lornajarrettblanchard

–730-940  Blanchard.[1]

–730-940  Grob. The Deadly Truth: A History of Disease in America. 2002, p. 74.

—     <900  McCandless. “Epidemics.” South Carolina Encyclopedia. 5-17-2016; 8-1-2017 update.

—     <730  South Carolina Department of Health & Environment.[2]

—       720  Hopkins. The Greatest Killer: Smallpox in History.  1983 and 2003, p. 244.[3]

—       710  Duffy. Epidemics in Colonial America. 1953, p. 93.[4]

Narrative Information

Grob: “Although sporadic epidemics ere common, smallpox was less significant in the Chesapeake and the South. A more dispersed population, an agricultural rather than a commercial economy, and the absence of port towns inhibited the introduction and spread of epidemics. South Carolina was an exception, since Charleston was an important seaport and commercial center with trade links to areas where smallpox was endemic. Like Boston, New York, and Philadelphia, it served as a port of entry for infectious diseases….

“In 1760 no less than 6,000 out of a total population of 8,000 were infected, and the estimates of mortality ranged from a low of 730 to a high of 940. Over 90 percent of all deaths in Charleston that year were due to smallpox.”[5] (Grob, Gerald N. The Deadly Truth: A History of Disease in America. 2002, p. 74.)

Hopkins: “Twenty-one years later [in 1738 smallpox was passed from Charleston to the Cherokee], smallpox spread from the Cherokees to Charleston, when soldiers returned from an expedition against the Indians in the late fall of 1759 after Governor Lyttleton of South Carolina concluded the Treaty of Fort St. George. The disease was rampant among Indians in Georgia and South Carolina that Year, having first been noted in August.  It erupted in the governor’s camp almost as soon as he had concluded his treaty. According to one contemporary historian [Duffy 1953, 93],

As few of {Governor Lyttleton’s} little army had ever gone through that distemper, and as the surgeons were totally unprovided for such an accident, his men were struck with terror, and in great hast returned to the settlements, cautiously, avoiding all intercourse with one another and suffering much from hunger and fatigue by the way.

“One of the ‘settlements’ to which Governor Lyttleton’s soldiers fled was Charleston, where the disease was epidemic by January 1760. By April, about three-fourths of Charleston’s eight thousand inhabitants had had smallpox, and one out of every eleven citizens had died of it.  In March that year, a newspaper correspondent wrote that:

What few escape the Indians, no sooner arrive in Town, than they are seized with Small-Pox, which generally carries them off; and from the Numbers, already dead, you may judge the Fatality of the Disease. Of the white Inhabitants 95; Acadians 115; Negroes 500, were dead two days ago, by the Sexton’s Account. (Duffy 1953, 93)”  (Hopkins 1983 and 2003, p. 244.)

(Hopkins, Donald R. The Greatest Killer: Smallpox in History. Univ. of Chicago Press, 1983.)

McCandless: “Unlike most smallpox epidemics, which arrived via ships, the epidemic of 1760 most likely came from the upcountry. It was apparently spread throughout the colony by soldiers returning to Charleston in December 1759 from Governor William Lyttleton’s expedition against the Cherokees. Precise statistics are impossible, but in Charleston alone about one-half to three-fourths of the population of about eight thousand were infected naturally or by inoculation and perhaps as many as nine hundred died. Mortality was especially high among Africans and French Arcadian refugees.” (McCandless, Peter. “Epidemics.” South Carolina Encyclopedia. 5-17-2016; updated 8-1-2017.)

Thornton: Speaking of the mortality associated with the 1738-39 smallpox epidemic or epidemics amongst the Cherokee, Thornton writes: “Perhaps the Cherokee population had recovered somewhat by the second smallpox epidemic, about 1760…. (p. 31)

