ky-footsteps Tuesday, April 22, 2003 Volume 03 : Issue 29 Today's Topics: # 1 [KYF] NARRATIVE OF THE CHOLERA EPIDEMIC OF 1873 (Part 4) _____________________________X-Message: #1 ------------------------------------------------------------ Images Submitted By: DEB HAINES [http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00003.html#0000719] Transcribed By: CHERYL WILSON [http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00003.html#0000720] Date: 22 Apr 2003 Subject: [KYF] NARRATIVE OF THE CHOLERA EPIDEMIC OF 1873 (Part 4) ------------------------------------------------------------ Pages 272 through 279 these cases sixty-three were males, fifty-three were females; seventy- three were whites, forty-three were blacks. We are especially indebted to Dr. John L. Cook for aid in collecting the information herewith presented. TRIGG COUNTY. The epidemic of 1873, as it affected Trigg County was confined to the towns of Cadiz and Rock Castle, and to the establishment known as Trigg's Furnace. Cadiz, the county town, is located upon the banks of Little river, nine miles from its confluence with the Cumberland. It has a population of about twelve hundred individuals, and is up to the average of towns of its size in the state. Rock Castle is a village located upon the banks of the Cumberland river. The information received form this county is of an unsatisfactory nature. The first case of cholera in the county occurred June 16, in the person of a black female living at the town of Cadiz, who died after an illness of a few hours. No other case occurred until the 25th, when a negro man died of the same disease, and on the 30th two other fatal cases occurred, also in the persons of negroes. On the 1st of July the disease became epidemic at Rock Castle. The first cases here were in the persons of negroes; but on the 3d a white female was attacked, and from that date until the subsidence of the disease on the 22d, but two negroes were attacked, twenty-four cases having occurred, twenty-two of whom were whites, eight of whom died. It is asserted by Dr. L. Lindsay, to whom we are indebted for the facts in our possession, that the early cases occurred in the persons of individuals who had not been away from home for a long time, and who had had no communication with boats upon the Cumberland river. It is inferred that the disease had a local malarial origin, form the fact that the first case occurred in a cabin the cellar of which was partly filled with stagnant water. At Trigg Furnace the parties first attacked were wood-choppers, who had, so far as is known, no communication with persons from infected districts. After the death of the lady who was taken with cholera at Rock Castle on the 3d, her body was taken for burial to Cadiz. At the funeral the husband was taken sick, and was carried to the house of Dr. T. B Jefferson, where he died of cholera. On the second day after this man's death, Dr. Jerrson took the disease and died, and on the third day the negro man who had nursed the first case at Dr. Jerrson's house also died. UNION COUNTY. The epidemic of cholera of 1873 in Union County is possessed of much interest, although the absolute contact of the initial case at the town of Caseyville cannot at this time be traced. Caseyville is a small town of about three thousand inhabitants, located upon the banks of the Ohio river. It is a point which is constantly touched at by all steamboats upon the river. The amount of information which we have received as to the outbreak at this town is exceedingly limited. The physician in whose care the majority of the cases occurred states his opinion that "the epidemic was caused by a special miasma traveling through the air," and has declined to impart further information. From a most reliable source, however, we learn that, prior to the outbreak at Caseyville, a steamboat, on board of which there were a number of cholera cases, touched at the wharf-boat and discharged both passengers and freight. That the first recognized case of cholera occurred in the person of a Mr. Reinfrane, whose business called him frequently to Paducah, and that he had returned home immediately prior to this attack from some point upon the river. Dr. J. W. Williamson reports favorably upon the use of atrophia, hypodermically exhibited, in the treatment of cholera. From Dr. William A. Jones, residing at Hazelwood, a village of Union County, some seven miles south of Caseyville, a most valuable contribution to the history of the epidemic has been received: After cholera had become epidemic at Caseyville, Mr. Harrison Berry, a resident of that town, came into the country to escape its influence. For some two or three days he complained of a diarrhoea, which on the 13th of July became profuse, violent, and exhausting. Absolute rest was enjoined upon the patient. Under careful treatment he reacted, and in three days was convalescent. July 14, MR. Luther Gilchrist, who resides some eight miles from Caseyville, which town he was obliged constantly to visit, was attacked with cholera. The attack was not very severe. His system responded to the medicines exhibited, and in a few days he was well. July 16, the mother of this case, a lady sixty-seven years of age, who during the two preceding days had nursed her son, was attacked, and died after an illness of nearly twenty hours. July 17, a negro woman seventy years of age, who resided