lornajarrettblanchard

— >416  Blanchard tally of “State” breakouts below.[1]

 

Summary of State Breakouts Below

 

Connecticut                 ~  59

Massachusetts             >255

New Jersey                        ?  “dysentery prevailed during the summer”

New York                   >100

Pennsylvania                   >2

Vermont                            ?  “universally present”

 

Connecticut    (~59)

–~59  Blanchard.[2]

—    3  Fairfield. Jacobus (ed). Revolutionary War Records of Fairfield, Connecticut, V3, 1932, 365.

—    ?  New Milford. “in 1777…dysentery prevailed, said…brought from the army…”[3]

—>56  Norfolk. History of Litchfield County, Connecticut, Part 1, p. 471.[4]

 

Massachusetts(>255)

— >8  Athol.  Vital Records of Athol, cited in Caulfield 1942, footnote 191.[5]

—>2  Drury family.

—>2  Haven family.

—>2  Hill family.

—>2  Hudson family

—  73  Conway. Dr. Williams. “Communications of the Massachusetts Medical Society,” p. 336.[6]

—>28  Vital Records of Conway, cited in Caulfield 1942, footnote 191.[7]

—>2  Isaac Amsden family.

—>2  Elisha Amsden family.

—>2  Bancroft family.

—>2  Billings family.

—>2  Catlin family

—>2  Collings family.

—>2  Daniels family.

—>2  Dickinson family.

—>2  Farnsworth family.

—>2  French family.

—>2  Maynard family.

—>2  Rice family.

—>2  Tobey family.

—>2  Wells family.

—>34  Granville. Vital Records of Granville Massachusetts, to the Year 1850.

–1  Moses Allen (child), 1777, camp distemper, p. 176.

–1  Gemima Bancroft, 1777, 68, camp distemper, p. 178.

–1  Malenda Bancroft, Sep 19, 1-year-old, p. 178.

–1  Sarah Bancroft, Sep 12, 5-years old, camp distemper, p. 179.

–1  Thomas Bancroft, 1777, 65, camp distemper, p. 179.

–1  Chena Barlow, 1777, 11-years-old, camp distemper, p. 180.

–1  John Barlow (son of Lt. Edmund Barlow), 1777, 2-years-old, camp distemper, p. 180

–1  Mary Barlow, daughter of Lt. Edmund Barlow, 1777, 1 year-old, p. 181.

–1  Molly Barlow, daughter of Lt. Edmund Barlow, 1777, 5-years, camp distemper, 181.

–1  Abigail Cooley, 1-year old, camp distemper, 1777, p. 190.

–1  Alexander Cooley, Sep 15, 3-years old, camp distemper, p. 190.

–1  Polly Cooley, Sep 11, 2-years-old, camp distemper, p. 192.

–1  Hannah Forbs, 1777, 1-year-old, camp distemper, p. 196.

–1  Stephen Forster, Oct 6, 2-years-old, camp distemper, p. 196.

–1  Polly Fullington, 1777, 2-years old, camp distemper, p. 197.

–1  Demaris Howe (daughter of Ephraim and Damarass), Sep 11, camp distemper, p.205.

–1  Ephraim Howe (son of Ephraim), Sep 7, 7-years old, camp distemper, p. 205.

–1  Tryphena Howe (daughter of Ephraim), Sep 8, age 2, camp distemper, p. 205.

–1  Clarissa Monson, 1777, infant, camp distemper, p. 209.

–1  Eleazer Peters, Aug 31, one-year-old, camp distemper, p. 213.

–1  Rosilla Peters, 1777, 7-years-old, camp distemper, p. 213.

–1  Hiram Pratt, Oct 30, 2 years, 6 months old, camp distemper, p. 214.

–1  Worthy Pratt, 1777, 2-years-old, camp distemper, p. 215.

–1  Sarah Pratt, Oct 1, 60, camp distemper, p. 215.

–1  Amos Root, 1777, 4-years-old, camp distemper, p. 217.

–1  Mary Root, 1777, 2-years-old, camp distemper, p. 218.

–1  Cloe Rowley, 1777, 16-years-old, camp distemper, p. 221.

–1  David Seward, Sep 11, 2 years old, camp distemper, p. 221.

–1  Alexander Strickland, 1777, 3-years-old, camp distemper, p. 227.

–1  Jonathan Strickland, 1777, 7-years-old, camp distemper, p. 228.

–1  Ezekiel Sweatman, Feb 16, camp distemper, p. 229.

–1  Mary Sweatman, March 16, camp distemper, p. 229.

–1  Nathan Wealthy, 1777, camp distemper, p. 220.

–1  Thomas Williams (child), 1777, camp distemper, p. 234.

—  50  Greenfield. Stephen Williams. “Communications…Massachusetts Medical Society,” 336.

—>14  Greenfield. Vital Records of Greenfield, cited in Caulfield 1942, footnote 191.[8]

—>2  Arms family.

—>2  Graves family.

—>2  Grenell family.

—>2  Lemuel Hastings family.

—>2  Medad Hastings family.

—>2  McHeard family.

—>2  Smead family.

—>10  Royalston. Vital Records of Royalston, and Caswell, History of Royalston, 459.[9]

—>2  Bragg family.

—>2  Metcalf family.

—>2  Richardson family.

—>2  Tytes family.

—>2  Woodbury family.

—  80  Shelburne. Stephen Williams. “Communications…Massachusetts Medical Society,” 336.

 

New Jersey     (    ?)

–?  Rush. Medical Inquiries and Observations (Vol. I, 2^nd Edition). 1805, pp. 273-274.[10]

–?  Wickes. History of Medicine in New Jersey, and of its Medical Men. 1879, p. 68.[11]

 

New York       (>100)

—>100  Blanchard.[12]

—      ?  Lake Champlain. “American soldiers…suffered severely from dysentery during 1777.”[13]

–100s. NYC. Petriello. Bacteria and Bayonets…Impact of Disease…American Military…, 101.[14]

—     1  Staten Island, Oct 7, Richard Charlton. Society for…Propagation…Gospel. 1898, 855.

 

Pennsylvania  (  >2)

–1  Philadelphia area, July 31. Dysentery.[15]

–1  Philadelphia, Aug 15. Catharine Hofmann, 15. Records of the American Catholic… p. 395.

 

Vermont         (?)

–?  “In the summer of 1776 and…of 1777, the dysentery was universally prevalent.”[16]

 

Narrative Information

 

Caulfield: “The American soldiers at Lake Champlain suffered severely from dysentery during 1777. Burgoyne also had plenty of sickness among his troops. Baroness Riedesel, who was with the British forces, described what she saw on the night before the crucial battle of that campaign: “The whole entry was filled with the sick, who were suffering with the camp sickness, a kind of dysentery.

 

“In the new settlements of Vermont dysentery raged with “great severity” during 1777.[17]

 

“In Athol and surrounding towns in Massachusetts there were numerous deaths from some epidemic disease, with a clue to the diagnosis furnished by the Royalston records, which show at least forty deaths from dysentery in a population of about six hundred.[18] In Granville, too, the camp distemper was very bad.[19] Similar but smaller epidemics occurred in some small towns in the Berkshires.

 

“In western Connecticut, particularly in Norfolk, Litchfield, and Fairfield, there were some dreadful epidemics. That in Norfolk was said to have destroyed ten percent of the population.

(pp. 61-62.)

 

Moyer: “Sickness was always a cause for concern in early America, and during the Revolutionary War dangerous diseases stalked the land. Army camps provided the perfect breeding grounds for pathogens, and armies on the move spread illness in the wake. Abner Brownell noted one such episode in the summer of 1777, when New England suffered from a ‘great Pestilence of the Bloody Flux [dysentery].’ Brownell’s reaction to the epidemic is significant. He wrote that the outbreak ‘greatly awakened me; Seeing So much Mortality as Expecting that Soon it would be my Turn.” It was this sense of his own mortality combined with the desire to secure salvation that sparked his religious seeking.” (Moyer. The Public Universal Friend: Jemima Wilkinson and Religious Enthusiasm in Revolutionary America. 2015, p. 40-41.)

 

Sources

 

American Catholic Historical Society. Records of the American Catholic Historical Society of Philadelphia, Vol. III, 1888-91. The Society, 1891. Google preview accessed 2-3-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=MaVJAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Caulfield, Ernest. “Some Common Diseases of Colonial Children.” Transactions of the Colonial Society of Massachusetts, Vol. 35, April 1942, pp. 4-65. Accessed 1-17-2018 at: https://www.colonialsociety.org/node/865

 

Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences. Memoirs of the Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences (Vol. 1, Part 1). New Haven, CT: Oliver Steele and Co., 1810. Accessed 2-3-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=YGBJAAAAcAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Daniels, Olive Bell. The Green, Sabin, Elliot, and Jerome Ancestry of Sarah Greer Slater; Rev. Jerome Greer, Vesta Greer Peeke, Mary Elliot Greer Bell, John Kingsley Greer, Frank Sabin Greer, and Their Descendents. Madison: University of Wisconsin, College Print. & Typing Co, 1969, digital version 11-7-2007. Google snippet accessed 2-3-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=cjtPAAAAMAAJ&q=1777+dysentery+connecticut&dq=1777+dysentery+connecticut&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjSlLfl4IrZAhWHm1kKHe3SBns4ChDoAQgmMAA

 

Forry, Samuel, M.D.: “Account of a Malignant Fever which prevailed at Rondout, Ulster County, New York, in the months of August and September 1843…” The New York Journal of Medicine, Nov 1843. Google preview accessed 2-3-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=YicgAQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q=forry&f=false

 

History of Litchfield County, Connecticut, with Illustrations and Biographical Sketches of its Prominent Men and Pioneers. Philadelphia: J. W. Lewis & Co., 1881. Google preview accessed 2-3-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=DyBEAQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Jacobus, Donald Lines (Editor), abstracted by Kate S. Curry. Revolutionary War Records of Fairfield, Connecticut (Volume 3). Originally published in 1932 as Volume III of History and Genealogy of the Families of Old Fairfield. Reprinted by Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc, Baltimore, MD, 2004. Google digital preview accessed 2-3-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=nY8cJB47MzEC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Moyer, Paul Benjamin. The Public Universal Friend: Jemima Wilkinson and Religious Enthusiasm in Revolutionary America. Cornell University Press, 2015. Google preview accessed 2-4-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=ce5IDwAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

New England Historic Genealogical Society. Vital Records of Granville Massachusetts to the Year 1850. Boston, MA: NEHG Society, 1914. Google digital preview accessed 2-3-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=MyIlAAAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Petriello, David R. Bacteria and Bayonets: The Impact of Disease in American Military History. Havertown PA and Oxford: Casemate Publishers, 2015. Google preview accessed 2-3-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=yF-qCwAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Rush, Benjamin. Medical Inquiries and Observations (Vol. 1 of 4, 2^nd Edition). Philadelphia, J. Conrad & Co., 1805. Google preview accessed 2-3-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=y3EFAAAAQAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Society for the Propagation of the Gospel. Classified Digest of the Records of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, 1701-1892 (Sixth Edition). London: The Society, 1898. Google preview accessed 2-3-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=Uh4RAQAAIAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Thompson, Zadock. History of Vermont, Natural, Civil and Statistical, in Three Parts. Burlington, VT: Chauncey Goodrich, 1842. Google preview accessed 2-3-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=8BUzAQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Wickes, Stephen, M.D. History of Medicine in New Jersey, and of its Medical Men. Newark, NJ: Martin R. Dennis & Co., 1879. Google preview accessed 2-3-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=4X5IAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

 

[1] From descriptions we have read and from sources noted herein, we have the impression of probably hundreds more deaths than the ones we show here. But, this will have to do until we locate additional data.

[2] We have it that 56 deaths took place in Norfolk, but that probably something like 6-9 were from other causes. We know there were 3 deaths in Fairfield. We know that dysentery “prevailed” in New Milford, but have no numbers or details, and thus cannot presume to know what “prevailed” entailed. We presume that there were other deaths in CT in the ranks of the army and civilian population, but have not seen data. As a stand-in number until more data come to our attention, we will assume approximately 59, though, again, we believe the actual number is higher.

[3] CT Academy of Arts and Sciences. Memoirs of the Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences, Vol. 1, Part 1, 133.