“In 1759-60, smallpox struck the Cherokees again. Early in 1760 an Augusta, Georgia, correspondent wrote with reference to the Cherokee town of Keowee (on the Keowee River in north-western South Carolina (see Smith 1979:48, map 2, 49, map 3, 50, map 4, 51, table I, 52):[6] ‘The late accounts from Keowee are that the Small-Pox has destroyed a great many Indians there; that those who remained alive, and have not yet had that Distemper, were gone into the Woods, where many of them must perish as the Catawbas did,’ and the August 13, 1760, Pennsylvania Gazette reported that ‘we learn from Cherokee country, that the People of the Lower Towns have carried smallpox into the Middle Settlement and Valley, where that disease rages with great violence, and that the People of the Upper Towns are in such Dread of the Infection, that they will not allow a single Person from the above named Places to come amongst them’ (quoted in Duffy 1951:338).”[7] (Thornton, Russell. “Smallpox and Other Diseases,” Chapter 2: “Pathogens and Wars: The 1700s,” The Cherokees: A Population History. 1990, p33.)

Sources

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

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

Hopkins, Donald R. The Greatest Killer: Smallpox in History. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1^st Edition, 1983, with new Introduction, 2003. Google preview accessed 1-9-2018 at:  http://books.google.com/books?id=z2zMKsc1Sn0C&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

McCandless, Peter. “Epidemics.” South Carolina Encyclopedia. 5-17-2016; updated 8-1-2017. Accessed 1-10-2018 at: http://www.scencyclopedia.org/sce/entries/epidemics/

South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control. Public Health History (website). “A Chronology of the History of Public Health in South Carolina.” Accessed 10-9-2008 at: http://www.scdhec.net/administration/history/timeline.htm

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

[1] Though we cite two sources noting 710 and 720 fatalities in Charleston we choose to use 730 deaths as the low-end of our fatality range because (1) it is the number used by the SC Dept. of Health and Environment, and (2) the numbers cited refer only to Charleston, whereas surely smallpox was carried from there elsewhere in the colony. And, as Hopkins notes, the Smallpox was epidemic among the Cherokees. We have not seen fatality numbers but we speculate the number was large.

[2] Both SC DHEC and Hopkins cite Duffy 1953, pp. 93-95,  as the source of their information.  SC DHEC notes, as well, that 9% of the population died.

[3] Derived by taking 9% (1 of 11) of 8,000 inhabitants.

[4] The total of numbers noted by the “newspaper correspondent” in Duffy 1953; cited by Hopkins.

[5] Cites: Duffy, Epidemics in Colonial America, pp. 7, 82-83, 92-95, 99-100; Dana P. Arneman, “The Medical History of Colonial South Carolina,” 1996), pp. 141-148, 163-168.

[6] Betty Anderson Smith. “Distribution of eighteenth-century Cherokee settlements .” In The Cherokee Indian Nation: A Troubled History, Duane H. King (ed.). Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1979, pp. 46-60.

[7] John Duffy. “Smallpox and the Indians in the American colonies.” Bulletin of the History of Medicine, Vol. 25, 1951, pp. 324-341.

—>10? Blanchard estimate based on Harris Journal cited in Wicke and reproduced in Duffy.

Narrative Information

Duffy: “For the second time a ten-year interval separated wide-spread outbreaks of measles. The next visitation can in 1759 and few regions escaped. The disease was both general and fatal in South Carolina, and Elizabeth Drinker of Philadelphia and Alexander Colden of New York noted its presence in their respective cities during the early part of the year. The infection was restricted to children and was relatively mild.[1]

“However, this mildness was not characteristic of the contagion in Fairfield, New Jersey, where Ephraim Harris recalled in his journal,

That fatal and never-to-be forgotten year, 1759, when the Lord sent the destroying angel to pass through this place, and removed many of our friends into eternity in a short space of time; not a house exempt, not a family spared from the calamity. So dreadful was it, that it made every ear tingle, and every heart bleed; in which time I and my family was exercised with that dreadful disorder, the measles. But blessed be God, our lives are spared.[2]

“Measles was only part of the troubles in Fairfield, for smallpox and other diseases were also prevalent at the same time.” (Duffy, pp. 174-175.)

Source

Duffy, John. Epidemics in Colonial America. Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State University Press, 1953, reprinted 1979.