with the Gilchrist family, was taken with cholera, and died within twenty- four hours.July 19, two other members of this family were taken with the same disease, but both recovered. A man named Smith, who resided at Caseyville, left the town after the disease became epidemic, and went to the house of his friend, Mr. Samuel Bradburn, who lived some eight or nine miles in the country. When he arrived Smith complained of diarrhoea. The next day the diarrhoea continued, and he vomited considerably, but by absolute rest the disease yielded, and he supposed himself to be convalescent. There had been no cholera in this neighborhood prior to the arrival of Smith. On the 24th of July, Smith left the house of Bradburn and went to the home of his sister, Mrs. Hopkins, a widow lady who lived some four miles distant from his first stopping place. The same day he was taken violently ill with cholera, and died in a few hours. Early on the morning of July 25, as Mrs. Bradburn was cooking breakfast for her family, she was suddenly taken with diarrhoea; one profuse dejection was followed by violent vomiting and cramps, and in fifteen or twenty minutes from the action of her bowels, she was fully collapsed, and died in a few hours. The same day two of Bradburn's children were taken with the same disease; one died, the other made a tedious recovery. All the other members of this family suffered more or less severely from diarrhoea. July 26, Mrs. Hopkins, at whose house Smith had died, and her negro servant woman, were attacked with cholera. The attack of the servant was as malignant s that of Mrs. Bradburn, and in three hours from the inception of the disease she was in articulo mortis. H.Ex.95----18 Mr. William Wallace, who is a relative of the Bradburns, and who resided some six miles from the infected locality, assisted at the funeral of Mrs. Bradburn. Wallace placed the remains in the coffin, drove the wagon to the grave, and getting into the grave, adjusted the coffin. Wallace then returned to his house, which was in a neighborhood up to that time perfectly free from the disease. A few hours after he arrived Wallace was attacked with cholera, but recovered. A young child of a brother of Wallace, who lived in the same house, died of cholera during the convalescence of the first case, and all the other members of the family had diarrhoea. Mr. Phillip Snow, who was also a relative of the Bradburn family, and who lived at Boxville, some six or seven miles distant, came to Bradburn's house to attend the funeral and assist in nursing the sick. He remained several days, and then, started for his home. When he arrived at Boardley, a village some four miles distant from the infected house, he was taken with cholera, and died at the house of Dr. Bradburn. Once week after his death Mrs. Bradburn was taken with cholera. She recovered from the disease, but never regained her strenghth, and died of a low form of a fever a few weeks later. A daughter of Dr. B. M. Long, who lived with her father at Casey's Mines, was, at the time when cholera was prevailing in Caseyville, giving music-lessons in the town. She called at Mr. Kerney's, whose son was ill with cholera. A few days subsequently, while at home, she was taken with the same disease, and died within thirty-six hours from its inception. Disinfectants were actively used in this case. Mr. John Calloway, a brother-in-law of Dr. Long, who lived in Crittenden County, a few miles distant, was next taken with the disease, and soon afterward one of his children. Mr. Calloway recovered; the child died. A Mr. Miller, who visited the last case during his illness, was next taken with cholera. He recovered, but six or seven fatal cases occurred at Long's Mines, where Mr. Miller lived, being the manager. The treatment adopted by Dr. Jones was opium and acetate of lead given cautiously; sinapisms and heat to the surface of the body; iced milk and soup given as constantly as called for. CARTER COUNTY. CHOLERA EPIDEMIC OF 1873 IN CARTER COUNTY. By Dr. P. H. Bailhache,Surgeon United States Marine-Hospital Service. (Received through the Supervising Surgeon Marine-Hospital Service.) Carter is a county in the northeastern portion of the State of Kentucky, bordering upon Virginia, from which State it is separated by the Big Sandy River, a navigable stream. Grayson, the county-town, has a population of about fifteen hundred inhabitants. This town is located upon the Little Sandy River, in a hilly region which abounds in coal and iron ore. On the 19th or 20th of June a number of railroad employs, who were working on a railroad cut some four miles south of the town of Grayson, were suddenly taken sick with vomiting and purging. Seven of these men died in three or four days, and as it was supposed that they had been poisoned; all left the work and the neighborhood. June 23, Mike Vincent, a laborer, at that time hauling for the railroad, and living one mile below the place where the negroes who had died were housed, was taken with a similar disease, but recovered. June 24, James Bryson, who lived about two miles from Vincent, was taken with the same disease, and died. The negroes who were first attacked had their cabins along the banks of the Little Sandy Creek. Vincent lived one mile below these cabins, and Bryson two miles below upon the same stream. The negroes, Vincent and Bryson (no one else lived between them) all drank of the