[4] “A heavier loss…was occasioned in 1777-78, when the camp fever, now called dysentery, became prevalent and carried many to the grave. The number of burials in town…for 1977, is 56.” Notes that for 1775 it was 9, for 1779 it was 6 and for 1780 it was 9. A footnote to this text is: “Dr. Roys, in his history, states that 56 were swept off by the camp distemper in 1777, and 38 by the same disorder in 1778. As these figures correspond almost exactly with the whole number whom Mr. Robbins buried in those years, Dr. Roys would appear to have fallen into error, for it is next to impossible that every death in town for two years should have been caused by dysentery.”

[5] Caulfield notes “multiple” deaths in named family. Not knowing how many deaths this is per family we use “>2.”

[6] “In 1777, both small-pox and dysentery were rife [in New England]; and of the latter disease, which prevailed extensively also in the towns of Greenfield, Shelburne, and Conway [all in Franklin County, MA], there died in the first, fifty — in the second, eighty — and in the third, seventy-three. The population of these places were, in the order of their occurrence, 900, 700, and 1000.” Paper of the “venerable Dr. Stephen Williams” is drawn from in: Dr. Samuel Forry paper: “Account of a Malignant Fever which prevailed at Rondout, Ulster County, New York, in the months of August and September 1843…” The New York Journal of Medicine, Nov 1843.

[7] Our number based on Caulfield’s notation of “multiple” deaths in 14 named families. In that we only know that “multiple” must mean at least two, this is the number we used to multiply against 14 to derive at least 28 deaths.

[8] Our number based on Caulfield’s notation of “multiple” deaths in 7 named families. In that we only know that “multiple” must mean at least two, this is the number we used to multiply against 7 to derive at least 14 deaths.

[9] Caulfield 1942, footnote 191.

[10] “The dysentery prevailed, in the summer of 1777, in the military hospitals of New-Jersey, but with very few instances of mortality.”

[11] “The dysentery prevailed in the summer of 1777 in the military hospitals of New Jersey, but without mortality.”

[12] Our number. We know dysentery was prevalent in northern NY within the Continental Army, but we do not have mortality numbers. We also know dysentery was prevalent in the NYC area. As we note, Petriello writes that “hundreds” died in NYC as smallpox, dysentery, and typhoid spread into the civilian population from the prevalence of those diseases amongst American prisoners on prison ships in the harbor, where, incidentally, large numbers died.  The CDC in its Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report “Bicentennial Issue” notes that in the Albany NY hospital more patients had been seen by Aug 20, 1777 (81) for dysentery than for any other disease. The next highest was intermittent fever, which came in at 79 patients, and the third, diarrhea, at 61 patients. The 4^th leading cause was rheumatism at 22 patients seen. Not noted is number of deaths. (Cites: Potts Papers II, p. 283, “A Return of the Present State of the General Hospital at Albany, 20 August 1777.) Again, though, we have not seen estimates of mortality. We speculate that “100 or more” is a very conservative number.

[13] Caulfield 1942, pp. 61-62.

[14] “The pestilences that began in the prisons and aboard the moored hulks quickly spread to the inhabitants of New York City. smallpox, dysentery, and typhoid erupted by the winter of 1777. Hundreds of more victims were thus added to the already growing death toll of the prisons.”

[15] Daniels, Olive Bell. The Green, Sabin, Elliot, and Jerome Ancestry of Sarah Greer Slater; Rev. Jerome Greer, Vesta Greer Peeke, Mary Elliot Greer Bell, John Kingsley Greer, Frank Sabin Greer, and Their Descendents. Madison: University of Wisconsin, College Print. & Typing Co, 1969, digital version 11-7-2007.

[16] Thompson, Zadock. History of Vermont, Natural, Civil and Statistical, in Three Parts. 1842, p. 220.

[17] Cites, in footnote 190: Gallup, Epidemic Diseases in Vermont, p. 33.

[18] Cites, in footnote 191: Vital Records of Athol, Vital Records of Conway, Vital Records of Greenfield, Vital Records of Royalston, and Caswell, History of Royalston, p. 459.

[19] Cites, in footnote 192: Vital Records of Granville.

— >76  Blanchard tally based on State breakouts below.

 

Connecticut                (   ?)

–?  Kulikoff. “soldiers spread smallpox and dysentery throughout coastal Connecticut in 1776.”[1]

 

Massachusetts            (>15)

— >10  Chester, Aug 7-Oct 2. Vital Records of Chester. Cited in Caulfield 1942, p. 61, fn. 187.

— >2  Blackman family.

— >2  Ellis family.

— >2  French family.

— >2  Geers family.

— >2  Johnson family.

—   ?  Kingston. Very mortal. (Caulfield. “Some…Diseases of Colonial Children.” 1942, 60-62.)

— >5  Roxbury. Reverend Samuel Danforth notes “many” deaths; MMWR, CDC, 1776, p. 4.[2]

 

New Jersey                 (51)

–25  Morristown. Record of First Presbyterian Church. Cited in Caulfield 1942, p. 61, fn. 189.

–4  Prudden family members.

–5  Reeve family members.

–26  Pleasantdale,[3] July 23-Sep 24. Jemima Condict diary, in Rae. People’s War. P. 220-221.[4]

–1  July 23                  Adonijah Harrison.

–1  Aug 6                    Child of John Ogdens.

–1  Aug 16                  Jered Freman.

–2  Date not noted.     Isaac Freman children with “the Same Distemper.”

–1  Aug 17                  John Freman child.

–1  Aug 25                  Sam Smith’s child.

–2  Aug 30                  Amos Burrel’s child, and Joseph Pierson’s child.

–1  Aug 30                  Timothy Crane “with the Same Distemper.”

–1  Sep 2                    Thomas Freman’s daughter.

–1  Sep 3                    John Freman.

–2  Sep 4                    Jonathan Smith’s child and Jonathan Condict’s daughter.

–2  Sep 8                    Jabez William’s child and Abel Freman child.

–1  Sep 8                    Widow of John Freman lost a child.

–1  Sep 8~                  John Dod child.

–1  Sep 9                    Another daughter of Jonathan Condict.

–3  No date.                “Enock Beach has Lost three of his Children in About a fortnight.”

–1  Sep 10                  Wife of Joseph Williams.

–1  Sep 15                  Jabes Regs.

–1  Sep 22                  “they Buried his [Jabes Regs] third Child…”

–1  Sep 24                  Wife of Jabes Regs. [Blanchard: Google preview ends here.]

 

New York                   (10)

–>10  Blanchard “stand-in” minimum number.[5]

—    ?  Lake George. Continental Army decimated by camp distemper throughout the summer.[6]

—    ?  Long Island. New England army camp there “full of ‘Fluxes, Fevers, & Smallpox’.”[7]

—    1  New York. Caulfield cites Fithian [who died] description of hospitals as full of dysentery.[8]

—    ?  Upstate NY. Continental Army was in upstate NY, in 1776, and experienced dysentery.[9]

 

Narrative Information

 

Caulfield: “If there is any question about dysentery in the Army during 1775, at least there can be no doubt about it during 1776. In June, Captain John Lacey wrote in his journal that the New England camp on Long Island was full of “Fluxes, Fevers, & Smallpox.” In July “The General [was] pained to observe” the frightful condition of the latrines and ordered all filth in and about the camp to be buried daily. The Chief Surgeon of the Hessian forces said that after they arrived in July, hardly a man escaped without dysentery or fever. Young Philip Fithian, describing the American military hospitals in New York, said: “In every apartment are many with the Dysentery”—and this was just before he himself contracted the disease and died. Dr. Ebenezer Beardsley also said that dysentery was rife in the Army during July, August, and September.[10]

 

“James Tilton described the condition of the camp at King’s Bridge: ‘All manner of excrementitious matter was scattered indiscriminately throughout the camp . . . A putrid diarrhea was the consequence. The camp disease, as it was called, became proverbial. Many died, melting as it were, and running off at the bowels.’ On October 4 Washington’s order of the day called attention to the ‘shameful inattention in some camps, to decency and cleanliness.’ At that time it was estimated that one-third of his forces were unfit for duty because of sickness.

 

“Elsewhere, too, there was ample reason to fear ‘more loss of men from Camp sickness than from y^e Gun & Bayonet.’[11] The Reverend Ammi Robbins, heartily distressed “midst sickness and death” while with the forces around Lake George, described the men, first terror-stricken by smallpox in April, then decimated by camp distemper throughout the summer.[12] At one time less than 50 out of a force of 240 men were able to carry on. At the peak of the epidemic five men were being buried daily. Webster was an eyewitness to the ‘terrible fatal’ dysentery among the troops at Ticonderoga. ‘I was at Mount Independence in October, and witness to the ravages of the disease. Of thirteen thousand troops, it was said that one half were unfit for duty.’

 

“ ‘The dysentery which prevailed in most parts of the United States in the year 1776’ was said to have been ‘very mortal’ in Kingston, Massachusetts, but neither in Kingston nor in other Massachusetts towns do my records reveal any terrible epidemics unless the one in Chester, in western Massachusetts, was caused by that disease.[13]

 

“In West Hartford, Connecticut, a two-year epidemic started with the deaths of about twenty soldiers ‘in y^e Camp,’ but most of the multiple deaths among children occurred the following summer [1777].[14]

 

“There was another moderately severe epidemic in Middletown. In one parish in Morristown, New Jersey, there were twenty-five dysentery deaths including those of five members of the Reeve family and four Pruddens.[15] All in all, however, there was nothing comparable to 1775.”

(Caulfield. “Some Common Diseases of Colonial Children.” Transactions, Apr 1942, pp. 60-62.)

 

CDC MMWR 1976: “Reverend Samuel Danforth of Roxbury, Massachusetts, in describing an outbreak of the bloody flux, wrote on July 20, 1776, ‘It was a very sickly time [with] many being visited with gripings, vomiting and flux, with a fever which proved fatal to many infants & little children esp’lly but also to some grown persons.’ (1) A colonist involved in the outbreak claimed hat his condition was ‘truly pitiable’ for he had ‘not had one day or one Nights Ease or rest these days past & do less than 15 times a night I am obliged to get up and that accompanied by the Most excruciating pains in my Bowels, my Back and my Loins!’….(1)

 

“Many of the involved took a variety of variety of cures. A colonist described the disease as ‘an obstinate Diarrhea, that will yield to no Medicine or Skill of the Physician.’ A physician beseeched his patient to take some ‘pilles…made of grated pepper made up with turpentine, and some pepper withhall.’ ‘Butter or oil with a Portion of Beer and Molasses’ was a popular cure advanced by the Boston Weekly News Letter. (1) Another physician urged affected patients to ‘Take an Egge and Boyle it very hard and then pull off the Shell and put it as hot as you can well endure, into the fundament of the patient grieved and when it is much abated of the heat put in another Egge in the same manner and it will cure.’ (1)

 

“The Outbreak ended but not before ‘many both elder and young Persons (were) taken down with Fever and Flux (and) died after less than a Weeks Illness.”[16]

 

Packard: “In 1776 dysentery was prevalent throughout North America, and particularly so in the various camps which covered the country. In Northern New York it was terribly fatal. Webster devotes much space to the attempt to prove that camp-life had nothing to do with the epidemic, but there is no doubt that in many instances the disease was propagated by the conditions in which the soldiery were placed. Dr. Ebenezer Beardsley wrote an interesting account of the outbreak of dysentery in the Twenty-third Regiment of the Continental army, which he attributed to overcrowding in barracks, which were likewise poorly ventilated. The regiment was quartered in New York at the time.”[17] (pp. 100-101.)

 

Sources

 

Caulfield, Ernest. “Some Common Diseases of Colonial Children.” Transactions of the Colonial Society of Massachusetts, Vol. 35, April 1942, pp. 4-65. Accessed 1-17-2018 at: https://www.colonialsociety.org/node/865

 

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “The Bloody Flux — Massachusetts,” Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (Bicentennial Issue). Vol. 25, July 1976, p. 4. Google preview accessed 2-2-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=Ci8gAAAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Kulikoff, Allan. From British Peasants to Colonial American Farmers. University of North Carolina Press, 2000. Google digital preview accessed 2-2-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=zK8TBAAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Packard, Francis Randolph, M.D. The History of Medicine in the United States. Philadelphia and London, J. B. Lippincott Company, 1901. Google preview accessed 1-26-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=dCxAAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Rae, Noel. The People’s War: Original Voices of the American Revolution. Guilford, CT: Lyons Press, 2012. Google preview accessed 2-2-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=2keLBAAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

[1] Kulikoff. From British Peasants to Colonial American Farmers. 2000, p. 255.)

[2] Five is our number based on statement that the bloody flux had “proven fatal to many infants & little children esp’ly but also to some grown persons.”