Wickes, Stephen, MD. History of Medicine in New Jersey, and of its Medical Men, From the Settlement of the Province to A.D. 1800. Newark, NJ: Martin R. Dennis & Co., 1879. Accessed 4-5-2018 at: https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=nyp.33433011688805;view=1up;seq=9

[1] Cites, in footnote 21, p. 174: Ramsay, History of South Carolina, II, 89; Elizabeth Drinker’s Diary, February 8, 1759; Alexander Colden to his sister, Katherine, New York, April 25, 1759, in Colden Papers, IX (1937), 173-75.

[2] Cites, in footnote 22, p. 175: Wickes, History of Medicine in New Jersey, 20-21.

Philadelphia

–>100  Caulfield. “Some Common Diseases of Colonial Children.” Transactions, Apr 1942, 10-11.

Narrative Information

Caulfield: “The epidemic [measles] which began in 1758 continued into January, 1760. Records of it have been found in about twenty-five towns from Maine to South Carolina.[1]….It is estimated that there were over one hundred deaths in Philadelphia.” (“Some Common Diseases of Colonial Children.” Transactions, Apr 1942, 10-11.)[2]

Deppisch on Martha Washington (Mount Vernon, VA): “In January 1760, Martha’s second husband, George Washington, used the services of the Rev. Charles Green, a local clergyman with medical training, when Martha contracted measles.” (Deppisch, Ludwig M. The Health of the First Ladies: Medical Histories from Martha Washington to Michelle Obama. 2015, p. 16.)

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

Deppisch, Ludwig M. The Health of the First Ladies: Medical Histories from Martha Washington to Michelle Obama. Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Co., Inc., 2015, p. 16. Google preview accessed 1-18-2017 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=wy1qBgAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

[1] Caulfield note: See Vital Records of Medford, 377, 391, 421, 455, 458 (Gill, Hawks, Reeves, Warren, White); Diaries of Benjamin Lynde and of Benjamin Lynde, Jr., 187 (for Boston); Lionel Chalmers, An Account of the Weather and Diseases of South Carolina (London, 1776), II, 161. Parkman Diary (Ms. American Antiquarian Society) for epidemics in various towns in Worcester County between February and July, 1759.

[2] The material we have reproduced from Caulfield, in this measles section of his presentation, has a subhead “1758-1760.” He makes it clear, though, that the measles continued only “into January, 1760.” A number of locations where it was present are noted. It is not clear what the time-frame was for Philadelphia. However, in that most epidemics have a higher mortality in the earlier periods, rather than at the end, we have dropped Jan 1760 from our heading, in the belief that the disease would have been of an epidemic nature within the 1758-59 time-frame.

–40 Dunn and Miller. Atlantic Hurricanes (Revised Edition). 1964, Appendix B, p. 314.
–40 Historical Marker Database. “San Marcos de Apalache” marker. 7-29-2013 posting.
–40 Rappaport and Partagas. The Deadliest Atlantic Tropical Cyclones, 1492-1994. 1995, p.24.

Narrative Information

Dunn and Miller: Deaths due to drowning. (Dunn and Miller 1964, 314.)

Historical Marker Database Marker Inscription: “This is the site of the original Spanish fortifications. The first fort was a flimsy wooden fort started in 1678 and completed in 1679. The second fort, also of wood was built in 1718 on this site. A hurricane flooded this fort in 1758 and forty men were drowned. The effects of this hurricane required a new start on the construction of the stone fort.” (Historical Marker Database. “San Marcos de Apalache” marker. 7-29-2013 posting.)

Sources

Dunn, Gordon E. and Banner I. Miller. Atlantic Hurricanes (Revised Edition). Baton Rouge LA: Louisiana State University Press, 1964, 377 pages.

Historical Marker Database. “San Marcos de Apalache” marker. 7-29-2013 posting. Accessed 9-4-2022 at: https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=67115

Rappaport, Edward N. and Jose Fernandez-Partagas. The Deadliest Atlantic Tropical Cyclones, 1492-1994 (NOAA Technical Memorandum NWS NHC-47). Coral Gables, FL: National Hurricane Center, National Weather Service, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, U.S. Department of Commerce, January 1995, 42 pages. Accessed 8-20-2017 at: http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/pdf/NWS-NHC-1995-47.pdf

–14  Duffy. Epidemics in Colonial America. 1953 and 1979, p. 126.

