Henderson County KyArchives History - Books .....Chapter XVII Milk Sickness 1887
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Book Title: History Of Henderson County, KY

CHAPTER XVII.

MILK SICKNESS-SCHOOL DISTRICTS-THE CHOLERA EPIDEMIC-MIASMATIC PONDS-METEORIC
SHOWERS, ETC., ETC.-1830.

THE census for 1830 gave Henderson County a population of six thousand six
hundred and fifty-nine souls, an increase of nine hundred and forty-five during
the preceding ten years. Seventeen hundred and eighty-seven tithables were
reported this year, and the levy fixed at what it was in 1828, one dollar twelve
and a half cents.

MILK SICKNESS.

    For some years prior to 1830, the milk sickness had made its appearance in
Kentucky, but, during this year, it was unusually annoying and frightful in
Henderson County. Particularly along the banks of Green River, it did its work
undiscovered. Scientists endeavored to discover the true cause of the disease,
but all their efforts failed. January 29, the Legislature of Kentucky offered a
reward of six hundred dollars for the discovery of the cause, and a specific
cure, yet no discovery was ever made. It was only with the clearing up of the
woods and timbered lands, that the dread disease disappeared. There has been no
cases of milk sickness reported in Henderson County for many years.

    On the twenty-ninth day of January, an act was approved, incorporating a
company under the name and style of the "Green River Navigation Company," for
the purpose of constructing locks, dams, docks, basins, canals, chutes and
slopes upon Green River and its tributary streams. The capital stock of the
company was fixed at sixty thousand dollars, divided into shares of twenty-five
dollars each. Books for the subscription of stock were directed to be opened on
the fourth day of March, and Leonard H. Lyne and James McLain appointed
commissioners for Henderson County. The scheme proved an utter failure.

    Under and by authority of an act, of the Legislature, approved January 29,
Henderson County was divided and laid off into public school districts.

1831.

    The Commissioners of Tax reported this year, nineteen hundred and sixty-nine
tithables, and the county levy was fixed at sixty-two and a half cents, making a
total of one thousand two hundred and thirty dollars and sixty-two and a half
cents. From this, it will be seen that the tithable increase from the Court of
Claims in October, 1830, to the Court of Claims, 1831, was one hundred and
eighty-two, the greatest increase for any one year known up to that time.

    The population in what is now known as the Point, or Scuffle-town District,
had so increased, that on the twenty-first day of December, an act of the
Legislature was approved, establishing it as an election precinct, and fixing
the voting place at the house of Doak Prewitt.

1832.

    Nineteen hundred and sixty-nine tithables were reported this year, and the
levy fixed at seventy-five cents. The county had now begun to grow rapidly, and
everything assumed a more cheerful aspect, but during the year the cholera
brought grief and gloom, and business stagnation in Henderson, as well as many
other points in the Ohio River Valley.

    This epidemic visitation occurred in the month of October, and absolutely
paralyzed the whole community. Business was suspended, and the panic complete.
Men were seized with the disease while walking in the streets, and were dead in
ten hours. The population of Henderson at that time was about seven hundred, and
fully ten per cent, of that number died. The physicians stood manfully at their
posts, and administered calomel and opium without limit. The practitioners at
that time were Drs. Levi Jones, Thomas J. Johnson, Owen Glass, Henry M. Grant
and Horace Gaither. Among those who died, were: Rev. Nathan Osgood, Rector St.
Pauls Episcopal Church, and J. B. Pollitt, husband of the first wife of Governor
Dixon. Mr. Butler, father of Harbison Butler, came into the town one day,
transacted his business and returned to his home in the country, and before
twelve o'clock that night, died of cholera. The negroes sufferred more, perhaps,
than the whites.

    Henderson, at that time, was a victim of "ponds," those frightful generators
of misasma, being located all over the place. At the corner of First and Elm
Streets, was one covering as much as one acre of ground. In the center of the
intersection of Main and Second Streets, was the public well, and this furnished
impure water for the greater part of the citizens. Those who drank water from
the river bank, escaped the cholera, while those who drank of the well, were to
a great extent victims of the disease.

    This was also the year of the great flood, when the river rose at Cincinnati
to the almost incredible height of sixty-two and a half feet above low water mark.