[3] We could not locate “Pleasantdale” in a Google search, but this is the name Noel Rae writes as the location of the diarist Jemima Condict.

[4] Memima Condict notes in her diary that the “Blody flux” began on July 23. We have left out the deaths of two elderly persons in that their deaths could have been due to some other cause, or possibly not. Indeed, some of the deaths noted herein may be due to some other cause, but it is clear from the way these diary entries started that the diarist was speaking of the bloody flux (dysentery). She also notes the deaths of several residents from “the Camp Disorder” [dysentery] while off with the Continental Army.

[5] Ten or more is our stand in number given our failure to locate specific numbers as opposed to descriptions of dismal conditions and mortality in several parts of the State.

[6] Caulfield 1942.

[7] Caulfield 1942, pp. 60-61.

[8] Caulfield 1942, pp. 60-61.

[9] Packard: “In Northern New York it was terribly fatal.” (p. 100)

[10] Cites, in fn. 184: Memoirs of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, I. 542; Cases and Observations, 68.

[11] Cites, in footnote 185: Penn. Mag. Hist. & Biog., CXCIII (October, 1899), p. 394.

[12] Cites, in fn. 186: Theron W. Crissey, History of Norfolk, Litchfield County, Connecticut (Everett, 1900), 105-116.

[13] Cites, in footnote 187: Vital Records of Chester.

[14] Cites, in footnote 188: West Harford Bill of Mortality (MS., Conn. State Library).

[15] Cites, in footnote 189: The Record of the First Presbyterian Church of Morristown, N.J., I (July, 1880), 55.

[16] The number (1) in the text refers to the reference source: Duffy, J. Epidemics in Colonial America. Baton Rouge, LA: State University Press, 1953.

[17] In footnote 34 notes: “Dr. Beardsley’s paper was published in the first volume of the Transactions of the New Haven County Medical Society. This was the first volume of transactions ever published by a medical society in this country.”

–16  Blanchard total of the breakouts Caulfield produces in footnote 52.

 

–2  Biglow family.     Vital Records of Athol, 185; in Caulfield, 1942, p. 22, footnote 52.

–2  Commins family.  Vital Records of Athol, 189; in Caulfield, 1942, p. 22, footnote 52.

–3  Dunton family.     Vital Records of Athol, 192; in Caulfield, 1942, p. 22, footnote 52.

–3  Foster family.       Vital Records of Athol, 195; in Caulfield, 1942, p. 22, footnote 52.

–2  Sanders family.     Vital Records of Athol, 218; in Caulfield, 1942, p. 22, footnote 52.

–2  Stockwell family. Vital Records of Athol, 221; in Caulfield, 1942, p. 22, footnote 52.

–2  Stone family.        Vital Records of Athol, 185; in Caulfield, 1942, p. 22, footnote 52.[1]

 

Narrative Information

 

Caulfield (Diphtheria section of his paper): “Though the disease in eastern Massachusetts seems to have quieted down considerably after the seventeen-sixties, it continued its periodic outbreaks in the small towns of the north-central section. An epidemic in Westminister in 1764 was followed by another in Athol in 1776 and another more severe one in Princeton and surrounding towns in Worcester County during 1786.”[2] (“Some Common Diseases of Colonial Children.” Transactions of the Colonial Society of Massachusetts, Vol. 35, April 1942, p. 23.)

 

Source

 

Caulfield, Ernest. “Some Common Diseases of Colonial Children.” Transactions of the Colonial Society of Massachusetts, Vol. 35, April 1942, pp. 4-65. Accessed 1-17-2018 at: https://www.colonialsociety.org/node/865

 

[1] Notes no causes stated. Caulfield does list these deaths with the other deaths in Athol epidemic which he believes was diphtheria.

[2] Cites Vital Records of Athol, 185, 189, 193, 195, 218, and 221.

— >482  Blanchard tally of State and local breakouts below.[1]

 

Connecticut    (>146)

–>21  Coventry. Susan W. Dimock. Births, Marriages, Baptisms and Deaths in Coventry, 1897.[2]

–2  Ames family.

–2  Brigham family.

–2  Carpenter family.

–3  Colman family.

–3  Curtiss family.

–4  Cushman family.

–2  Jones family.

–3  Mead family.

–100  Danbury. Noah Webster, Epidemic…Diseases, cited in Caulfield 1942, pp. 59-60.[3]

—    ?  Lebanon. Rev. Solomon Williams, Dec 3, notes abatement of the “sore sickness.” Caulfield.

—  24  Middletown, Aug 11-Nov 19. Middletown First Society, cited in Caulfield 1942, 59-60.

—    1  Wintonbury. One of several “sever epidemics” in CT. Caulfield, 1942, pp. 59-60.[4]

 

Delaware        ( ?)  Caulfield cites Philip Vickers Fithian noting his hope it would stop in DE.

 

Maryland       ( ?) Caulfield citing Philip Vickers Fithian: Journal, 1775-1776. 1934, p. 32, 94.[5]

 

Massachusetts (326)

—>12  Bellingham. Caulfield 1942, pp. 57-58, citing Vital Records of Bellingham.

–2  Hill family. Vital Records of Bellingham, pp. 189-190.

–3  Eliphalet Holbrook family. Vital Records of Bellingham, pp. 190-194.

–3  Luke Holbrook family. Vital Records of Bellingham, pp. 190-194.

–4  Scott family. Vital Records of Bellingham, pp. 209-210.

—>10  Boston, summer, Jonathan Sewell.[6]

–2  Cotton family. Massachusetts Spy, July 19, 1775 (in Caulfield 1942, 55-56).

–2  Wiswall family. Massachusetts Spy, July 19, 1775 (in Caulfield 1942, 55-56).

—>12  Braintree. Abigail Adams letter to husband, John Adams, cited in Caulfield 1942, 56-57.[7]

—  >7  Brimfield. Historical Celebration of the Town of Brimfield, in Caulfield 1942, pp. 57-58.

–3  Bacon family. Historical Celebration of the Town of Brimfield. Springfield 1879, 90.

–2  Moffatt fam. Historical Celebration of the Town of Brimfield. Springfield 1879, 369.

–2  Sherman fam. Historical Celebration of…Town of Brimfield. Springfield 1879, 453.

—    ?  Brookline. Epidemic there but less serious than in Groton, Medford and Sutton.[8]

—    1  Cambridge. Cpt. Elihu Adams (brother of John). McCullough. John Adams. NYT.[9]

—    1  Charlestown. Nathan Day, of dysentery, in army camp.[10]

—>15  Chelmsford. Caulfield 1942, 57-58, cites Waters, History of Chelmsford, p. 721.

–3  Butterfield family. Vital Records of Chelmsford, pp. 371-373.

–2  Campbell family. Vital Records of Chelmsford, p. 374.

–2  Chamberlain family. Vital Records of Chelmsford, pp. 376-377.

–2  Isaac Parker family. Vital Records of Chelmsford, pp. 419-420.

–2  Philip Parker family. Vital Records of Chelmsford, pp. 419-420.

–2  Proctor family. Vital Records of Chelmsford, p. 431.

–2  Robbins family. Vital Records of Chelmsford, p. 436.

—    3  Concord, Aug-Oct. Cataldo. 1775 Dysentery Epidemic, slide 17. 2015.

—  >3  Dedham.[11] Caulfield 1942, pp. 57-58.

—    ?  East Bridgewater. Epidemic there but less serious than in Groton, Medford and Sutton.[12]

—>15  Groton (“severe” “epidemic”). Caulfield 1942, pp. 57-58.[13]

—  15  Lexington (10 children), Aug-Oct. Cataldo. 1775 Dysentery Epidemic, slide 17. 2015.

—    4  Lincoln, Aug-Oct. Cataldo. 1775 Dysentery Epidemic, slide 17. 2015.

–~50  Marlborough (out of population of about 1,400).  Caulfield 1942, pp. 57-58.[14]

—>23  Medford. Brooks, Whitmore and Usher. History of the town of Medford, in Cataldo, 18.[15]

—  >7  Medway. Vital Records of Medway, cited in Caulfield 1942, pp. 57-58.

–5  Adams family. Vital Records of Medway, pp. 283-288.

–2  Hammond family. Vital Records of Medway, p. 312.

–~50  Needham, one parish. Rev. Samuel West, cited in Caulfield 1942, pp. 56-57.[16]

–7  Family (wife and six children) of Joseph Daniels. (Rev. Samuel West Memoirs).[17]

—    1  Newbury. John Pearson, Sep 28, having returned home from army sick with dysentery.[18]

—  >8  Plympton. Vital Records of Plympton, cited in Caulfield 1942, pp. 57-58.

–4  Boney family. Vital Records of Plympton, p. 443.

–4  Churchil family. Vital Records of Plympton, pp. 458-459.

—    1  Roxbury, Aug 16. Lt. John Bowen. Cataldo. 1775 Dysentery Epidemic, slide 14.[19]

—>20  Sharon.  Vital Records of Sharon, cited in Caulfield 1942, pp. 57-58.

–5  Clifford Belcher family. Vital Records of Sharon, p. 152.

–4  Jeremiah Belcher family. Vital Records of Sharon, p. 152.

–2  Bird family. Vital Records of Sharon, p. 154.

–2  Coney family. Vital Records of Sharon, p. 159.

–5  Richards family. Vital Records of Sharon, pp. 184-186.

–2  Withington family. Vital Records of Sharon, pp. 192-193.

—  10  Stow (8 children), Middlesex Co. Cataldo. 1775 Dysentery Epidemic, slide 17. 2015.

—    3  Sudbury. Wright Richardson Journal, noted in colonialspinningbee.blogspot, 9-1-2015.[20]

—  17  Sutton. Caulfield 1942, pp. 56-57, and 57-58.[21]

—    ?  Tewksbury. Epidemic there but less serious than in Groton, Medford and Sutton.[22]

—    ?  Wakefield. Epidemic there but less serious than in Groton, Medford and Sutton.[23]

—  27  Westford, July 25-Sep 23. >2% of pop. (Colonialspinningbee.blogspot.com, 9-1-2015.)[24]

—  25  Westford (23 children), Aug-Oct. Judy Cataldo. 1775 Dysentery Epidemic, slide 17. 2015.

–2  Dutton family. Vital Records of Westford, p. 275, cited in Caulfield 1942, pp. 57-58.

–4  Keyes family. Vital Records of Westford, pp. 293-294, in Caulfield 1942, pp. 57-58.

–2  Read family. Vital Records of Westford, p. 307-309, in Caulfield 1942, pp. 57-58.

–3  Robinson family. Vital Records of Westford, p. 312, in Caulfield 1942, pp. 57-58.

–2  Smith family. Vital Records of Westford, pp. 313-314, in Caulfield 1942, pp. 57-58.

–4  Ephraim Wright fam. Vital Records of Westford, p. 321-325, Caulfield 1942, 57-58.

–2  Thomas Wright fam. Vital Records of Westford, 321-325, in Caulfield 1942, p.57-58.

—    1  Weston. Nathan Stone, Aug., on way home from army to Sutton sick with dysentery.

—    ?  Weymouth. Abigail Adams writes husband John that Weymouth was “very sickly.”[25]

—>10  Winchendon. Hyde, Ezra. History of the Town of Winchendon. 1849, p. 60.[26]

 

New Jersey     (>10)

— >10  Cumberland Co. Elmer. History of…Settlement…of Cumberland County [NJ]. 1869. 63.[27]

 

Narrative Information

 

Caulfield: “If ever there was a dysentery year in New England, it was the memorable year of 1775. On the surface it seems that during this and the next three years dysentery caused the deaths of more children than all other diseases combined. At this late date, chiefly because the newspapers of that time were devoted almost exclusively to war and politics, it is difficult to find detailed descriptions of many local epidemics; but it was a rare New England town that sometime during these four years did not experience an epidemic that would begin in mid-summer, reach its peak in autumn, and disappear in winter, meanwhile killing off children in groups of twos and threes and fours. Occasionally, in some towns, the epidemic would last two summers, while in other towns there would be two separate epidemics, one in 1775 and another in 1778. Altogether it was one of the most fatal periods for children in colonial history.