Narrative Information

Duffy: “The next summer [1756] fourteen children were carried off in Saco, an adjacent town[1]. The reporter of these deaths commented upon the prevailing ‘sickly time’ and listed the ills affecting the local towns and villages. In only one town, Saco, was the throat distemper[2] the cause of the trouble. This fact illustrates once again the throat distemper characteristic of moving slowly and flaring up sporadically in scattered areas. Thus towns within five or ten miles of focal points of infection frequently were unaffected.”

Source

Duffy, John. Epidemics in Colonial America. Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State University Press, 1953, reprinted 1979.

[1] Had just previously been writing of a diphtheria outbreak in 1755 in New Casco, near Falmouth, ME.

[2] Later throat distemper would be named diphtheria. This section of Duffy’s book is on diphtheria and scarlet fever.

— >225  Caulfield. “Some…Diseases of Colonial Children.” 1942, 52.[1]

—   220  Blanchard tally from locality breakouts below.

Maine                         (   ?)

–?  Black Point, “the slow fever and bloody flux” “prevailed.” Caulfield 1942, pp. 53-54.

–?  Falmouth, “the slow fever and bloody flux” “prevailed.” Caulfield 1942, pp. 53-54.

–?  North Yarmouth, “the slow fever and bloody flux” “prevailed.” Caulfield 1942, pp. 53-54.

Massachusetts            (220)

Boston            (  ?)  “Infectious Distemper” caught from returning French & Indian War troops.[2]

Chauxit          (  ?) (Sterling.) 5% of population within eight weeks. Caulfield 1942, pp. 53-54.[3]

Dudley            (>4)

–4  Robinson children, Oct-Nov. Caulfield. “Some…Diseases of Colonial Children.” 1942, 52.

Harvard         (25)

–~25  Sep-Oct.  Caulfield. “Some Common Diseases of Colonial Children.” 1942, 53-54.[4]

Holden            (40)

–40  By Oct 20. Rev. John Mellen of Lancaster, “Discourse,” in Caulfield 1942, pp. 52-53.[5]

Lancaster       (42) Thirty-three were children.

–42  Parish of John Mellen of Lancaster, from his “Discourse” in Caulfield 1942, pp. 52-53.

Marlborough (  ?)  Caulfield citing Parkman as referring to epidemic as “malignant fever.”[6]

Newbury        (  ?)  John Tucker called Jan epidemic “wasting pestilence.” Caulfield 1950, 48.

Newtown        (>5) (Just 1 family. Caulfield writes his belief that over 1,000 MA children died.)

–5  Sheppard children, Aug-Sep. Caulfield. “Some…Diseases of Colonial Children.” 1942, 52.

Oxford            (>4) (Just 1 family. Caulfield writes his belief that over 1,000 MA children died.)

–4  Parker children, Aug-Sep. Caulfield. “Some…Diseases of Colonial Children.” 1942, 52.

Rutland          (60)

–60  MHC. MHC Reconnaissance Survey Town Report, Rutland. 1984, p. 3.

–45  By Oct 20. Rev. John Mellen of Lancaster, “Discourse,” in Caulfield 1942, pp. 52-53.[7]

Sherborn        (>4)

–4  Lealand children, Oct-Nov. Caulfield. “Some…Diseases of Colonial Children.” 1942, 52.

Shrewsbury   (20) (Just within the North Parish.)

–20  Rev. John Mellen of Lancaster, “Discourse,” in Caulfield 1942, pp. 52-53.

Southborough(>4)

–4  Johnson children, Oct-Nov. Caulfield. “Some…Diseases of Colonial Children.” 1942, 52.

Sutton             (  ?)  “Nervous Fever, re one David Hall, cited in Caulfield 1950, p. 48.

Westborough (  8)  Within 4 days in Oct. Ebenezer Parkman Diary.[8]

Weston           (>4)

–4  Smith children, Aug-Sep. Caulfield. “Some…Diseases of Colonial Children.” 1942, 52.