THE FLOOD.

    The youthful city did not feel the visitation of the flood, but the river
bottoms suffered immensely. This great rise commenced on the tenth day of
February, and continued until the twenty-first of that month, having risen to
the extraordinary height fifty-one feet above low water mark at Louisville.
Nearly all of the frame and log buildings near the river, either floated off or
turned over and were destroyed. The marks made by the Government engineers, for
that purpose, at the head of the Canal and foot of the Falls, at Louisville,
showed a maximum height at the head, of forty-six feet above low water, and
sixty-nine feet above low water at the foot of the Falls. This was by far the
greatest rise ever known in the Ohio at that time.

A RALROAD CURIOSITY.

    As an evidence of the progress of the age, it may be noted that during this
year upon a circular track, in George Atkinson's Factory, formerly Audubon's
Mill, was exhibited a small locomotive made several years before at Lexington,
by Mr. Thomas H. Barlow. To this locomotive was attached a small car, in which
many people took their first railroad ride. This miniature engine ran smoothly,
and was a great curiosity. A small amount was charged for riding, which the
people paid most cheerfully. This was the first railroad or railroad engine and
car ever seen by but very few, if any, of the citizens of Henderson.

1833.

    Twenty-one hundred and fifty-two tithables were reported this year, one
hundred and eighty-three more than last year, and the levy fixed at 81 1/4
cents. The cholera returned to Kentucky this year, and raged from about May 30
to August, only two months, but with great virulence and deadly effect.
Beginning as high up as Maysville, it soon spread through the State, slaying
large numbers in town and country. Within nine days after its appearance at
Lexington, fifteen hundred persons were prostrated by it, and fifty deaths
occurred in some single days. Many places, altogether spared in 1832, were
desolated this year. In Henderson there were but few cases This was the year also
of

"METEORIC SHOWERS"

    It was about two o'clock in the morning when the stars began to shoot, and
before daylight such an incessant cross-firing of heavenly bodies had not only
never been seen, but had never been heard of. The heavens presented a most
gorgeous picture, and yet many of the superstitious believed it to be the
beginning of the end, and that soon the trump of Gabriel's horn would announce
the coming of "The New Jerusalem." Everybody was up to see it, and closely they
scanned the firmament until the grand display was shut out by the light of day.

    January 25 an act was approved establishing a precinct in that part of the
county known as the "Big Bend" of the Ohio (now known as Walnut Bend), to be
called and known as "Big Bend" Precinct, and the elections to be held at the
residence of William B. Cannon.

    On the second of February the State was divided into thirteen Congressional
districts, elections to be held on the first Monday in August. Henderson County,
with Christian, Hopkins, Muhlenberg, Butler, Ohio, Daviess and Hancock, formed
the Second District. A levy of $500 was made for the purpose of building a poor
house, but the project was abandoned, and, in 1836, this amount was placed to
the order of the Board of Internal Improvements, to be applied with the
additional sum of $1,000, appropriated by the Legislature at their session of
1835-36, for the improvement of the roads of the county.

1834.

    Two thousand one hundred and fifteen tithables were reported this year, and
the levy fixed at seventy-five cents. By an act of the Legislature the county
was divided into five precincts, one at Henderson, one at Galloways, now
Hebardsville, one at Sellers, now Cairo, and Robard's Station, one at Prewitts,
now Scuffleton in the point, and one at Wm. B. Cannon's, now Walnut Bottom.

1835.

    Two thousand two hundred and sixty-eight tithables were reported this year,
and the levy fixed at fifty cents.

    Owing to its terrible surroundings, Henderson was yet as unhealthy as a
place well could be, and as an evidence of it, the following incident related to
the writer by Dr. H. H. Farmer, is here inserted:

    "When a boy in 1835, I was going to Virginia in company with my uncle and
grandmother. We were traveling in a carriage, and when near Crab Orchard Springs
I was taken suddenly ill; my uncle wished to stop at some house on the road, but
the people learning we were from Henderson, refused to take us in, fearing some
dreadful contageous disease. The very name of Henderson seemed to inspire the
mountaineers with terror. My disease was slight, however, and we suffered no
serious inconvenience."