 

“As early as June 17, 1775, the ‘Bloody Flux [was] already very bad in Maryland.’ Early in August, Philip Fithian made another note in his diary: ‘. . . many Disorders, chiefly the Flux, are now raging in the lower Counties, Chester, Newcastle &c. I pray God Delaware may be a Bar & stop that painful & deadly disorder. Enough has it ravaged our poor Cohansians . . .’[28]

 

“It was characteristic of dysentery years for the disease to break out in the southern and middle colonies before it broke out in New England. But also contributing greatly to the magnitude of the New England epidemic were the British troops in Boston and the American troops in Cambridge. The first reports of the disease appeared in the newspapers during July: ‘We hear the camp distemper rages in the regular army in Boston, as also among the distressed inhabitants who are confined in that town by order of Tom. Gage, in open violation of his most solemn engagement. It is to be hoped he will meet the fate of Pharoah of old, whose example he so exactly follows.’[29] In August a letter sent through the lines mentioned that two members of the Cotton family and two of the Wiswall family were dead of the flux.[30] It was also learned that three thousand British troops were sick.[31] Apparently by the end of August the disease had appeared in many inland towns, for there was published on the front page of the Massachusetts Spy a whole column of medical news entitled ‘A Cure for the Bloody Flux.’[32]

 

“…Dr. John Morgan, who was at the scene, said that army hospitals were crowded and that contagious diseases, including dysentery, were rampant.[33] Certainly if this army camp was anything like the others during 1776 and 1777, conditions were deplorable. It has been authoritatively stated that more wounded men died from contagious diseases after they reached army hospitals than died from the effects of their wounds. Noah Webster, who did not believe that dysentery was contagious and who ridiculed all his contemporaries who disagreed, tried to prove that the Army was not responsible for the spread of dysentery to civilians by pointing out that there were malignant epidemics during 1773 and that even some 1775 epidemics could have had no relation to returning soldiers. But Webster had no conception of “healthy” carriers, and carriers were undoubtedly a major source of trouble. It is difficult to prove this by the evidence now at hand, but there are a few suggestive items. It so happens, for instance, that the first deaths in the Marlborough epidemic of 1775 were in the family of Colonel Abraham Williams, and there are other instances of multiple deaths of children whose brothers or fathers were serving in the war…

 

“It makes little difference whether or not the Army got its dysentery from British or American sources, for the fact remains that the Army, once infected, was the source of many disastrous local epidemics. The best evidence of this is from the autobiography of the Reverend Samuel West, minister at Needham in 1775:

 

The Dysentery soon prevailed in the American Army & extended itself more or less through the Country. Although it prevailed most in the Town near camp, my Parish partook largely of this calamity. We buried about 50 persons in the course of the season. Some families were dreadfully bereaved. One in particular a Mr. Joseph Daniels buried an amiable wife & 6 very promising Children in about 6 weeks—we often buried 3 or 4 in a day. My time was wholly devoted to visiting the sick, attendance on the dying & the dead.[34]

 

“Writing to her husband about the sickness in her family, Abigail, wife of John Adams,[35] vividly described the epidemic in Braintree. ‘The desolation of war is not so distressing as the havoc made by the pestilence. Some poor parents are mourning the loss of three, four, and five children; and some families are wholly stripped of every member . . . ’Tis a dreadful time with the whole province. Sickness and death are in almost every family. I have no more shocking and terrible idea of any distemper, except the plague, than this.’

 

“The Marlborough records are complete enough to show that the epidemic in that town was the “most destructive” in its history.[36] Out of a population of one thousand four hundred there were seventy-eight deaths during 1775, perhaps fifty from camp distemper. The vital records show many multiple deaths.

 

“In Dedham…August 29, 1775, there was a ‘Parish Fast on acc^t of the mortal Dysentery’ which had been raging for at least a week;[37] and in Groton, Medford, and Sutton the epidemics appear to have been severe. Those in Brookline, East Bridgewater, Tewksbury, and Wakefield appear less serious on the basis of incomplete records. Of the more than twenty-five still unidentified but simultaneous epidemics, the worst were in Bellingham, Brimfield, Chelmsford, Medway, Plympton, Sharon, and Westford.

 

“In addition there were scattered dysentery deaths but no evidence of serious epidemics in numerous other towns in eastern Massachusetts. A Thanksgiving proclamation dated November 4, 1775, mentions the “wasting sickness . . . in many of our Towns,” although by that time it was apparently subsiding, for the “voice of health” was once again being heard.[38]

 

“In Connecticut, according to Noah Webster, there were one hundred dysentery deaths in Danbury;[39] and in Middletown dysentery followed in the wake of “cynanche maligna” in the spring.[40] There were severe epidemics also in Wethersfield, Wintonbury, and, particularly, Coventry. The Reverend Solomon Williams preached a sermon on December 3, 1775, on the abatement of the ‘sore sickness’ accompanied by multiple deaths in Lebanon and ‘in many towns.’[41]” (Caulfield. “Some Common Diseases of Colonial Children.” 1942, pp. 55-60.)

 

Hyde: “Seasons of great Mortality, Sudden Deaths, &c.

 

“Few towns have been favored with more general health than this; yet there have been seasons of great mortality. The disorders which have prevailed to the greatest extent, have been the dysentery and the canker-rash. In 1775, the dysentery, then called ‘fever and flux,’ or ‘camp distemper,’ prevailed: some aged people, and many children died.” (Hyde. History of the Town of Winchendon. 1849, p. 60.)

 

Miller: “Diseases spread quickly in the filthy, overcrowded conditions [of army camps]. Deadly typhoid, smallpox, and dysentery killed thousands. One Delaware doctor recorded that ten to twenty soldiers died of disease for every one killed in battle.” (Miller. Growing Up in Revolution and the New Nation, 1775-1800. 2003, p. 13.)

 

Sources

 

Bell, Michael. Food for the Dead. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2011 Google preview accessed 2-1-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=xSwMELSIxkYC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Brooks, Charles. History of the Town of Medford, Middlesex County, Massachusetts, From its First Settlement in 1630 to 1855 (Revised, Enlarged, and Brought Down to 1885, by James M. Usher.) Boston: Rand, Avery & Company, The Franklin Press, 1886. Google preview accessed 2-1-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=ASwWAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Cataldo, Judy. 1775 Dysentery Epidemic (presentation of 21 slides). 3-27-2015. Accessed 2-1-2018 at: https://www.slideshare.net/judycataldo7/historycamp2015-1775-dysentery-epidemic

 

Caulfield, Ernest. “Some Common Diseases of Colonial Children.” Transactions of the Colonial Society of Massachusetts, Vol. 35, April 1942, pp. 4-65. Accessed 1-17-2018 at: https://www.colonialsociety.org/node/865

 

Colonialspinningbee.blogspot.com, 9-1-2015. Accessed 2-1-2018 at: http://colonialspinningbee.blogspot.com/2015/09/?m=0

 

 

Elmer, Lucius Q. C. History of the Early Settlement and Progress of Cumberland County, New Jersey; and of the Currency of This and the Adjoining Colonies. Bridgeton, NJ: George F. Nixon, Publisher, 1869. Google preview accessed 2-1-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=xvMCRguVjLoC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Find A Grave. “Lieut Samuel Foot, Sr.” Record created on 3-26-2012 by M. Cooley. Accessed 2-1-2018 at: https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/87418187/Samuel-Foot

 

Hildreth, Samuel Prescott. Biographical and Historical Memoirs of the Early Pioneer Settlers of Ohio, with Narratives of Incidents and Occurrences in 1775. Cincinnati: H. W. Derby & Co., Publishers, 1852. Google preview accessed 2-1-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=iL9cAAAAcAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Hyde, Ezra. History of the Town of Winchendon, from the Grant of the Township by the Legislature of Massachusetts in 1735, to the Present Time. Worcester: Henry J. Howland, 1849. Google preview accessed 2-1-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=-WJZAAAAcAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Marvin, Rev. A. P. History of the Town of Winchendon, (Worcester County, Mass.,) from the Grant of Ipswich Canada in 1735, to the Present Time. Winchendon: By author, 1868 Google preview accessed 2-1-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=v2CuIDaPtaIC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Miller, Brandon Marie. Growing Up in Revolution and the New Nation, 1775-1800. Minneapolis: Lerner Publications Company, 2003. Google digital preview accessed 2-1-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=WDxu48f2bJIC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

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, DT: Hudson & Goodwin, 1799. Accessed 1-7-2018 at: https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/evans/N27531.0001.001/1:11?rgn=div1;view=fulltext

 

 

 

 

 

[1] These are just a tally of numbers we have seen. By reading description of the widespread and virulent nature of this epidemic I would speculate that hundreds died, whose deaths are not reflected herein.

[2] Cited by Caulfield, in footnote 182. Pages in Dimock noted are pp. 177-179, 187, and 222.

[3] Michael Bell, in Food for the Dead (Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2011, p. 243) writes that “In the four hundred families of the First Church in Danbury, Connecticut, one hundred people had died of the camp distemper by November 1774, and according to the  minister, many other towns had been similarly stricken.”

[4] Caulfield, in footnote 182, notes, “See New Eng. Hist. Gen. Reg., LXXI, 304-305.” The one death we note is from Findagrave.com, of a soldier, Lt. Samuel Foot, Sr. Specifically notes the cause of death as “`The Camp Distemper,’ dysentery that ran rampant through the war camps.”

[5] “As early as June 17, 1775, the ‘Bloody Flux [was] already very bad in Maryland.’”

[6] Wrote “Death has so long stalked among us that he is become much less terrible to me than he once was…Funerals are now so frequent that for a month past you meet as many dead folks as live ones in Boston streets, and we pass them with much less emotion and attention than we used to pass dead sheep and oxen in days of yore when such sights were to be seen in our streets.” (Quoted by Judy Cataldo in 1775 Dysentery Epidemic slide presentation (slide 11). Caulfield (1942) pp. 55-56, notes that British troops in Boston helped spread dysentery amongst citizens there.

[7] Our number. Caulfield quotes from her letter: “Some poor parents are mourning the loss of three, four, and five children; and some families are wholly stripped of every member…Sickness and death are in almost every family.” To obtain a minimum number we simply added the three, four, and five deaths per family noted.

[8] Caulfield 1942, pp. 57-58.

[9] While we note just this one death, Caulfield writes that Colonial troops had helped to spread dysentery to civilian population. (Caulfield 1942, pp. 55-56.)

[10] Marvin, Rev. A. P. History of the Town of Winchendon, (Worcester County, Mass.,). 1868, p. 359.

[11] The number is our attempt to come with a minimum number to add to tally, based on fact that a Fast was held on Aug 29 in response to “the mortal Dysentery” which had been, in Caulfield’s words, “raging for at least a week.”

[12] Caulfield 1942, pp. 57-58.

[13] Caulfield notes, in footnote 177 that there were multiple deaths in at least seven families: Champney, Hazen, Keys, Moors, Patch, Quailes, and Stone families, though the cause of death is not noted. Notes the death of Abigail Kinrick on Sep 5 that is “expressly attributed to dysentery.”

[14] Notes, at pp. 56-57, that the first deaths were in the family of Colonel Abraham Williams.

[15] “1775: During this and some following years, there was fatal sickness in Medford from dysentery. Out of fifty-six deaths in 1775, twenty-three were children.” It is possible that most, if not all, of the deaths were due to dysentery, but this is not clear. While all twenty-three child deaths may not have been from dysentery, we use this figure, given the ambiguity, because the very young were more susceptible and vulnerable to the effects of dysentery. Caulfield notes, in footnote 177, deaths attributed to dysentery in Angier, Blanchard, Brooks, Calf, Faulkner, Hall, Vitent, Wade, and Winship families. Cites Brooks, History of Medford, 450.

[16] In a slide presentation on the 1775 Dysentery Epidemic, Judy Cataldo notes that “4 deaths in Needham in 1775 would be about 200 people a day today.” (slide 5 of 21)

[17] See Narrative section below. Rev. West goes on to note “we often buried 3 or 4 in a day.”

[18] Caulfield 1942, pp. 56-57.

[19] Hildreth, in Biographical and Historical Memoirs of the Early Pioneer… p. 381, cites Aug letter of orderly-sergeant Jonathan Stone, noting he was sick with the “camp distemper” which in the words of Hildreth, “prevailed amongst the troops, and extended into the country towns, as was thought by contagion from the sick soldiers.”

[20] “Now God is trying us with another terrible judgement that is the feavour & bloody flux & several have Died of it.” Journal of Experience Wright Richardson, Sudbury Massachusetts, August 29, 1775, privately published 1978. In order to contribute to our tally we “translate” “several” into three.

[21] Notes four deaths in the family of Captain Arthur Daggett, as well as “camp distemper” deaths in the Allen, Bruce, Cordwell, Gibbs, Goold, Haden, Lilly, Marble, Sibley, Stone, Walker, Whipple, and Woodberry families.

