USA > New York > Onondaga County > Syracuse > From a forest to a city : personal reminiscences of Syracuse, N. Y. > Part 11
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on the approach of such alarming epidemics, to advise the suppression of the full particulars of the frightful loss of life as it was claimed in cases in Syracuse, that fear rendered some more susceptible to the disease. The cholera commenced in New York on the first of July. and from that time until the first of September was em- phatically the reign of the most awful pestilence that was ever known in that city. In sixty days there were over three thousand deaths from cholera, and the population at that time being only slight in comparison to what it is to-day. As soon as it became known in Syracuse that the dreaded disease had commenced its work of death so near as Montreal, the people were at once active in mak- ing preparations to meet it, by taking all sanitary pre- cautions, in cleaning yards and streets as far as possible. A meeting of the freeholders of the village was called on the 20th of June. 1832, for considering the best means to be pursued. They resolved to station two competent persons at Teall lock (so called) with directions to ex- amine every boat from the east, and should they find any sick to stop the boat until the sick could be examined by a physician from the village and then proceed according to the physicians directions. They also resolved that the physicians of Syracuse should constitute a board of health for said village. It was resolved at this meeting that the trustees be empowered to borrow a sufficient sum of money, not exceeding one thousand dollars on the credit of the inhabitants of the village, to be ex- pended, or any part thereof, for the benefit of the health of the village. A meeting of the trustees was called,
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when they resolved to divide the village into four wards. In the First ward, Silas Ames and E. B. Wicks were to have charge. Second ward, Henry Raynor and Theo- dore Ashley. Third ward, Paschal Thurber and B. C. Lathrop. The names of the Fourth ward I do not re- member. One of the duties of this committee was to cause a quantity of lime to be kept in each ward at all times, and that liberal use be made of it wherever they deemed necessary. On the 25th of June the board of trustees of the village of Syracuse adopted the following resolutions : " Whereas, a disease commonly called Asiat- ic Cholera exists in Quebec, Now, whereas in pursuance of authority to us given by the Governor of the state by proclamation, we, with a view to prevent the introduction of the disease into Syracuse, order as follows :- No canal boat having any person on board sick with cholera shall approach within one mile of the village, unless such boat has first performed a quarantine of fifteen days or until Dr. George Hooker or any other appointed physician shall certify that no such cholera patient be on board." The board of trustees petitioned the Governor, to appoint and commission Dr. Jonathan Day of the village of Syra- cuse to proceed forthwith to Montreal, for the purpose of ascertaining the best mode of treatment to be employed for cholera patients. Dr. Day's visit to the cholera stricken city of Montreal was short, and without any sat- isfactory results. Yet it was illustrative of the confidence of Spreise reposed in the medical fraternity. I'llty-seven years have passed by since that occurrence, and yet this epidemic possesses a character which has
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hitherto defied all the researches of philosophy, and with. our present measure of information respecting such dis- eases, it is scarcely to be presumed that we could poss. > the means to prevent it if our resources were so extensive as to be limited only by the measure of possibility. Who. in the exercise of his senses, would pretend to arrest the march of influenza or measles ? And yet those diseases were known and described two thousand years ago. We may as well confess our ignorance at first as at last. The most intelligent physician or natural philosopher knows no more of their causes than the peasant or the arti- zan. The only difference between them is, that the on: can conceal his ignorance in terms of science, while the other is obliged of necessity to confess it. Nature will sometimes reveal her secrets at the stern demand of science, yet there are some secrets she stubbornly refuses to make known, and epidemic cholera is one of the-e. The air has been tortured in vain to reveal the secrets. no sidereal, telluric, nor appreciable atmospheric changes have been satisfactorily connected with its endemic o: epidemic appearance ; bacteria, animalcule and fungus growth have been equally unable to account for it. Of its primary cause the world with all its science and M. D.'s is yet unable to account for the cholera. The first case of cholera occurred in Syracuse on the 17th of July, the victim being a laborer, living on Clinton street. The day had been very hot and the man had drank freely of cold water, which was given as a reason for his det !! , but the next day another case occurred which proved fatal in twelve hours, and was so well defined that there
