— 232 Yandell, Professor; in Wynne. Report on Epidemic Cholera… 1852, p. 19.

— >140 Baird, Nancy D. “Epidemics,” pp. 271-274 in The Encyclopedia of Louisville.

— Blanchard note.[1]

Narrative Information

Baird: “Another frequent complaint during the antebellum era [another being smallpox] was ‘bilious remitting fever.’….In the summer of 1822 the destroyer struck. Called ‘bilious fever’ but probably yellow fever, it swept away at least 140 of Louisville’s 4,000 residents [3.5%]. In his monumental work of 1850 on the Principal Diseases of the Interior Valley of North America, midwest physician Daniel Drake recalled that the fever scourged the town ‘almost to desolation’ by slowing the town’s growth and economic development. The town trustees appointed a Board of Health – the community’s first – to examine the malady’s cause and make suggestions for a remedy….” (p. 273.)

Collins and Collins: “Louisville scourged by a terrible epidemic, an aggravated bilious fever, which some call yellow fever.” (p. 30.)

Yandell: “Intermittent fever was a regular annual visitant [to Louisville]; and occasionally a form of bilious fever prevailed, rivaling yellow in malignity, and threatening to depopulate the town. He most fatal of these endemics broke out in the summer of 1822, after a hot, rainy season; the number of victims from it, out of a population less than 5,000, was 232. In a family consisting of 20 persons, 19 were sick at one time and in some families every individual died. At this time only one street in Louisville was paved, and within its limits were at least eight ponds of greater or less dimensions, most of which, in the course of the autumn, were dried up, exposing foul bottoms to the sun.” (Professor Yandell in Wynne, p. 19.)

Newspapers

Aug 12: “Fever at Louisville (Ky.)–At this place the deaths in one week, ending on the 12^th ult. [last month] were 20, of which 14 were of what they denominate bilious fever. This for a population of 4,000, is a great mortality.” (Milledgeville Georgia Journal. “Fever at Louisville (Ky.).” 9-24-1822, p. 7.)

Oct 1: “The Louisville, Ky. Post of the first of October in relation to the health of the people of that town, says–We are again flattered by the change of weather, with the prospect of a cessation of the prevailing fever–whilst we have been labouring under this most afflicting dispensation of Providence, our sympathies have been excited for the sufferings of our fellow-citizens generally of Kentucky, for never has disease been so prevalent or so fatal in this State, as during the past Summer.–In Ohio, a great mortality has prevailed.” (Maryland Herald, Hagers-Town. 10-22-1822, p. 2.)

Sources

Baird, Nancy D. “Epidemics,” pp. 271-274 in The Encyclopedia of Louisville, John E. Kleber, editor. Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 2001. Accessed 2-16-2015 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=W7EeBgAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=true

Collins, Lewis and Richard H. Collins. Collins’ Historical Sketches of Kentucky. History of Kentucky By the late Lewis Collins, Judge of the Mason County Court. Revised, Enlarged Four-Fold, and Brought Down to the Year 1874, by his son Richard H. Collins (Vol. I). Covington, KY: Collins & Co., 1882. Accessed 2-16-2015 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=xMM6AQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

Maryland Herald, Hagers-Town. 10-22-1822, p. 2, col. 3. Accessed 7-14-2019 at: https://newspaperarchive.com/hagerstown-maryland-herald-and-hagerstown-weekly-advertiser-oct-22-1822-p-2/

Milledgeville Georgia Journal. “Fever at Louisville (Ky.).” 9-24-1822, p. 7. Accessed 7-14-2019 at: https://newspaperarchive.com/milledgeville-georgia-journal-sep-24-1822-p-7/

Wynne, James, M.D. (Chairman of the Medical Department of the National Institue and Chairman of the First Committee of Public Hygiene of he American Medical Association). Abstract of Report on Epidemic Cholera, as it Prevailed in the United States in 1849 and 1850. Appendix (C.) to Report of the General Board of Health on the Epidemic Cholera of 1848 & 1849. London: George E. Eyre and William Spottiswood, Her Majesty’s Stationery Office, 1852. Accessed 3-4-2015 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=Da2lh3WZnwYC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=true

[1] Have chosen to list separately from Yellow Fever entry for 1822 in that it was referred to as Bilious Fever and in that it was not included in books and reports which discussed yellow fever in 1822 by George Augustin, J.M. Keating, John Monette, George M. Sternberg (U.S. Public Health Service), and the U. S. Marine-Hospital Service.

1822 — Summer, “Bilious [“Intermittent”] Fever” Epidemic, Louisville, KY –140-232