[22] Caulfield 1942, pp. 57-58.

[23] Caulfield 1942, pp. 57-58.

[24] The “summer of 1775 was a sad time in Westford Massachusetts when the town experienced an epidemic of dysentery known as the Bloody Flux. 27 died, most were children and uncounted others were sick. The town lost over 2% of the population based on a census from 1776 the year after so the percentage lost was likely higher. The blogger (Judy) lists the names, dates of death, age, and cemetery location on this web page.

[25] “Dr. Tufts [tells] me he has between 60 and 70 patients now sick with this disorder.” They did not appear to be mortally sick. (Sep 16, 1775 letter; quoted on slide 12 of Judy Cataldo presentation on 1775 Dysentery Epidemic.)

[26] Our number, for the purpose of a tally, based upon statement: “…some aged people, and many children died.”

[27] Our number, in order to be able to include in a tally, based on statement: “The dysentery was very prevalent and fatal in Cumberland County in 1775.” Given that a war was being fought, and dysentery amongst troops, spreading into settlements, our assumption of ten or more dysentery deaths in the county seems conservative.

[28] Cites, in footnote 164: Philip Vickers Fithian: Journal, 1775-1776, Robert G. Albion and Leonidas Dodson, Editors (Princeton, 1934), 32, 94.

[29] Cites, in footnote 165: Massachusetts Spy, July 19, 1775.

[30] Cites, in footnote 166: Massachusetts Spy, August 16, 1775.

[31] Cites, in footnote 167: Massachusetts Spy, August 23, 1775.

[32] Cites, in footnote 168: Massachusetts Spy, August 30, 1775.

[33] Cites: Louis C. Duncan. Medical Men in the American Revolution, 1775-1783. Carlisle Barracks, PA: 1931.

[34] Cites in fn 173, Dedham Historical Register, II (January, 1891), 22. Caulfield writes: “The dates given on the Daniels tombstone show that the seven deaths in that family occurred between August 31 and September 12, 1775.”

[35] Cites, in footnote 174: Charles F. Adams. Letters of Mrs. Adams. Boston: 1841, li, 69.

[36] Cites, in footnote 175: Charles Hudson. History of the Town of Marlborough. Boston: 1862, pp. 186 and 252; also Vital Records of Marlborough.

[37] Cites, in footnote 176, Dedham Historical Register, III (July 1892), 130.

[38] Cites, in footnote 179, Massachusetts Spy, Nov 17, 1775.

[39] Noah Webster. Pestilential Diseases, I, 263; II. 23.

[40] Cites, in footnote 180, The Middletown First Society.

[41] Caulfield, in footnote 183, cites: The Greatness and Sovereignty of God, Sufficient Reason to Silence Man’s Complaints of his Providence. Norwich: 1977, p. 24.

–Hundreds of thousands.  US National Library…Medicine. Native Voices. “Timeline. 1775…”[1]

—                       ~84,000  Colonies, Native America.  Fenn. Pox Americana…1775-82. 2001, 274

—                       ~32,000  Great Plains Natives 1780-82.  Fenn. Pox Americana…1775-82. 2001.

—                         13,000  Arikara, Mandan, Hidatsa tribes.  Lehmer in Hodge 2009, 79-80.[2]

 

Philadelphia (1776-1777)                                                                             (  2,500)

–2,500  Simonds.  The American Date Book.  1902, p. 82.

–2,500  Willsey and Lewis. “Philadelphia,” Harper’s Book of Facts. 1895, p. 626.

 

Great Plains Native Americans (1780-82)                                                  (~32,000)

—                      ~32,000.   Great Plains Natives, 1780-82.  Fenn. Pox Americana…1775-82. 2001.

—      Tens of thousands.   Hodge, Adam. Vectors of Colonialism…Smallpox…” 2009, p. 188.

—      Tens of thousands.   Rich, E.E. (ed.). Cumberland House Journals; in Hodge 2009, 87.[3]

—                        13,000.   Arikara, Mandan, Hidatsa tribes.  Lehmer in Hodge 2009, 79-80.

—            Terrible losses.   Assiniboine.  Hodge. Vectors of Colonialism…Smallpox….” 2009, 81.

—              Considerable.   Blackfoot.  Hodge. Vectors of Colonialism…Smallpox…” 2009, 76.

—        Several thousand.   Cree.  Hodge, Adam. Vectors of Colonialism…Smallpox…” 2009, 81

–Diminished very much.  Gros Ventres.  Hodge. Vectors of Colonialism…Smallpox…” 2009, 81.

—                           2,000.   Ojibway.  Calloway, One Vast…, 421, 423; in Hodge 2009, 83.

—                          Heavy.   Piegans.  Hodge. Vectors of Colonialism…Smallpox…” 2009, 76.

—                         1/3-1/2.   Shoshones. Hodge. Vectors of Colonialism…Smallpox…” 2009, 76-77

—               Considerable.   Sioux.  Hodge. Vectors of Colonialism…Smallpox…” 2009, 83.

—             Suffered much.   Snakes. Lewis and Clark, Original Journals, V2, 373, in Hodge, 177.

 

Southwestern Alaska Natives. Especially Sitka vicinity (1775-77)          (   ?   )

—  Great numbers.  Portlock, Nathaniel. 1789, pp. 271-72; in Boyd 1999, 23-24.[4]

 

Western Washington Native Americans (1776-78)                                   ( 11,000)

— 11,000  Boyd, Robert Thomas.  The Coming of the Spirit of Pestilence. 1999.[5]

 

Canadian Plains First Peoples                                                                     (~30,000)

— ~30,000.  “Canadian plains alone.”  Hodge. Vectors of Colonialism.” 2009, 87.[6]

 

Narrative Information Overview:

 

U.S. National Library of Medicine: “As the American Revolution begins, epidemic smallpox spreads across North America, killing hundreds of thousands of whites and Native peoples, from the Eastern Seaboard to the Mississippi River and from the Gulf Coast into Canada. In Mexico City, smallpox erupts and moves north to the Niuam (Comanche), who carry it north to the Shoshone. The epidemic devastates Native populations from the Pacific Northwest to Alaska.”

 

(United States National Library of Medicine. Native Voices. Native Peoples’ Concepts of Health and Illness.  “Timeline. 1775: Smallpox strikes again in North America.” Bethesda, MD:   National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services.)

 

Alaska

 

Portlock:  “12 August 1787, Portlock’s Harbor…

 

“I expected to have seen a numerous tribe, and was quite surprised when I found that it consisted only of three men, three women, the same number of girls, two boys about twelve years old, and two infants….I observed the oldest of the men to be very much marked with the small-pox, as was a girl who appeared to be about fourteen years old.  The old man endeavored to describe the excessive torments he endured whilst he was afflicted with the disorder that had marked his face, and gave me to understand that it happened some years ago.  This convinced me that they had had the small-pox among them at some distant period.  He told me that the distemper carried off great numbers of the inhabitants, and that he himself had lost ten children by it; he had ten strokes tattooed on one of his arms, which I understood were marks for the number of children he had lost.  I did not observe any of the children under ten or twelve years of age that were marked; therefore I have treat reason to suppose that the disorder raged little more than that number of years ago {1775-1777}; and as the Spaniards were on this part of the coast in 1775, it is very probable that from them these poor wretches caught this fatal affliction….A number of the Indians who visited us from the Eastward were marked with the small-pox, and one man who had lost an eye gave me to understand that he had lost it by that disorder; but none of the natives from the Westward had the least traces of it….”  (Portlock, Nathaniel. A Voyage Round The World But More Particularly To The North-West Coast Of America. 1789, pp. 271-72. Reprinted by Kessinger Publishing, LLC, 2005; in Boyd, Robert Thomas.  The Coming of the Spirit of Pestilence:  Introduced Infectious Diseases and Population Decline among Northwest Coast Indians, 1774-1874.  Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1999, pp. 23-24.)

 

East Coast

 

From November 5, 2001 CNN interview with Dr. Elizabeth Fenn, assistant professor of history at George Washington University, and author of Pox Americana:

 

CNN: Can you tell us how this epidemic affected the course of the Revolutionary War?

 

FENN: It had a dramatic effect on the early episodes. There’s some evidence that indicates that it helped to keep George Washington and the Continental Army from pursuing the British into Washington in 1775 and 1776, and also wreaked havoc on the American soldiers when they invaded Canada and tried to make Canada the 14th colony involved in the rebellion.

 

CNN: Does anyone know the source of this historic outbreak — where it originated?

 

FENN: It appears that smallpox was present in Canada when the American troops got there, but once it took hold in this crowded camp, the effects were devastating….

 

CHAT PARTICIPANT: How is smallpox transmitted?

 

FENN: Smallpox is almost exclusively transmitted from one human being directly to another….you can track connections between people, by watching epidemic smallpox move….

 

CNN: How long did it take to finally eradicate smallpox?

 

FENN: The eradication campaign in a way can be traced back to Edward Jenner’s development of vaccination in 1796…. It’s really vaccination that enabled the eradication of smallpox to even be possible. The World Health Organization’s eradication campaign really lasted for about 20 years. It culminated in the final certification of eradication in 1979.

 

CHAT PARTICIPANT: Are those of us who have been vaccinated for small pox in the forties still protected?

 

FENN: …The vaccination for smallpox confers immunity only temporarily. While smallpox was still around, people were expected to be re-vaccinated periodically, every three to five years…

 

CNN: How great a threat is a bioterrorism attack with smallpox today?

 

FENN: There are really two things to remember about smallpox. First, it depends on having a population of susceptible individuals. Second, it depends upon connections between those individuals. This is because it’s a disease contagious from one person to another. In both of those regards, we are more vulnerable today, odd though it seems, than in the 1700s. So, if an incident were to occur, the consequences certainly could be disastrous.

 

Lamb: “In the fall and winter of 1776-1777 the country was ravaged by the smallpox, the curse of the last century.  The army in Canada had been decimated by it, and it had made appearance in all the larger cities, where inoculation was as yet powerless to check its spread, owing in part doubtless to the general dread of even the milder form of the disease. In January, 1777, the epidemic reached Fishkill, and great alarm was felt that it would be communicated to the barracks.”  (Lamb. The Magazine of American History with Notes and Queries.  1879, p. 6.)

 

Philadelphia

 

“Small-pox and camp-fever cause 2500 deaths…1776-77.”  (Willsey. “Philadelphia,” Harper’s Book of Facts. 1895, p. 626.)

 

Great Plains Native Americans

 

Hodge:  “…the arrival of smallpox on the northern plains in 1780 constituted a demographic catastrophe for the region’s Indian inhabitants….it took thousands of lives….[and] constitutes a thus far overlooked turning point in northern Great Plains history.”  (Hodge 2009, 65-66)

 

“The epidemic that eventually reached the Saskatchewan River originated in Mexico in 1779. After killing tens of thousands south of the Rio Grande, smallpox reached into New Mexico and Texas, where it likely met another strand of the disease moving westward from Louisiana. In 1780, the Comanches contracted the disease while raiding the Spanish settlements of the Southwest, thus taking the malady, along with their stolen horses, to the southern Great Plains. From there, it appears that Shoshones contracted the disease from their Comanche neighbors via the horse trade, facilitating its movement northward.[7]….”  (Hodge 2009, 73)

 

“On the northwestern reaches of the Great Plains, the Blackfeet contracted smallpox while warring on the Shoshone….”  (Hodge 2009, 75)

 

“Both the Shoshones and Piegans suffered heavy losses to smallpox…. Later explorers noted that the Blackfoot confederacy as a whole sustained considerable losses during the epidemic of 1780-82….” (Hodge 2009, 76)

 

“Although precise figures are difficult to obtain in regard to the Shoshone, it appears that they lost more people during the epidemic, probably somewhere between one-third and one-half of their population….As the historian George E. Hyde writes, smallpox ‘badly shattered’ the Shoshone.[8]

 

“It appears that Shoshones transmitted smallpox to their Crow neighbors, most likely through the horse trade. When Francois Antoine Larocque visited the Crows in 1805, he learned that just before the disease struck, they occupied some two thousand lodges. As a result of the 1780-82 epidemic, as well as some later outbreaks, according to his hosts, they now counted but three hundred lodges. Hyde estimates that their losses were about fifty percent during the first major outbreak.”[9] (Hodge 2009, 77)

 

“The Crow likely transmitted Variola to the semi-sedentary Missouri River tribes….Since these tribes, the Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara, lived in static, highly populated villages, the disease ran rampant among them. As a result, their casualties far surpassed those of other northern plains tribes, for they suffered from what Trimble refers to as ‘acute crowd infections’.”[10]  (Hodge 2009, 78)