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could be no doubt of its being cholera. The Rev. Nelson J. Gilbert preached the funeral sermon. The follow- ing evening he was stricken down with the disease, and died within a few hours. This circumstance seemed to be evidence that the cholera was contagious, and there were few, if any funeral services held thereafter. Mrs. Gilbert was attacked with the same disease within a few hours of her husband's death. Dr. Day attended both cases which seemed precisely alike in every res- pect. The doctor allowed the free use of ice-water in Mrs. Gilbert's case during the first stages, until she be- came too weak to swallow. Though there were indica- tions of death, such as cold limbs, the eyes set, and a seemingly unconscious condition, life continued and she finally recovered. Dr. Day was in hopes that he had found in the ice-water what would be useful in other cases, but in this he was disappointed. Two domestics in the Gilbert family left as soon as they found that cholera was in the house, but both died within a day or two. After these cases there was no disguising the fact that the fearful disease was establised in Syracuse, and from the popularity of Mr. Gilbert and his temperate and regular habits, it proved that the disease was no respecter of persons, and was not, as had been reported, largely confined to the lower classes of intemperate people. Cases in rapid succession occurred in different parts of the village, also in the hotels where guests from New York and Albany were staying. The number of deaths daily increased and furnished much work for the under- takers. Alarm and dismay seized a large class of the
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inhabitants, and with the increase of fear the disease a; seemed to increase. The two officials stationed at Te. lock, for the purpose of establishing a quarantine. ... detained several well filled boats (it must be rememl .. that at that time nearly all travel was confined to : canal boats). Much complaint arose among the sengers and the captains of the boats about being com. pelled to be thus detained to perform quarantine in :... inland town. While this matter was being discussed : . tween the owners of the boats and the officers of Syra. cuse, another serious matter came up for consideration The canal boat "Western Barque" which had left Albany after the cholera had appeared in that city, had made it- way westward as far as Utica, with about sixty pas-en. gers, composed of English, Swiss and Irish emigrants. The boat was said to have become very foul, and the large number confined under the low decks of a cand! boat, afforded the most perfect conditions for a pes :. - lence. The captain was the first to succumb to :!: cholera; within six hours after the beginning of :.: attack, and by the time the boat was stopped at Syr .. cuse, there were several dead and others sick. Mr. Gou. .. the grave digger, was at once informed that he mu -: increase his forces, as he must furnish graves for others besides the citizens of Syracuse. Another boat, "Th .: Columbia," had on board over fifty passengers. T ... cholera made its appearance when near Utica, and on arrival in Syracuse six persons had died. They were buried in the oldl bmying ground west of Clinton s" : The Board of Health, together with the more intell_ : citizens, became alarmed at this feature of the case, and
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at once decided to raise the quarantine and allow the boats to proceed as fast as possible on their way through Syracuse to their destination. An attempt to fulfil the law of quarantining every boat, according to Governor Troop's proclamation, would soon establish an immense hospital and concentrate in our midst a condition, the consequences of which could be nothing less than appall- ing. During the days of the greatest number of deaths, the bodies were buried after midnight and the rumbling of the wheels on the streets at night filled the minds of many with more fear than though the true number of deaths had been known to them, as they were apprehen- sive that an effort was being made to suppress the true conditions. Such a time is a good school in which to study human nature. While some were nearly frantic withi fear, others were as cool and indifferent as if noth- ing unusual was transpiring around them. Of the several resident physicians of Syracuse, Dr. Day was by far the most popular. He was well educated in his profession, and possessed a sympathetic nature, and unlike the phy- sicians of to-day, spent his whole time, as far as possible, with the sick, to watch for himself the effects of the remedies prescribed. By such a course, together with his kind words of hope and encouragement he endeared him- self to his patrons, and when he was stricken down with this destroyer, many seemed to feel that they were left to the mercy of the disease. Yet to all appearance the death rate was no greater after his death, and it is probable that had there not been a physician in Syracuse, the death rates during the cholera siege would not have been in-
