevailed in this and the neighbouring Towns lately.’”

(Caulfield, Ernest. “The Pursuit of a Pestilence.” Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society, April 1950, pp. 49-50.)

 

Finkler: “Epidemic of 1761.

 

“According to Webster, the influenza visited America in this year, for he says in regard to the year 1762 that the influenza made its appearance in Europe one year later than in America.

 

“The influenza appeared in the spring of 1761 in the northern parts of America.  In Philadelphia it occurred in the winter (Webster probably means the winter of 1760-61), in Massachusetts in the month of April, in the same month and also in May in Weymouth; it even reached the West Indies in its march ‘through the whole country,’ having invaded Babadoes [sic] in May….” (Finkler, Ditmar.  “Influenza.” P. 26 in Stedman, Thomas L. (Ed.). Twentieth Century Practice: An International Encyclopedia of Modern Medical Science, Volume 15, Infectious Diseases.  NY: William Wood and Co., 1898, pp. 1-249.)

 

Gordon: “1761. Severe catarrh or influenza prevailed in spring in the United States…” (Surgeon-General C.A. Gordon (UK). An Epitome of the Reports of the Medical Officers…1884, p. 366.)

 

Thornton: “…an epidemic of influenza probably occurred among American Indians in 1761 (Dobyns 1983:17, table 2; 19, table 3[4])….” (Thornton. The Cherokees: A Population History. 1990, p. 33.)

 

US NLM: “Influenza is one of the diseases that Europeans brought to the New World. Unlike previous influenza epidemics, this one originates in the Americas in the spring and then spreads to Europe and the world. This viral strain, which causes inflammation of the larynx and trachea, first takes hold among settlers and Native peoples. Hundreds of Native peoples die.

 

“Reaching Europe in the midst of the flourishing intellectual climate known as the Enlightenment, the pandemic is the first to be studied by many physicians and others, who communicate about it through European medical journals and books.” (US Nat. Library of Med. Native Voices. “Timeline. 1761: First known influenza pandemic from the Americas begins.”)

 

Webster: “In November, the town of Bethlem [sic] was assailed by an inflammatory fever, with symptoms of typhus, which in the course of the following winter, carried off about 40 of the inhabitants. The disease as extremely violent, terminating on the 3d or 4th day; in some cases, the patient died within 24 hours of the attack. It seems to have been that species of winter fever, which occurs in pestilential periods, mentioned under the year 1698….

 

“This disease was called a malignant pleurisy….

 

“The same species of fever prevailed in that winter and the spring following, in many other parts of Connecticut… In Hartford it carried off a number of robust men, in two or three days from the attack. In North-Haven it attacked few persons, but every one of them died. In East-Haven about forty-five men in the prime of life, mostly heads of families. The same disease prevailed in New-Haven among the inhabitants, and students in college.

 

“It is obvious then that this was an epidemic, very well known in sickly periods, and not dependent on local causes.” (Webster. A Brief History of Epidemic and Pestilential Diseases. 1799, pp. 248-249.)

Sources

 

Caulfield, Ernest. “The Pursuit of a Pestilence.” Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society, April 1950, pp. 21-52. Accessed 1-17-2018 at: http://www.americanantiquarian.org/proceedings/44807204.pdf

 

Finkler, Ditmar. “Influenza.” P. 26 in Stedman, Thomas L. (Ed.). Twentieth Century Practice: An International Encyclopedia of Modern Medical Science, Volume 15, Infectious Diseases.  NY: William Wood and Co., 1898, pp. 1-249. Accessed 9-18-2012 at: http://books.google.com/books?id=wWy2ZRmVmY8C&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Gordon, Surgeon-General C. A., MD (compiled by). An Epitome of the Reports of the Medical Officers to the Chinese Imperial Maritime Customs Service from 1871 to 1882. London: Bailliѐre, Tindall, and Cox, 1884. Google preview accessed 3-30-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=KC0AAAAAQAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Thornton, Russell. The Cherokees: A Population History. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1990. Google preview accessed 8-23-2015 and 1-10-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=3Cgr4fPfAZQC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

United States National Library of Medicine. Native Voices. Native Peoples’ Concepts of Health and Illness. “Timeline. 1761: First known influenza pandemic from the Americas begins.” Bethesda, MD:   National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services. Accessed 9-17-2012 at:  http://www.nlm.nih.gov/nativevoices/timeline/226.html

 

Webster, Noah. A Brief History of Epidemic and Pestilential Diseases; with the principal phenomena of the physical world which precede and accompany them, and observations deduced from the facts stated (in two volumes). Hartford, CT: Hudson & Goodwin, 1799. Accessed 3-30-2018 at: https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/evans/N27531.0001.001/1:12?rgn=div1;view=fulltext

 

[1] Webster. A Brief History of Epidemic…Pestilential Diseases. 1799, p. 248-249.

[2] Webster. A Brief History of Epidemic…Pestilential Diseases. 1799, p. 248-249.

[3] Cited in Caulfield. “The Pursuit of a Pestilence.” Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society, Apr 1950, p50.

[4] We cannot access the bibliography in our Google preview. However, it would appear to be a reference to: Henry F. Dobyns and William R. Swagerty. Their Number Become Thinned: Native American Population Dynamics in Eastern North America. University of Tennessee Press, 1983.