 

“…smallpox simply ravaged the Missouri villagers [such as the Mandan, Arikara and Hidatsa].”  (Hodge 2009, 79)

 

“Formerly able to send four thousand men on the warpath, the Arikara could muster but five hundred warriors after smallpox ravaged them.”[11]

 

“Scholars place overall losses for the three Missouri River tribes at nearly seventy percent. Donald J. Lehmer conservatively estimates that the Arikara, Mandan, and Hidatsa lost a total of some 13,000 individuals, a mortality rate of sixty-eight percent. Lehmer, however, concedes that losses probably reached closer to seventy-five or eighty percent….”[12]  (Hodge 2009, 80)

 

Hodge speaking of the Cree:  “Those who tried to flee from the disease only spread it further and before long, several thousand Indians died.”  (Hodge 2009, 81-82)

 

“David Thompson and Edwin Thompson Denig, who lived on the plains during the mid-nineteenth century, recorded that the Nahathaway, or Cree, lost half of their people in 1782 and that entire villages simply ceased to exist.[13]….Some two thousand Ojibway perished.[14]  (Hodge 2009, 82)

 

“Although little information is available regarding the precise casualties sustained by the Gros Ventres of the Plains, a neighbor of the Cree and Assiniboine, evidence suggests that smallpox left their population “diminished very much.”[15]  (Hodge 2009, 82-83)

 

Hodge on Sioux:  “Seven separate winter counts produced by Sioux bands record that smallpox killed many people during the years 1779, 1780, 1781, and 1782. Of those counts, six of them reported consecutive years of smallpox.[16] The number of losses that the Lakota and Yankton Sioux sustained, however, is difficult to gauge because the winter counts do not provide any numerical estimation of the destruction. Linea Sundstrom suggests that Sioux losses were considerable, as ‘[a] high mortality rate can be inferred from the use of the phrase ‘[smallpox] used them up’.’”[17]  (Hodge 2009, 83)

 

“Scholars’ best estimates place overall Indian losses between one-third and one-half.[18] The Canadian plains alone, which were not even home to the groups which bore the brunt of the outbreak, lost some thirty thousand natives.  As if such heavy casualties were not devastating enough, the epidemic swept the entirety of the northern plains in less than a year and a half. During the course of approximately fifteen months, tens of thousands of Indians sickened and died.[19]  According to Donald J. Lehmer, these tremendous population losses simply “threatened the very existence of the individual tribes” of the region.[20]  Smallpox nearly annihilated some groups, leaving their few survivors broken and struggling to survive….”  (Hodge 2009, 87)

 

(Hodge, Adam R. Vectors of Colonialism: The Smallpox Epidemic of 1780-82 and Northern Great Plains Indian Life (A thesis submitted to Kent State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts). May 2009.)

 

Pacific Northwest Natives

 

Crosby: “The disease [smallpox] often spread far beyond the European frontier, often to people who had barely heard of the white invaders.   Smallpox probably reached the Puget Sound area on the northwest Pacific coast in 1782 or 1783, a part of the world then as distant from the main centers of human population as any place on earth.  When the explorer George Vancouver sailed into the Sound in 1793, he found Amerindians with pockmarked faces, and human bones scattered along the beach at Port Discovery, skulls, limbs, ribs, backbones – so many as to produce the impression that this was ‘a general cemetery for the whole of the surrounding country.’  He judged that ‘at no very remote period this country had been far more populous than at present.’  It was an assessment that he could accurately have extended to the entire continent.[21]” (Crosby, Alfred W. “Virgin-Soil Epidemics,” in Warren.  American Environmental History, 2003, 54-55.)

 

Fenn, 2003:  “Cruising the northwest coastline of America in 1792, Captain George Vancouver was troubled. Where, he wondered, were all the natives? The land was abundant, with a seemingly unlimited supply of salmon and fresh water, but there were strikingly few people. Instead, the British navigator found deserted villages. The first, encountered south of Vancouver Island on the shores of Discovery Bay, was ‘over-run with weeds; amongst which were found several human skulls, and other bones, promiscuously scattered about’.

 

“As Vancouver charted the Strait of Juan de Fuca, the scene repeated itself regularly. ‘During this Expedition’, crew member Thomas Manby noted, ‘we saw a great many deserted Villages some of them … capable of holding many hundred Inhabitants’. For Manby, the conclusion was inescapable: ‘By some event, this country has been considerably depopulated, but from what cause is hard to determine.’ Vancouver agreed. All the evidence, he believed, indicated ‘that at no very remote period this country had been far more populous than at present’.

 

“There had indeed been a disaster, one so vast, in fact, that even its witnesses and victims could not appreciate its extent. In the years from 1775 to 1782, as the Revolutionary War reshaped society and politics along the eastern seaboard, a very different cataclysm shook the entire North American continent. The cataclysm, huge and hideous, was smallpox….

 

“Recorded eyewitness accounts of the pandemic of 1775–82 end at Hudson Bay and the northern plains. The epidemic, however, did not. It struck the northwest coast, where George Vancouver and others observed its depopulating effects….

 

“References to abandoned villages and to smallpox-scarred Indians can be found in at least a dozen journals kept on seven different voyages to the Pacific north-west from 1787 to 1795. Even Lewis and Clark, returning through the Cascades in 1806, stopped at a nearly deserted Chinook village where they met an old woman ‘badly marked with the Small Pox’, who remained there still. The woman indicated that the disease had struck ‘about twenty-eight or thirty years past’.

 

“If it is clear that the epidemic did indeed strike the north-west coast, it is not clear exactly how or when it did so. It is most likely that the pox proceeded westward from the Shoshones, following native trade networks down the Columbia River to the sea. Yet no evidence proving this has been found.

 

“It is also possible that the pox arrived by sea. From 1775 to 1779, four Spanish voyages cruised north from San Blas, Mexico, in an effort to stake out and protect territorial claims. Could one of these have carried the infection? Perhaps. But if so, it has not yet turned up in the historical record. Nor, for that matter, does mention of smallpox or depopulation appear in the journals of Captain James Cook’s 1778 voyage, perhaps indicating that the epidemic arrived after that date.

 

“Russians also frequented the north-western coastline, and they had already established trading posts in southern Alaska. Smallpox had ravaged Asia’s Kamchatka peninsula in 1768, and there is some evidence that it was present in 1774. But there is no clear indication that Russians carried the contagion eastwards in these years.

 

“We are left, then, with George Vancouver’s mystery. From 1775 to 1782, as conflict and political upheaval rocked the east coast, smallpox had wreaked its own havoc wherever it found access to susceptible populations. From Quebec to Mexico to Hudson Bay, the continent was alive with human activity. Variola found not just susceptible populations, but connections between them. Transported by human carriers between ports and along rivers, roads, lakes, and trails, the virus showed how closely linked seemingly disparate regions already were.  In so doing, it forged a horrific common experience that spanned the continent and reshaped life for years to come.”  (Fenn, Elizabeth A.  “The Great Smallpox Epidemic.”  History Today, Vol. 53, Issue 8, 2003.)

 

Ruby and Brown: “As effective as these tools were [iron], they could not match another Russian import in their swiftness to kill.  Some time around 1750 disease spread from ‘far to the north,’ where it had been borne by a wrecked ship reported to have previously acquired the contagion in a Chinese port.  The plague moved rapidly to the south, trapping susceptible natives in its death swath and wiping out nearly three-quarters of a village at the mouth of the Columbia River near present-day Ilwaco.  To prevent its further ravages Chinook survivors put their lodges, clothing, and other effects to the torch, a practice which some of them would continue until the late nineteenth century.  The once proud and powerful villagers, the scourge of natives in all quarters, now stood scourged themselves and in fear that the Great Spirit would return to vent the rest of his wrath on them.

 

“This would not be the last Lower Chinook exposure to imported disease.  Striking them as it had natives as far east as the Missouri River, where it had been introduced by white traders, the smallpox moved up that river to reach the Columbia sometime about 1782-83, or nearly a quarter of a century before white men would follow its lethal path to the Pacific.  As natives succumbed to its ravages, the British blamed it on American traders, the Americans blamed it on the French, and the French in turn, on the Spanish.”  (Ruby, Robert H. and John A. Brown. The Chinook Indians: Traders of the Lower Columbia River. 1976, p. 34.)

 

Sources

 

Boyd, Robert Thomas. The Coming of the Spirit of Pestilence: Introduced Infectious Diseases and Population Decline among Northwest Coast Indians, 1774-1874. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1999, 403 pages.  Partially digitized by Google. Accessed 8-28-2017 at:  http://books.google.com/books?id=jnWMCaFcuM4C&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

CNN. “Elizabeth Fenn: The History of the Smallpox Virus.” November 5, 2001. Accessed at:  http://archives.cnn.com/2001/COMMUNITY/11/05/fenn/index.html

 

Crosby, Alfred W. “Virgin-Soil Epidemics.” Pp. 50-62 in Warren. American Environmental History, 2003.

 

Fenn, Elizabeth A.  Pox Americana – The Great Smallpox Epidemic of 1775-82.  New York:  Hill and Wang, 2001.

 

Hodge, Adam R. Vectors of Colonialism: The Smallpox Epidemic of 1780-82 and Northern Great Plains Indian Life (A thesis submitted to Kent State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts). May 2009. Accessed 9-18-2012 at: http://etd.ohiolink.edu/send-pdf.cgi/Hodge%20Adam%20R.pdf?kent1239393701

 

Lamb, Martha Joanna. The Magazine of American History with Notes and Queries (Vol. III).  New York and Chicago: A. S. Barnes & Company, 1879. Digitized by Google. Accessed at:  http://books.google.com/books?id=iCIDAAAAMAAJ

 

Portlock, Nathaniel. A Voyage Round The World But More Particularly To The North-West Coast Of America. 1789, pp. 271-72. Reprinted by Kessinger Publishing, LLC, 2005; in Boyd, Robert Thomas.  The Coming of the Spirit of Pestilence: Introduced Infectious Diseases and Population Decline among Northwest Coast Indians, 1774-1874.  Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1999, pp. 23-24.

 

Ruby, Robert H. and John A. Brown. A Guide to the Indian Tribes of the Pacific Northwest (revised edition). Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1992. Partially Google digitized at: http://books.google.com/books?id=-7zBc-pqnGsC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Ruby, Robert H. and John A. Brown. The Chinook Indians: Traders of the Lower Columbia River. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1976. Google preview accessed 6-7-2019 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=HuCjdhf_hMIC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Simonds, W. E. (Editor). The American Date Book. Kama Publishing Co., 1902, 211 pages. Google digital preview accessed 9-8-2017 at: http://books.google.com/books?id=JuiSjvd5owAC

 

United States National Library of Medicine. Native Voices. Native Peoples’ Concepts of Health and Illness. “Timeline.” Bethesda, MD: National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services. Accessed 9-17-2012 at: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/nativevoices/timeline/index.html

 

White, Richard. Land Use, Environment, and Social Change: The Shaping of Island County, Washington.  Seattle and London: University of Washington Press, 1980, 1992, and 1999. Google preview accessed 6-7-2019 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=KtMhCwAAQBAJ&dq=richard+white+land+use,+environment&source=gbs_navlinks_s

 

Willsey, Joseph H. (Compiler), Charlton T. Lewis (Editor). Harper’s Book of Facts: A Classified History of the World.  New York: Harper & Brothers Publishers, 1895. Accessed 9-4-2017 at: http://books.google.com/books?id=UcwGAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_v2_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q=&f=false

 

Additional Reading

 

Robertson, R. G. Rotting Face: Smallpox and the American Indian. Caldwell, ID: Caxton Press, 2002. Google preview accessed 6-7-2019 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=-EoEm_OO8RgC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

 

 

 

[1] This probably includes Mexico and the Canadian provinces.

[2] Lehmer, Donald J. “Epidemics among the Indians of the Upper Missouri,” Selected Writings of Donald J. Lehmer.  Reprints in Anthropology, vol. 8. Edited by W. Raymond Wood. Lincoln: J&L Reprint Co., 1977, p. 107.  In:  Hodge, Adam R. Vectors of Colonialism: The Smallpox Epidemic of 1780-82 and Northern Great Plains Indian Life (A thesis submitted to Kent State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts). May 2009, pp. 79-80.

[3] Rich, E. E., (ed.). Cumberland House Journals and Inland Journals, 1775-82 (2 vols.)  London: The Hudson’s Bay Record Society, 1952.