water from this stream. In other words, the washings from the negro camp flowed past Vincent and Bryson, who both used the water. The section hands of the railroad were constantly going and coming to and from the Ohio river boats. From Bryson's house, the disease was carried by his father up the valley to the Iron Hill Furnace, where he died of the disease. At this furnace the explosion of the disease occurred. The employes were "poor white trash" and negroes, who were huddled together in ill-ventilated, filthy shanties, drinking stagnant and unhealthy water. Only two or three cases of the disease occurred in the town of Grayson, and these cases were easily traceable to communication with the epidemic at the furnace. Thirty-two cases are reported, with twenty deaths. Dr. L. Prichard reports that he depended upon the early treatment by hypodermic injections of morphia. KENTON COUNTY. The city of Covington is located on the south bank of the Ohio river, at the mouth of the Licking river, by which stream it is separated from the city of Newport. Covington is directly opposite the city of Cincinnati, and from the facilities of intercourse, which consist of a suspension-bridge (crossed by a street-railroad) and a steam-ferry, many person doing business in Cincinnati reside at Covington. So intimate is this connection that any epidemic affecting the public health of one city would have direct influence upon the other. The northern terminus of the Kentucky Central Railroad is at Covington. The first case recorded at Covington was in the person of a white female thirty years of age, whose husband was employed in Cincinnati. She was taken with cholera June 22, and died after a few hours' illness. It has been found impossible to trace the lines of infection in the Covington cases. The majority, however, were employed at or were in constant contact with persons who worked at the city of Cincinnati. Although the disease was confined almost exclusively to the lower classes, still several cases occurred among those individuals possessed of all the comforts of life. Dr. Knollmann reports an interesting group of cases that occurred in a block of tenement-houses in the western part of the city. These cases were seven in number; two cases occurred in two houses, three cases in another. These cases were all connected with the initial case of the series that occurred July 20. Six of these cases died. The last case of this series, a Mrs. Klewes, before she was taken with cholera washed the clothing of Schmidt, the second case of the series. Schmidt died ten days before Mrs. Klewes. His clothing had been shut up in the room in which he died until the morning of July 31, when they were brought to be washed. After performing this work the woman sickened and died within ten hours. Several cases are reported of the wife being attacked after nursing the husband sick with the cholera, and vice versa.A total of seventy-five cases are reported, with twenty-five deaths. Of these cases, thirty-nine were males, thirty-six were females; sixty-nine were whites, six were blacks; fifty were married, twenty- five were single. The ages range from six months to seventy-five years. CALDWELL COUNTY. Princeton, the county-seat of Caldwell County, is located on the Louisville, Paducah and Southwestern Railroad, on hundred and eighty-three miles southwest of Louisville, and forty-four miles northeast of Paducah. This town is also in direct communication with Nashville, Tenn., on hundred and twenty-six miles southeast, by means of the Saint Louis and Southeastern Railway, which crosses the Paducah road at Nortonsville Junction, which point is thirty-one miles east of Princeton. The town is build upon undulating ground, gradually ascending from the northwest until it reaches an elevation that forms a ridge which nearly encircles the town. North and east the country is broken and hilly, while to the south and west is a beautiful fertile plain through which flows a branch that is formed by the water of a large spring (so called, but in reality a brook flowing from a cave which has been explored for over two miles) which runs from beneath a ledge of shelving rock on the southern edge of the town, and passes on to the Cumberland River, a distance of twelve miles. From the foot of the ridge, north of the town, affords drainage for many acres. This ravine has washed considerably; gullies have been formed, and after heavy rains the water is collected in many places, forming pools that have some influence upon the health of the individuals living in the vicinity. In the month of July, 1873, Princeton was in an excellent sanitary condition, with the single exception that the privies of the town were without vaults, and were therefore influenced by surface-washings. No other local causes were found to account for the presence of any epidemic disease. Dr. James A. Carr, a distinguished physician of the county, writes: "There were no local causes in or around the town calculated to produce cholera that are not found every year, and therefore not capable of promoting it. "On the 29th day of June a Mr. Druse arrived at Princeton from the infected city of Paducah. At the time of arrival he was complaining of malaise, and proceeded to the room of his friend, Dr. J. A. Maxwell, when a painless diarrhoea, attended with great exhaustion, was developed. Mr. Kruse remained for some hours with