    Henderson in early times suffered more from malarial disease than for many
years past. The disease at that time was more severe, but the great cause of its
fatality was ignorance on the part of the physicians of its proper treatment.

1836.

     Two thousand two hundred and sixty-five tithables were reported this year,
and the levy fixed at fifty cents. On the twenty-ninth day of February the State
was apportioned into thirty-eight Senatorial Districts, Henderson, with Hopkins
and Daviess forming the Fifth District. December 23 the election district
formerly known as Sellars, was changed to William Suttons.

1837.

    Two thousand two hundred and eighty-nine tithables were reported this year,
and the levy fixed at seventy-five cents. February 8 an act was approved
incorporating the Henderson & Nashville Railroad. The capital stock fixed at
fifteen thousand shares, and Wyatt H. Ingram, George Atkinson, James Rouse, John
D. Anderson, George Gayle, and James Alves were appointed Commissioners to open
books for the subscription of stock.

    February 27 the 4town of Steamport, on Green River, was incorporated upon
the plan formed and laid down by Isaac Harman. The Trustees appointed in the act
were Isaac Harman, Owen Thomas, John McElroy, James M. Edwards, and James Thomas.

A DIRT TURNPIKE.

    On February 23 an act was approved creating a company for the purpose of
building a "dirt turnpike on the Virginia plan" from Henderson to Hopkinsville.
Wyatt H. Ingram, George Atkinson, Smith Agnew, and John McMullin were appointed
Commissioners for the purpose of carrying out the object of the act. The
Commissioners were authorized to locate toll-gates, but no two gates were to be
nearer together than ten miles. At the next meeting of the Legislature the time
for opening stock books was extended twelve months, and finally the plan was
abandoned entirely.

BANK FAILURES.

    On the nineteenth day of April a financial cricis came. The banks all over
the State suspended specie payment, and closed their doors. The full force of
this blow was sadly felt, confidence fled, and everything before so radiant with
the springtime of hope and promise, was changed to the sad autumn lines of a
fruitless year. Petitions were sent to the Governor to convene the Legislature
in extra session, but this he declined to do; but, when that body met in regular
session, it legalized the suspension of the banks in the State, and refused
either to compel them to resume specie payment, or to forfeit their charters.
The people of Henderson County suffered, as did the people all over the State.
Times were extremely pinching, and not for twelve months was any relief
experienced, and that when the banks ventured to resume specie payments.

AN ISLAND.

    It was in the low water of 1837 that the tow-head above the city first made
any pretentions to being an island. Prior to that time there had been no island
there, and since that time it has become the respectable body of land it now is.

    This year, William Wurnell, the notorious murderer of Abner Jones, was
captured and confined in the county jail.

1838.

    Two thousand three hundred and seventy-seven tithables were reported this
year, and the levy fixed at one dollar and twenty five cents. A glance at this
will show, that, in spite of the commercial difficulties of the previous year,
the population increased. During this year the county was re-districted,
additional school districts being established.

1839.

    Two thousand four hundred and ninety tithables were reported this year, and
the levy fixed at one dollar twelve and a half cents.

    The first iron steamer on a western river or lake, the "Valley Forge,"
passed Henderson in the month of December.

    October 16, all of the Kentucky banks again suspended specie payment.

    This was a great year for old, young and middle-aged people, for the
greatest of sights, a circus with an elephant, a trick-mule, and a pony, came to
town during the summer. Stickney's Great Circus, with Lou. Lippman and Frank
Wilmot, and Ricards, the clown, exhibited in the Public Square, and every man,
woman and child, who could squeeze inside the tent, was there to witness the show.


Additional Comments:

Extracted from:

HISTORY OF HENDERSON COUNTY, KENTUCKY,
BY
EDMUND L. STARLING,

COMPRISING HISTORY OF COUNTY AND CITY, PRECINCTS, EDUCATION, CHURCHES, SECRET
SOCIETIES, LEADING ENTERPRISES, SKETCHES AND RECOLLECTIONS, AND BIOGRAPHIES OF
THE LIVING AND DEAD.

ILLUSTRATED.

HENDERSON, KY, 1887.

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