Narrative Information

Caulfield (Dysentery section of 1942 paper): “The year 1756 was a perilous one for the children of Massachusetts. It would not be surprising to find that well over a thousand of them died in this one colony alone. The throat distemper was not so bad as usual, but it was bad enough. Most of the trouble started, however, after the middle of July, when multiple deaths began to increase in number. In Newton five Sheppard children, in Oxford four Parker children, and in Weston four Smith children died during August and September. During October and November four Lealands died in Sherborn, four Robinsons in Dudley, and four Johnsons in Southborough. At least one hundred families lost two or three. The cause has not been determined in all cases, but a detailed account of the epidemics in some small towns north of Worcester has been preserved in a sermon by the Reverend John Mellen of Lancaster.[9] He started off in the usual tough Calvinistic fashion but managed to include some interesting footnotes:

I write unto you little Children, because I wou’d move you to Consideration and Seriousness, to reflect upon yourselves, upon your Ways, upon the End of Things, upon Death, Judgment and the eternal World, and to prepare for your own Death and Dissolution. I write unto you because I am tenderly concerned for you, and pained at my Heart for that dreadful Destruction that God has made among you, within a few Weeks past, by an obstinate and noisome Disease, that has bid such Defiance to Medicine . . .

How we have attended Funeral upon Funeral, Day after Day, and Week after Week; and laid our Hopes in the Grave . . . How sudden the Deaths! How awfully distressing the Sickness of the Deceased! . . .

And how that in the Autumn . . . [of] Seventeen Hundred fifty-six, the Inhabitants of the Land, and more especially those in the Neighbourhood of this Chasm, were seiz’d with this mortal pestiferous Distemper, that has swept them off in such Numbers.

The Distemper is a Dysentery, or Bloody-Flux. And when malignant, is commonly attended with Vomiting, high Fever, extream Pain: and sometimes with visible Canker.—When the Patient appeared with high Symptoms of the Distemper at first, he often died in 3 or 4 Days: Others, and especially those less violently seiz’d, lived 8 or 10 Days, or more. Much vomiting a bad Symptom: and cold Hands and great Restlessness commonly fatal: Tho’ many died without all, if not without any, of these Symptoms in a high Degree . . .

In this Parish have been buried 42 in about seven Weeks [thirty-three of them children]. A Mortality, (which in less than three Years wou’d have buried the whole Parish, which consisted of near 800 Souls), allowing for the probable Increase in the mean Time. The Proportion of the Dead to the Living is as 1 to 19, nearly. In the little Town of Holden [population about four hundred], where the Sickness first began, which, [to] the 20th of October had buried 40, the Proportion is much greater. In Old Rutland [population about nine hundred], at the same Time, had died 45. In the North Parish in Shrewsbury upwards of 20. And in more distant Places less, in Proportion to the Number of People.[10]

“This same epidemic spread to Westborough. Ebenezer Parkman, recording the names of those who were sick or dead, turned back a few pages of his diary to September 13, 1756, to make a marginal note: “The Begin^g of y^e sore sickness.” Of some significance, perhaps, was his remark that Dr. Gott had returned to Marlborough “from y^e camp” and that “The sorrowf. news from y^e Army is confirmed, of y^e multitudes w^c have dyd by Sickness.” Early in October he noted that eight persons died within four days. There was a fast in Shrewsbury on October 13, and another the following day in Westborough. In Chauxit (now Sterling) five percent of the population died within eight weeks, “and the well hardly sufficed to give proper care to the sick.” In Harvard there were about twenty-five more dysentery deaths during September and October.[11] Other Massachusetts towns suffered epidemics during the autumn of 1756; and in Maine “the slow fever and bloody flux” prevailed at Black Point, North Yarmouth, and Falmouth.[12] (Caulfield. “Some Common Diseases of Colonial Children.” Transactions…Colonial Society…[MA], V35, April 1942, pp. 53-54.)

Caulfield, from Pursuit of a Pestilence, 1950: “Students of colonial military affairs are no doubt aware that the epidemics which broke out frequently in camps should be more thoroughly investigated. At Louisburg in 1745, to cite but one example, the name of the enemy that killed less than 100 men during May and June is known while the name of the enemy that during the following winter killed 560 men, or about one-quarter of the total fighting force, remains unknown. Sometimes these camp distempers were directly responsible for frightful epidemics among civilian populations, the diseases having been carried back home by sickly soldiers. This was true particularly of dysentery as can be amply demonstrated by the Massachusetts epidemics of 1745, 1756, and 1775.” (Caulfield 1950, p. 22.)