Dr. Maxwell, when he was removed to a hotel, and by careful nursing and the judicious use of opiates and mercurials, the severity of the attack was sucessfully combatted, and after an illness of about a week the patient was convalescent. The next day Dr. Maxwell, who had been in constant attendance upon this friend, was similarly attacked, but recovered after an illness and tedious convalescence of some two weeks' duration. No other cases of the disease were recognized in the town, from the occurrence of the two noted, until July 19; but the fact is established that during the period alluded to, viz, from June 29 to July 19, a number of persons from Paducah and other points infected with cholera had visited the town. The body of a railroad employe, who had died of cholera at a point west of Princeton, had been brought to that town for burial, and no restriction was placed upon negroes (who are notorious wanderers) from coming into the town from any point upon the line of the railway. Prior to July 19 cholera had become epidemic in fourteen counties of Kentucky, from any of which the infection of cholera could have been carried into Caldwell County, (counties of Hickman, Ballard, McCracken, Crittenden, Union, Henderson, Daviess, Trigg, Christian, Simpson, Warren, Hardin, Meade, and Jefferson.) July 19.--Mildred Wyle, a homeless, friendless negro woman, who had been abandoned on account of her worthlessness by her husband, was taken with cholera in the tow of Princeton, and died of the disease within twenty-four hours. This woman had been away from the town for some time, and had returned only a few days before she was taken sick. It is a matter of impossibility to determine at this date where she had been; but it is known that she returned from some point on the railway west of Princeton, and it is highly probable that after she had been discharged a family who had employed her as a domestic, and who lived about twenty miles from Paducah, that she had visited that city before returning to Princeton. July 21.--A negro woman employed as the cook at one of the hotels was taken sick with cholera, and died on the succeeding day. July 25.--Two cases occurred, one of which proved fatal. July 26.--A fatal case is reported.July 27.--Two cases occurred; both recovered. July 29.--Three cases with one death, and July 30 four cases with two deaths are reported, and the epidemic may be considered as established. From the 30th of July to the 2d of August sixty-eight cases of cholera, with twenty-two deaths, are reported; a total of seventy-eight cases, with twenty-nine deaths. Of these cases forty-five were males, thirty-three were females; thirty-six were whites, forty-two were negroes. Of the fatal cases, nine occurred among the whites, twenty among the blacks. Of the total cases, seven occurred among children from on to ten years of age, five of whom died. In the demonstration, the last fatal case occurred August 15. The maximum of intensity was reached August 10, upon which day eight cases, with four deaths, are reported. The disease was distributed over the entire village, but the district in which the infection was intense was found to be along the line of the ravine north of the town. In one family, eight cases of the disease occurred, with four deaths. In two families three cases occurred, with one death. In one family two fatal cases are recorded, and in seven families two cases occurred, and in three instances the attack was fatal. In a few instances the disease was carried from the town into the surrounding country. On July 31, a Mr. William Perryman, who was at Princeton attending court, was attacked with cholera, and was conveyed by his friends to his home in Hopkins Count, where he died of the disease, August 2. On August 4, Dr. Shackelford, who attended this case after it reached Hopkins County, died of the disease. On the 31st of July, Mr. Hugh Craig, who resided in a most desirable location, some five miles southwest of Princeton, where for the three preceding days he had been on duty as a juryman, was taken with cholera, and died after an illness of then hours. August 4, Mr. Robert Craig, who had been in constant attendance upon his uncle, Mr. Hugh Craig, was taken with cholera, but recovered. August 3, Mr. T. J. Morse, residing eight miles north of Princeton, where he had also been attending court on the preceding days, was attacked with cholera, and died after an illness of twenty hours. No other case occurred in this neighborhood. August 10, a young lady who resided some six miles east of Princeton was, while on a visit to the town, so severely attacked with the disease that she was unable to return to her home. Her illness, which terminated fatally, lasted for forty-eight hours. The mother of this young woman came at once to Princeton to care for her daughter, and after the funeral returned at once to her home. The same day, August 12, the mother sickened and died of the same disease within ten hours. In this family several cases, which recovered, occurred. BALLARD COUNTY. During the summer of 1873, a party of laborers engaged in the extension of the Mississippi Central Railroad from Jackson, Tenn., to Cairo, Ill., moved into camp at the foot of a bluff some three miles back of the Mississippi River, nearly opposite to the city of Cairo, Ill. Near their camp was a spring of water that flowed from the foot of a bluff the summit