[4] Portlock, Nathaniel. A Voyage Round The World But More Particularly To The North-West Coast Of America. 1789. Reprinted by Kessinger Publishing, LLC, 2005.

[5] Boyd, Robert Thomas.  The Coming of the Spirit of Pestilence:  Introduced Infectious Diseases and Population Decline among Northwest Coast Indians, 1774-1874.  University of Washington Press, 1999,

[6] Hodge notes the Canadian provinces “were not even home to the groups which bore the brunt of the outbreak…”

[7] Hodge footnote 24:  George E. Hyde, Indians of the High Plains: From the Prehistoric Period to the Coming of Europeans (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1959), 164; Fenn, Pox Americana, 213-4; Ann F. Ramenofsky, Vectors of Death: The Archaeology of European Contact (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1987), 130; Donald J. Lehmer, “Epidemics Among the Indians of the Upper Missouri,” in The Selected Writings of Donald J. Lehmer, ed. W. Raymond Wood (Lincoln: J&L Reprint Co., 1977), 106.

[8] Hodge footnote 37:  Hyde, Indians of the High Plains. 1959, 165.

[9] Hodge footnote 38: Francois-Antoine Larocque, “Yellowstone Journal,” in Early Fur Trade on the Northern Plains: Canadian Traders Among the Mandan and Hidatsa Indians, 1738-1818, ed. W. Raymond Wood and Thomas D. Thiessen (Norman: Oklahoma University Press, 1985), 206; Fenn, Pox Americana, 220; Hyde, Indians of the High Plains, 165.

[10] Hodge footnote 40:  Trimble, “Epidemiology on the Northern Plains.” 108.

[11] Hodge footnote 45:  Pierre Antoine Tabeau, Tabeau’s Narrative of Loisel’s Expedition to the Upper Missouri, ed. Annie Heloise Abel, trans. Rose Abel Wright (Norman: Oklahoma University Press, 1939, 1968), 123-4; Calloway, One Vast Winter Count, 419; Fowler, “The Great Plains,” 16; Hyde, Indians of the High Plains, 17. Jean-Baptiste Truteau mentions that the Arikaras suffered from three different smallpox outbreaks during the late eighteenth century. Truteau, “Journal of Truteau,” 299. According to Hyde, all three outbreaks occurred between 1772 and 1780. George E. Hyde, Red Cloud’s Folk: A History of the Oglala Sioux Indians (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1937, 1957), 17.

[12] Hodge footnote 46: Lehmer, “Epidemics,” 107; Fenn, Pox Americana, 274; W. Raymond Wood and Thomas D. Thiessen, eds., Early Fur Trade on the Northern Plains: Canadian Traders Among the Mandan and Hidatsa Indians, 1738-1818 (Norman: Oklahoma Univ. Press, 1985), 6; Donald J. Lehmer, “The Other Side of the Fur  Trade,” in The Selected Writings of Donald J. Lehmer, ed. W. Raymond Wood (Lincoln: J&L Reprint Co., 1977), 100.

[13] Hodge footnote 52:  Thompson, David Thompson’s Narrative, 92; Edwin Thompson Denig, Five Indian Tribes of

the Upper Missouri, ed. John C. Ewers (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1961), 109, 114.

[14] Hodge footnote 53:  Calloway.  One Vast Winter Count. 421, 423.

[15] Hodge footnote 54:  Henry and Thompson. New Light, vol. 2, p. 531.

[16] Hodge footnote 56:  Mallery, Picture-Writing, vol. 1, 308, vol. 2, 589; Ronald T. McCoy, “Winter Count: The Teton Chronicles to 1799,” Ph.D. diss., Northern Arizona University, 1983, 217-224. One of these counts refers to consecutive years of measles ravaging the Sioux. McCoy points out that this could have very well also been smallpox, for smallpox was often mistaken for measles at the time. This study counts it as an instance of smallpox, for it is likely that it was part of the larger epidemic.

[17] Hodge footnote 57:  Linea Sundstrom, “Smallpox Used Them up: References to Epidemic Disease in Northern Plains Winter Counts, 1714-1920,” Ethnohistory, 44, 2 (1997): 314.

[18] Hodge footnote 70:  Fowler. “The Great Plains,” p. 20-21; Stearn, Effect of Smallpox, p. 47; Calloway, Our Hearts Fell to the Ground, p. 40.

[19] Hodge footnote 71:  Rich. Cumberland House Journals, lx.

[20] Hodge footnote 72: Lehmer, “Epidemics,” p. 109.

[21] Cites:  Richard White. Land Use, Environment, and Social Change. The Shaping of Island County, Washington. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1980, pp. 26-27, and Robert H. Ruby and John A. Brown. The Chinook Indians: Traders of the Lower Columbia River. 1976, p. 80.

 

Massachusetts            ( ~21)

—    1  Beverly, Nov 11. William Patch buried after death from smallpox.[1]

—  ~3  Marblehead, (“a few died.”. New England Historical Society. “The 1730…1774…Riots.”[2]

—>17  Salem. Duffy. Epidemics in Colonial America. 1953, p. 68.[3]

 

Philadelphia, PA       (300)

–>300  Duffy. Epidemics in Colonial America. 1953, p. 100.

—  300  Schultz, Suzanne M.  “Epidemics in Colonial Philadelphia from 1699-1799…” 2007.[4]

 

Narrative Information

 

Duffy: “Both Salem and Marblehead were subject to smallpox in 1773. One church record in the former town lists 17 deaths from the disorder, a fact which would indicate 80 to 90 or more cases….”[5] (Duffy. Epidemics in Colonial America. 1953, p. 68.)

 

“In the latter year [1773] the Philadelphia Bills of Mortality show that over three hundred smallpox deaths occurred. ‘As the chief of them were the Children of poor People,’ a newspaper account stated, ‘a Number of Gentlemen in that City have formed a Society for inoculating the Poor, free of Expense to them, and are providing a Fund for that Purpose.’”[6] (Duffy. Epidemics in Colonial America. 1953, p. 100)

 

New England Historical Society: “….In June 1773, a small epidemic again struck Marblehead [another in 1730]. Two months later the town debated building a public inoculation hospital on one of the islands in the harbor. The proposal failed, but the town did permit four prominent citizens to build a private hospital on Cat Island.[7]….They bought Cat Island on Sept. 2, 1773 and began building the hospital. Three groups of patients were inoculated during the last three months of the year. Most survived, but a few died.

 

“The furious townspeople began rioting for several days. They blackened their faces, burned a small boat that brought supplies to the hospital and broke the windows of the proprietors’ homes. In January [1774], four Marbleheaders were caught stealing contaminated clothing from Cat Island, presumably to spread the epidemic and discredit the hospital….” (New England Historical Society. “The 1730 and 1774 Marblehead Riots Against Smallpox Inoculation.”)

 

Sources

 

Duffy, John. Epidemics in Colonial America. Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State University Press, 1953.

 

New England Historical Society. “The 1730 and 1774 Marblehead Riots Against Smallpox Inoculation.” Accessed 3-27-2018 at: http://www.newenglandhistoricalsociety.com/1730-1774-marblehead-riots-smallpox-inoculation/

 

Schultz, Suzanne M. “Epidemics in Colonial Philadelphia from 1699-1799 and The Risk of Dying.”  Early America Review, Winter/Spring 2007. Accessed 1-9-2018 at:  https://www.varsitytutors.com/earlyamerica/early-america-review/volume-11/early-american-epidemics

Also at: http://www.earlyamerica.com/review/2007_winter_spring/epidemics.html

 

Vital Records of Beverly, Massachusetts, To the end of the Year 1849 (Vol. II, Marriages and Deaths). Topsfield, MA: Topsfield Historical Society, 1907. Google preview accessed 2-12-2017 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=ayaF0vm1AMIC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[1] Vital Records of Beverly Massachusetts to the End of the Year 1849 (Vol. II), 1907, p. 523.

[2] In order to take note of and for the purposes of a tally, we translate “a few died” into approximately three.

[3] In write “at least” 17 deaths in that this is the number of deaths noted on the record of one church.

[4] Cites Roslyn S. Wolman. “A tale of two colonial cities:  inoculation against smallpox in Philadelphia and Boston,” Transactions and Studies of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia, Vol. 45, October 1978, p. 340.

[5] Cites, in footnote 48, “Description of Salem,” in Massachusetts Historical Society, Collections, Ser. 1, VI (1800), 276-77); Boston Evening Post, No. 1981, September 13, 1773; Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Weekly News-Letter, No, 1657, November 4, 1773.

[6] Cites, in footnote 61, Massachusetts  Gazette and Boston Post Boy and Advertiser, No. 861, February 14-21, 1774.

[7] Shows a photo and notes the island is now referred to as Childrens Island [at least as of 2016].

Boston

–?  “…in 1772…measles was a leading cause of death in Boston…” Hinman and Orenstein, p70

 

Charleston, SC

–800-900  Grob. The Deadly Truth: A History of Disease in America. 2002, p. 79.

–800-900  Webster. A Brief History of Epidemic and Pestilential Diseases (V. 1). 1799, p. 259.

—       900+ Krawczynski. Daily Life in the Colonial City. 2013, p. 424.[1]

 

Philadelphia, PA

–180 (out of population of about 29,000). Anroman. Chapter 2 in Zuckerman, 2014, p. 25.[2]

 

Narrative Information

 

Anroman: “…Philadelphia’s every-growing population provided a constant pool of susceptible individuals, creating the necessary environment for measles epidemics to occur. In her analysis of Philadelphia’s bills of mortality, Klepp (1998b, 1991)[3] notes that two of the most severe epidemics occurred in 1759 and 1772. In 1759, the population of Philadelphia was just over 18,000 people. That year, approximately 113 deaths were attributed to measles. By 1772, the population had grown to approximately 29,000; 180 deaths were recorded for measles.”

 

Grob: “In 1772 and 1773, Noah Webster reported, ‘the measles appeared in all parts of America, with unusual mortality,’ Though mild in New England, it was devastating in Charleston. According to Webster, as many as 800 to 900 children died in the city (out of a total population of 14,000). Although Webster’s figures may have been grossly inflated, they do suggest the potential severity of the disease.”[4]

 

Hinman and Orenstein: ““…in 1772…measles was a leading cause of death in Boston…”

 

Webster: “M.S. letter from Dr. Tufts. In this year [1772],[5] the measles appeared in all parts of America, with unusual mortality. In Charleston, S. Carolina, died 8 or 900 children.” (Webster, Noah. A Brief History of Epidemic and Pestilential Diseases (Vol. 1). 1799, p. 259.)

 

Sources

 

Anroman, Gilda. Chapter 2: “Infectious Disease in Philadelphia, 1690-1807: An Ecological Perspective.” Pp. 15-34 in Zuckerman, Molly K. (ed.). Modern Environments and Human Health: Revisiting the Second Epidemiologic Transition. Wiley Blackwell. 2014.

 

Grob, Gerald N. The Deadly Truth: A History of Disease in America. Cambridge, MA: President and Fellows of Harvard College, Harvard University Press, 2002. Partially Google digitized at: http://books.google.com/books?id=U1H5rq3IQUAC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Hinman, Alan R. and Walter A. Orenstein. “A Shot at Protection: Immunizations Against Infectious Disease.” Chapter 4 in Silent Victories: The History and Practice of Public Health in Twentieth Century America (John W. Ward and Christian Warren, eds.). Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, Inc., 2007. Google preview accessed 1-11-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=YPYRDAAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Krawczynski, Keith. Daily Life in the Colonial City. Santa Barbara, CO and Denver: Greenwood (An Imprint of ABC-CLIO, LLC), 2013. Google preview accessed 1-8-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=E_QgVyPcmIAC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Webster, Noah. A Brief History of Epidemic and Pestilential Diseases…(in two volumes). Hartford, DT: Hudson & Goodwin, 1799, p. 203. Accessed 1-7-2018 at: https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/evans/N27531.0001.001/1:11?rgn=div1;view=fulltext

 

Zuckerman, Molly K. (ed.). Modern Environments and Human Health: Revisiting the Second Epidemiologic Transition. Wiley Blackwell. 2014. Google preview accessed 1-11-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=EdYVAwAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q=measles&f=false

 

 

[1] From Table 12.1. Epidemics in the Cities.

[2] We have seen references to measles in Philadelphia in 1773, but without an estimate of mortality.