“1756…was a dysentery year, in fact one of the frightful dysentery years of New England history with abundant instances of multiple deaths of children especially during August and September. Despite all the epidemics during the early months of 1756 it seems as if every one deliberately avoided giving them names by which they can now be recognized. John Tucker called the January epidemic in Newbury ‘the wasting pestilence.’ Parkman made frequent notes on ‘malignant fever’ in Marlborough and Westborough between January and March. David Hall, after noting a few cases of throat disease in children, mentioned a different disease of all age groups in Sutton which he called ‘The Nervous Fever.’ During May and June sickly soldiers were returning from Albany [NY] and Nova Scotia bringing with them ‘an Infectious Distemper’ which quickly spread in Boston. And in one of his sermons John Mellen of Lancaster made indefinite references to some ‘mortal distempers’ and ‘contagious diseases’.” (Caulfield. The Pursuit of a Pestilence. 1950, pp. 48-49.)

Massachusetts Historical Commission: “By 1720, 50 families had settled in the town…the total equaled 1,090 in 1765. The town lost 60 children to dysentery in 1756…”

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

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

Massachusetts Historical Commission. MHC Reconnaissance Survey Town Report, Rutland. Boston, MA: MHC, 1984, 13 pages. Accessed 1-21-2018 at: http://www.sec.state.ma.us/mhc/mhcpdf/townreports/Cent-Mass/rut.pdf

Nourse, Henry Stedman (Ed.). The Early Records of Lancaster, Massachusetts, 1643-1725, Lancaster, MA: 1884. Google digitized. Accessed 1-22-2013 at: http://books.google.com/books?id=687odzw5rKYC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

[1] Caulfield: “At least one hundred families lost two or three [children in MA colony]. Two children each times one hundred families is 200, to which we add the twenty-five deaths of children he notes within context of named families who lost four or five children. He further notes that over 1,000 MA Bay Colony children probably died and that dysentery was rampant in British and colonists fighting the French and Indians. Sick soldiers would not only contaminate water sources near settlements but would carry the disease with them when sent home to recover.

[2] Noted in Caulfield. The Pursuit of a Pestilence, 1950, pp. 48-49.

[3] Cites History of Harvard by Nourse (p. 119) to effect that “the well hardly sufficed to give proper care to the sick.”

[4] Caulfield “In Harvard there were about twenty-five more dysentery deaths during September and October.”

[5] Mellon refers to Holden as a little town and Caulfield adds that the population was about 400.

[6] Caulfield 1950, p. 48.

[7] Caulfield notes a population of about nine hundred at the time.

[8] Noted in: Caulfield. “Some Common Diseases of Colonial Children.” MA Transactions, 1942, 53.

[9] A Discourse…at the West Parish in Lancaster: on Occasion of the Late Mortality in That and the Neighbouring Places (Boston, 1757).

[10] A Discourse…at the West Parish in Lancaster… (op cit) (Boston, 1757), pp. 2-3 and 30-31.

[11] Nourse. History of the Town of Harvard, Massachusetts: 1732-1893. Harvard, MA: 1894, p. 119.

[12] Cites, in footnote 157, Journals of the Rev. Thomas Smith and the Rev. Samuel Deane, 169.

Hampton        (24)

–51  Belknap. The History of New Hampshire (Vol. 1).[1] 1831, p. 236.

–51  Duffy, John. Epidemics in Colonial America. 1953, 1979, p. 126.

–34  in 1754 (30 children).

–17  Jan-July, 1755.

–24  Caulfield. “Some Common Diseases of Colonial Children.” Transactions, 1942, pp. 18-19.[2]

–1  Ezekiel Moulton family.  New Eng. Hist. Gen. Reg., LVIII, 139-140; in Caulfield

–5  Jonathan Moulton fam.    New Eng. Hist. Gen. Reg., LVIII, 139-140; in Caulfield.

–3  Josiah Moulton family.    New Eng. Hist. Gen. Reg., LVIII, 139-140; in Caulfield.