of which had for years been used as a graveyard. The men of this party, twenty in number, had been recently paid off and had been indulging in whisky. They cleaned out the spring on Saturday, the 29th day of June, drank freely of the water during Sunday, and on Monday, July 1, cholera, most malignant in its character, broke out among them, and during the next five days sixteen of the twenty men were dead. Some of the men reached Cairo and died at that city; others died upon the road-side. One case, a young man employed as a teamster, came to Cairo on July 1 with diarrhoea. He went into a drug-store to obtain some medicine, fell fainting from exhaustion upon the floor, and was carried to a house about one hundred yards distant and placed in bed. The characteristic rice-water discharges at once set in, with vomiting and cramps. He sank rapidly, and died after a collapse of about ten hours. A young Irish girl, seventeen years of age, who had been employed at the boarding shanty of the same gang of laborers, was admitted to hospital at Cairo on the 3d day of July with a diarrhoea, which soon took on the rice-water character, with vomiting and cramps. In twenty-hours she was collapsed, in which state she remained for thirty-six hours, when she died. It has been found impossible to obtain full lists of this demonstration. The four survivors of the party are not to be found, and nothing was known of them other than that they had come from some point in Tennessee. The line of extension of this road was through Union City, Tenn., at which point a formidable epidemic occurred. For the facts of this demonstration we are indebted to Dr. H. Wardner, of Cairo.Dr. L. M. Lovelace, of Milburn, Ballard County, reports that four or five cases of cholera occurred at that town, but that all yielded to treatment. MASON COUNTY. So much of the epidemic of cholera in 1873 as affected the county of Mason, was confined to the city of Maysville, located upon the south bank of the Ohio river, sixty miles above Cincinnati. Maysville is a city of some importance, being the entrepot for the greater portion of Northeastern Kentucky, having a considerable tobacco-trade, and being the most extensive hemp-market in the United States. The manufacturing interests are large and growing. According to the census of 1870, Maysville has a population of 4,705 individuals, of whom 681 are negroes. The city is built upon an elevated, well-drained position, at the foot of an extensive range of hills, by which it is nearly encircled. It has daily communication with Cincinnati, Ohio, Parkersburg, and Wheeling, W. Va., and all intermediate points, by river-steamers, and with Lexington, Ky., sixty miles to the southwest, by the Maysville and Lexington Railway. The hills or bluffs in rear of the city are composed, according to Owen's geological survey, entirely of limestone, clay, and marlite. At Maysville, in 1849, cholera remained in force from the month of April until October; and there seemed to be just grounds for apprehending a serious epidemic in 1873, but the city escaped almost entirely. From June 29 to July 25, but fourteen cases occurred, seven of whom were in one family of negroes. June 29, a young man just returned from Cincinnati was attacked with cholera, but recovered. June 30, a lady, resident of the city, was taken with cholera, but recovered.July 3, Dr. Shackelford reports the first of a most interesting group of cases, in the person of negro woman, who died after an illness of about fifty-two hours. July 5, her daughter, aged twenty years, was taken with cholera, and died after ten hours' illness. The same night a young child of the last case was taken ill and died. The next day (July 6) after the funeral of those who had died the previous day, the cabin was abandoned. In a few hours thereafter the husband of the second case and her two sisters were taken with cholera. These cases were treated at the city hospital; the man and one of the women died. July 7, a negress, who had been in attendance upon the first two cases, was taken with cholera, and died the next day. This family of negroes had resided in a small cabin on a hillside. The ground around was extremely filthy, and the drainage and surface-washings of this filthy yard were into the well from which they obtained water, and also under the cabin. From July 25 to August 18, no new cases of cholera are reported in the city. At the last date a white female, in destitute circumstances, was brought into the city from some point upon the river. She died of cholera after an illness of three days. August 27, a negro man, named Purcell, was brought to Maysville by boat, and although collapsed from cholera, was placed in a spring-wagon and carried to Millersburgh, Bourbon County, where he died two days after his arrival. These three instances of the importation of cholera produced no epidemic at Maysville. For the notes of the last-mentioned cases we are indebted to Dr. M. F. Adamson. The exemption of Maysville from a fatal epidemic of cholera in 1873, is, in the opinion of Dr. Jno. M. Duke, a distinguished physician of that city, who has witnessed the effects of each epidemic since 1832, due to the almost universal substitution of cistern for well water. [Cont'd in Part 5] Original images of the pages can be found at http://www.usgwarchives.net/ky/state/cholera. 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