[3] SE Klepp. Philadelphia in Transition: A Demographic History of the City and its Occupational Groups, 1720-1830. (New York” Garland Publishing, Inc., 1989; SE Klepp. “Demography in early Philadelphia, 1690-1860.” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, Vol. 133, 1989, pp. 85-111; SE Klepp. “The Swift Progress of Population”: A Documentary and Bibliographic Study of Philadelphia’s Grown, 1642-1859. (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society).

[4] Grob cites, in footnote 16: Caulfield, “Early Measles Epidemics,” pp. 538-545; Noah Webster, A Brief History of Epidemic and Pestilential Diseases, 2 vols. (Hartford: Hudson & Goodwin, 1799), 1: 259-260.

[5] The lines before and after this entry are devoted to the year 1772.

—  150  Blanton, et al. in Historical Climate Variability and Impacts in North America. 2009, 16.

–~150  Griggs. Historic Disasters of Richmond. 2016, p. 15.

–~150  Henrico County Historical Society.

–~150  Historical Marker Database, The Flood of 1771.

 

Narrative Information

 

Blanton, Chenoweth and Mock: “This chapter describes the causes and effects of a catastrophic flood on the south Atlantic seaboard early in US history…In Virginia it has been referred to as the Great Fresh of 1771, regarded as perhaps the most catastrophic flood in the region’s history. Our purpose is to offer a more complete account and analytical explanation of the flood itself, and to explore it social, economic, and political implications. The historical sources we draw on are collected not only from Virginia where prior attention has been focused, but from wherever relevant observations were recorded, extending as far southward as Florida and as far northward as Massachusetts. We also bring to bear the perspective of synoptic climatology to reconstruct the weather pattern that accounts for this unusual late spring event. Finally, we attempt to digest existing historical perspectives from colonial Virginia to offer a fuller interpretation of the flood’s meaning at this formative stage in colonial history. The larger goal is to use this case as a means of exploring the place of natural climatic events in human affairs…

 

“A variety of sources allow us to establish the basic facts surrounding the May 1771 flood including personal correspondence and journal entries, official records and correspondence, and newspaper accounts. The great weight of the material is attributed to observers in eastern Virginia, either in the vicinity of towns like Richmond at the falls of rivers, or toward the coast in Tidewater…The same is true of the information from South Carolina, where most reports come from the more populous Low Country districts…. [p. 4]

 

“Based on several reports that put the first visible rise of the water at Richmond on May 25, the deluge in the Virginia mountains would have occurred between about May 14-26. The peak flood stage at all of Virginia’s fall line towns was on May 27…)Virginia Gazette, 1771a, 1771b; Van Horne, 1975; The Farmer’s Register, 1836). Geographically the extent of flooding appears to have been vast, extending at least through the Carolinas and over Virginia… Rivers specifically noted at flood stage in late May were the Savannah, Pee Dee, Wateree, Congaree, Yadkin, Roanoke, Rivanna, James, Pamunkey, Mattaponi, Rappahannock, and Shenandoah, ordered from south to north respectively…. [p. 6]

 

“Reported maximum flood levels in 1771 are impressive and at least in Virginia are not matched in official records (Camp and Miller, 1970; [1]  Bailey et al., 1975[2]). At Richmond the James River floodwater maximum was marked at 40 ft (12.9 m) above normal level (Bland, 1771;[3] The Virginia Gazette, 1771b). At Osborne’s about 10 miles (16.09 km) below Richmond the water level reached ‘five or six lengths of shingles upon the roofs’ (The Maryland Gazette, 1771). Given in relative terms, the peak level at the Fall Line was most commonly noted as 20-25 ft…above the previously observed ‘old record’, probably set in May 1766 (The Virginia Gazette, 1771a). A single account measures the relative height as 10 ft…above the flood levels recalled uncertainly from August ‘1720 or 1724’ (The Pennsylvania Journal and Weekly Advertiser, 1771.)…. [p. 7]

 

“On the Roanoke River, the 1771 flood is cited as 9 ft…above the previous all-time high mark (The New London Gazette, 1771a)…. [p. 8]

 

“Of all states affected, Virginia sustained the greatest losses from the 1771 flood, and the physical damage compounded already-existing economic and political strains….at the time of the great flood a significant portion of the colony’s wealth was collected at riverside warehouses, and each of the…facilities was affected….. [p. 15]

 

“….An estimated 150 persons drowned in Virginia and regionally economic losses were great. Along with prized floodplain soils, crops and facilities of every description were washed away or damaged. Richard Bland wrote in a letter that, ‘Promiscuous heaps of houses, trees, men, horses, cattle, sheep, hogs, merchandize, corn, tobacco and every other thing…were seen floating upon the water’ (Bland, 1771)….” [p. 16]  (Blanton, Chenoweth and Mock. “The Great Flood of 1771: An Explanation of Natural Causes and Social Effects.” Pages 3-22 in Historical Climate Variability and Impacts in North America. (Dupigny-Giroux and Mock, editors). 2009.)

 

Dupigny-Giroux and Mock: “The regional case studies open with ‘The Great Flood of 1771: An Explanation of Natural Causes and Social Effects’ by Blanton et al. that uses synoptic reanalysis and historical sources to explore the human and societal ramifications of a catastrophic flood along the eastern Atlantic seaboard in May 1771 on the eve of the American Revolution. The study serves to highlight the disproportionate toll of natural hazards on lower income populations as a result of mobility, housing locations and access to resources, a finding that is as true today as it was three centuries ago.” (Dupigny-Giroux and Mock, eds. Historical Climate Variability and Impacts in North America. 2009, p. xii.

 

Griggs: “….By most accounts, the worst flood in Richmond’s history came as a surprise on May 27, 1771. It was not raining in Richmond when the flood surged down the James River and inundated the River City. Unbeknownst to most Richmonders, it had been raining for ten or twelve days in the mountains, and the water was flooding the rivers. Soon, Richmonders saw that the James River had risen above all previous flood levels and was overflowing its banks…the water rose to a height of forty feet above flood stage….It swept through Richmond, destroying buildings and boats and killed about 150 people.

 

Henrico County Historical Society. “On May, 27, 1771, a wall of water came roaring down the James River valley following ten to twelve days of intensive rain.  As water swept through Richmond, buildings, boats, animals and vegetation were lost.  About one hundred fifty people were killed as the river reached a flood state of forty-five feet above normal.  A monument to the flood was inscribed by Ryland Randolph, of Curles, in 1771-71:

 

“…all the great rivers of this country were swept by inundations never before experienced

which changed the face of nature and left traces of violence that will remain for ages.”

 

“The marker recalls the events of the Great Fresh of 1771, the biggest flood to affect the James River valley in our recorded history. The marker suggests a flood stage of 45 feet. The level upriver at Richmond was 40 feet above normal, a level not even approached by the flood caused by Hurricane Camille in 1972.  That “fresh” reached a level of 36.5 feet above normal at Richmond.

 

“The marker also refers to the eighteen-foot-tall obelisk on a six-foot square base, constructed of brick and faced with cement. The eighteenth century monument at Turkey Island purportedly marks the high-water mark of the flood.

 

“Contemporary accounts confirm that it was quite a flood. A letter to the Virginia Gazette of May 30, 1771, said:

 

There is now the greatest Fresh in James River even known, it being at least twenty Feet higher than that in May 1766. The Warehouses at Westham are entirely gone, with three Hundred Hogsheads of Tobacco. At Byrd’s Warehouses, the Water is now Half Way up the Lower Tier of Hogsheads; the other Warehouses of Shocko are almost under Water, and the Tobacco drifting away by thirty and forty Hogsheads at a Time. It is imagined there might have been about three Thousand Hogsheads in the different Warehouses at Shocko. Almost every Lumber House is gone, and destroyed, on each Side of the River, many of them full of Good.

 

“The magazine account continues:

 

Some People who left Richmond the same Day, in the Afternoon, say that the River was then rising at the Rate of two Inches an Hour, but we since learn, that it began to abate about Sunset.

 

All the low Ground have been overflowed, by which inconceivable Damage has been done. Every Thing was carried off to Farrar’s Island, belonging to Colonel Thomas Mann Randolph, and at Elk Island, John Wayles, Esquire, is said to have suffered to the Amount of four thousand Pounds. Nothing being saved but the People and five Horses…

 

The Ships in the River were in most imminent Danger, from the vast Number of huge Trees driving down the Rapidity of the Current, and many of them have sustained great Damage. The Ships at Shirley Hundred were driven from their Mooring over to City Point, and those at City Point down as low as Jordan’s.

 

“The estimate was a bit off, and the river was really rising on May 26 at a rate of 19 inches per hour. On June 6, 1771, John Howard of Botetourt wrote to Dr. William Cabell in Amherst:

 

I received last night by my Fellow Cato accounts of the dismal Destruction made in  James River by the late Fresh, in which I share very deeply, and I understand all my Crop of Tobacco that was growing is ruined as well as all that was in the Tobacco Houses about 6 Hogsheads, together with all my Tobacco Houses except one, are swept away, and 13 Hogsheads that were sent to the Warehouse, or Westham, I suppose are gone, as I hear the water was over both places, my Corn House with the Corn swept away, & some of my stock, and it is owing to the great goodness of God that my People are all alive.

 

“On August 1, 1771, Richard Bland wrote to Thomas Adams:

 

Upon the 27th of May a most dreadful Inundation happened in James, Rappahannock and

Roanoke Rivers occasioned by very heavy and incessant Rains upon the mountains for ten or twelve days…Promiscous Heaps of Houses, Trees, Men, Horses, Cattle, Sheep, Hogs, Merchandise, Corn, Tobacco & every other Thing that was unfortunately within the dreadful sweep were see [sic] Floating upon the Waters, without a possibility of their being saved.

 

“Obviously, the flood was devastating, and it prompted the Assembly to issue 30,000 pounds in Treasurer notes for the tobacco lost at public warehouses.”[4]

 

Historical Marker Database, Inscription:  “On May 27, 1771, a wall of water came roaring down the James River valley following ten to twelve days of intensive rain. As water swept through Richmond, buildings, boats, animals, and vegetation were lost. About one hundred fifty people were killed as the river reached a flood stage of forty-five feet above normal. A monument to the flood was inscribed by Ryland Randolph…in 1771-72: ‘… all the great rivers of this country were swept by inundations never before experienced which changed the face of nature and left traces of violence that will remain for ages’.”  (Historical Marker Database, The Flood of 1771.)

 

Sources

 

Blanton, Dennis B., Michael Chenoweth and Cary J. Mock. “The Great Flood of 1771: An Explanation of Natural Causes and Social Effects.” Pages 3-22 in Historical Climate Variability and Impacts in North America. (Lesley-Ann Dupigny-Giroux and Cary J. Mock, editors). Springer, 2009. Google preview accessed 9-4-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=fNuOhA8SKjsC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q=1771&f=false

 

Griggs, Walter S. Jr. “Chapter 1: Two Floods Two Hundred Years Apart, 1771 and 1972.” Historic Disasters of Richmond. Charleston, SC: The History Press, 2016. Google preview accessed 9-3-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=KjSACwAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

Henrico County Historical Society, Henrico, VA. News 2011, First Quarter. “Forty Foot High (And Rising?) Flood levels of the Great Fresh of 1771 still stand as a record…” Accessed 9-4-2018 at: http://www.henricohistoricalsociety.org/news2011.firstquarter.html

 

Historical Marker Database. The Flood of 1771. (Contribued by Kathy Walker, Stafford, VA, July 17, 2008). Accessed at: http://www.hmdb.org/marker.asp?marker=9248

 

[1] J. D. Camp and E. M. Miller. Flood of August 1969 in Virginia. Water Resources Division, Geological Survey, U.S. Department of the Interior, Richmond, Virginia, 1970.

[2] J. F. Bailey, J. L. Patterson, and J. L. H. Paulhus. Hurricane Agnes Rainfall and Floods, June-July 1972. Geological Survey Professional Paper 924. US Geological Survey and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Washington, DC, 1975.

[3] R. Bland. Letter from Richard Bland to Thomas Adams, August 1, 18771. Adams Family Papers, Mss 1, Ad98a12-167, Sec 6 (B) Folder 2 of 7, The Virginia Historical Society, Richmond, 1771.

[4] Cites:  Williams and Mary Quarterly, vol. 5, 1897; Dupigny-Giroux, Lesley-Ann and Gary J. Mock, eds. Historical Climate Variability and Impacts in North America; Virginia Gazette, May 30, 1771; Tyler’s Quarterly Historical and Genealogical Magazine, vol. 2, no 4, April 1921.