–2  Worthy Moulton family.  New Eng. Hist. Gen. Reg., LVIII, 139-140; in Caulfield.

–2  Philbrick family.               New Eng. Hist. Gen. Reg., LVIII, 139-140; in Caulfield

–3  Amos Towls family.         New Eng. Hist. Gen. Reg., LVIII, 139-140; in Caulfield.

–3  Elisha Towls family.        New Eng. Hist. Gen. Reg., LVIII, 139-140; in Caulfield.

–3  Joseph Towls family.       New Eng. Hist. Gen. Reg., LVIII, 139-140; in Caulfield.

–2  Nathaniel Towls family.   New Eng. Hist. Gen. Reg., LVIII, 139-140; in Caulfield.

Narrative Information

Caulfield: “A third epidemic wave[3] swept the same area [NH], involving…Hampton and Kinston in 1754, and East Kingston in 1755.”[4]

Duffy on Diphtheria: “The years 1754-55 saw a great increase in the virulence of the contagion. Of this period Belknap[5] declared: “In 1754 and 1755, it {throat distemper} produced a great mortality in several parts of New-Hampshire, and the neighboring parts of Massachusetts.’ The church records of Hampton…throw some light upon the extent of the pestilence. From January, 1754, to July, 1755, a total of fifty-one persons succumbed to the infection. Of the thirty-four who died in 1754, thirty were children.

Sources

Belknap, Jeremy. The History of New Hampshire (Vol. 1). Dover: S. C. Stevens and Ela & Wadleigh, 1831. Google digitized. Accessed 1-31-2013 at: http://books.google.com/books?id=ck-kNJ8whbEC&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

Duffy, John. Epidemics in Colonial America. Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State University Press, 1953, reprinted 1979.

[1] “It appears…from the church records of Hampton, that from January 1754, to July 1755, fifty-one persons died of the same distemper [“throat distemper”], in that town.”

[2] Our addition of deaths noted by family in footnote 42 for 1754-1755. Generally, Caulfield notes families where multiple deaths occurred. When within a relative short period of time it is more indicative of contagious disease.

[3] First wave was 1735-37 and second, 1742-45.

[4] Caulfield fn 42, p. 19, notes: “According to Belknap, throat distemper in 1754 and 1755 ‘produced a great mortality in several parts of New-Hampshire, and the neighbouring parts of Massachusetts.’ History of New Hampshire, II, 96. He also gives figures showing epidemics, from unstated causes, in Hampton and East Kingston, Id., III. 178, 186….For the epidemic in Kingston, see Boston Evening Journal (Supplement), Feb. 19, 26, 1881.”

[5] Belknap, Jeremy. The History of New-Hampshire, 3 vols. Boston: 1791-92

–43  Vaughan. Epidemiology and Public Health. 1922, p. 88.

–43  Webster. A Brief History of Epidemic and Pestilential Diseases. 1799, p. 244.

Narrative Information

Webster: “In December 1753 and January succeeding, the small town of Holliston, in Massachusetts, lost forty-three of its citizens, by a fever. The disease began with a violent pain in the breast, or side, not often in the head; then succeeded a high fever, but without delirium. The critical days were the 3d, 4th, 5th, or 6th. Some of the patients appeared to be strangled to death. The town contained no more than 80 families.”

Sources

Vaughan, Victor C., MD assisted by Henry F. Vaughan and George T. Palmer. Epidemiology and Public Health: A Text and Reference Book for Physicians, Medical Students and Health Workers Vol. I, Respiratory Infections. St. Louis: C. V. Mosby Co., 1922. Google preview accessed 4-8-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=duUxAQAAMAAJ&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, CT: Hudson & Goodwin, 1799. Accessed 1-7-2018 at: https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/evans/N27531.0001.001/1:11?rgn=div1;view=fulltext

Fairfield         (  ?)

–?  Caulfield (1942, 51) notes a severe epidemic, but gives no indication of mortality.[1]

New London  (>1)

— >1  Rev. Eliphalet Adams, Oct 4. Caulkins. History of New London. Chapter XXVIII, p. 486.[2]

—   ?  Caulfield (1942, 51) notes a severe epidemic, but gives no indication of mortality.

Norwich         (27)

–27  Jabez Fitch, Jr., cited by Caulfield 1942, p. 51.[3]

—  2  Mary and Elizabeth Arnold (sisters of Benedict Arnold, who was away at school).[4]

Narrative Information

Caulfield (Dysentery section of paper): “There were…severe epidemics in Fairfield during June and July, 1753 (Which was a little off-season for a New England epidemic), in New London and Norwich during the mid-summer and autumn of 1753… Concerning the Norwich epidemic Jabez Fitch, Jr., noted in his diary in 1753: ‘ye Later Part of this Sumer & ye Foll was ye Most Remarkable for Sickness that Ever was Known in the Plais In About 2 months 27 Persons Died of ye Camp Distemper in Our Society.’

“After 1753 the name ‘camp distemper’ became increasingly popular because of the prevalence of dysentery among troops [fighting French & Indian War].” (Caulfield, Ernest. “Some Common Diseases of Colonial Children.” Transactions…Colonial Society of Mass., V35, Apr 1942, p. 51.)

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

Caulkins, Francis Manwaring. History of New London, Connecticut: From the First Survey of the Coast in 1612 to 1860. Carlisle, MA: Applewood Books, (originally published in 1895 in New London by H. D. Utley). Google preview accessed 1-30-2018 at:  https://books.google.com/books?id=HgIPz4OPYNoC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

Powell, Walter Louis. Benedict Arnold: Revolutionary War Hero and Traitor. New York PowerPlus Books, Rosen Publishing Group, 2004. Google preview accessed 1-30-2018 at: https://books.google.com/books?id=vuaJAhm9ztIC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

[1] Cites, in footnote 149: Black Rock, Seaport of Old Fairfield, Conn., 1644-1870, Cornelia P. Lathrop, Editor (New Haven), 1930, 25; Coll. New London Hist. Soc., I. 612-616.

[2] Caulkins notes he preached his last service on Sep 9. “Immediately after this he was seized with an epidemic disorder which then prevailed in the town, and expired Oct. 4^th.”

[3] In footnote 150, notes Mayflower Descendant, I (January, 1899), p. 38.

[4] Powell. Benedict Arnold: Revolutionary War Hero and Traitor. P. 100.

–~72  Caulfield. “Some Common Diseases of Colonial Children.” Transactions. 1942, p. 18,[1]

Breakouts:

–10  Exeter. Caulfield. “Some Common Diseases…Colonial Children.” Transactions. 1942, 18.[2]

—  5  Rye. Caulfield. “Some Common Diseases of Colonial Children.” Transactions. 1942, p.18.[3]

–57  Stratham. Caulfield. “Some…Diseases…Colonial Children.” Transactions. 1942, 18.[4]

Narrative Information

Caulfield: “….in New Hampshire, Stratham and Greenland were revisited in 1742, Newmarket in 1743, Kingston and Exeter in 1744, and Hampton in 1745. A third epidemic wave swept over this same area, involving Exeter, Stratham, and Rye in 1753…” (“Some Common Diseases of Colonial Children.” Transactions of the Colonial Society of MA, Vol. 35, April 1942, pp. 17-18.)

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] The numbers are all from footnote 42. It will be noted, however, that, as Caulfield points out, the cause of death is not noted for the Stratham deaths. In that Caulfield includes this data he appears to have thought that the on-going diphtheria epidemic accounted for the unusually high mortality. We use the approximate sign (~) kin recognition of uncertainty. It should also be noted, however, that it is likely that diphtheria deaths were not confined to just these three settlements.

[2] Caulfield footnote 42 cites Diary of the Reverend Daniel Rogers (MS., Maine Hist. Soc.).

[3] From Caulfield footnote 42, citing Boston Gazette, August 28, 1753: “We hear that the Throat Distemper prevails and proves mortal in several Towns at the Eastward, particularly at Rye in New-Hampshire, where in one Family of five desirable Children, the Parents have been bereav’d of them all, in a short Time of one another.”

[4] From Caulfield footnote 42: “Samuel Lane of Stratham records fifty-seven deaths there, although the cause is not stated.” Journal, 70.