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creased, as no effectual remedy was ever found. Many experiments were tried by the empirics without effect. One remedy being to heat a bushel of salt to a tempera- ture just below that of burning the flesh of the victim, and when the cold stage of the disease made its appear- ance, to place the heated salt and the patient in a sheet . and roll them together snugly. Although ingenious, this procedure would not restore to the system that heat which sustains life. In other cases they were not a few. some of those having no friends nor families to look after them, crawled away in some salt block or out of the way place and contended single handed with the monster, sometimes coming off victorious, and their cadaverous countenance and personal appearance showing what they had suffered. The above doubt in the efficacy of the physician's remedies may be criticised, but in support of the statement I will quote as high authority, James R. Manley resident physician of the city of New York dur- ing both years of the cholera in that city, and at that date one of New York's most eminent practitioners, in a memorial addressed to the Legislature of the state of New York, April 17th, 1833, upon the cause and treat- ment. We give space for only a few lines of this most in- teresting and able essay. "Cause :-- A frank confession of ignorance is always more becoming than a labored attempt to conceal it. The world has been amused for centuries by speculations on the causes of epidemics, and to this hour we are as ignorant as those who lived three thousand years ago. We can arrange facts, we can frame analogies, copy tables of temperature, measure by the
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ingenuity of dial plates the humidity of the atmosphere, note its weight, measure its density ; nay we may and have ascertained its component parts with a precision which leaves no room for deception, in so far as the con- stituents are cognizable by our senses ; and after all what information have we acquired which we can apply to practice in enabling us to control the agency of the still unknown cause? We have satisfied ourselves that there are agents whose force we cannot measure, and whose power we therefore cannot appreciate. The gaseous materials which enter into the composition of our atmos- phere we have analyzed, but there are also constituents so subtle that the gases compared with them, are ponder- ous masses of brate matter, and for all our knowledge to the contrary mere instruments through which these sub- tle agents operate. Our knowledge of meteorology is very limited, and can never become very extensive, inas- much as the agents most efficient in producing the changes in our atmosphere are precisely those whose nature we cannot examine, and whose properties we can- not therefore fully estimate. All that is left to us then, is honestly to confess our impotence, and confine our- selves within the scope of our known powers. Of the cause of the epidemic we know nothing. Treatment :- It is unfortunate for humanity and not less so for the interests of science, that seasons of great public distress from. pestilence are those in which fraud and imposture are most successful. Where there is no opportunity for examination into facts and especially where there is no ability to reason from or improve them ; assertion will
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readily pass for truth and impudent pretension for scien- tific acquirement. Every country under heaven which cholera has visited presents the same sickening details of fraud and imposture ; and it is not to be expected that it is within the scope of possibility to enumerate the reme- dies to which the cure of this disease has been confided. Among the profession themselves, and those of them too, who may of right claim distinction, a most unaccountable discrepancy of opinion and practice bas prevailed." When the doctors disagree who shall decide ?
Salina, what is now the First and Second wards, then contained quite as large a population as Syracuse. The cholera was equally destructive there and perhaps in 1834 a greater number of deaths occurred than in Syra- cuse. Mr. Hill, a resident of Salina, returning home at nine o'clock one evening, passed a neighbor's house con- taining a family of five who were all well. The next morning he saw there was trouble, and calling found three of the five dead, whom he had seen in apparent health only a few hours before. Such cases were not uncominon. A portion of the people kept on with their business as usual, while a large number would congregate on the street corners relating the death of friends and neighbors. Fear compelled many to leave the place, in fact, all who could get away, left for Onondaga and l'om- pey Hills and other elevated places. Truly it was a sad time. Mr. Campbell, the sexton at Salina, was kept buey with his old dilapidated hearse, with its narrow box of plain boards painted black, an object frightful enough to strike terror to the bravest heart. This was on the street
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day and night. When a person died they were rolled up in their clothing, laid in their coffin, and thus found their resting place. Every countenance wore the expression of seriousness. The voices of mirth and merriment were everywhere hushed, and sadness and gloom seemed to hang like a pall over the town. Among the most prominent victims I still remember, were Dr. Kirkpatrick, Anson Richmond, uncle to Dean Richmond, I. Dunscombe, Wm. Smith and wife, a very highly respected young man named Holcombe, Dr. Jonathan Day and Rev. N. J. Gil- bert. The whole number of deaths in Syracuse from cholera I do not think was ever known, as records during that exciting time if kept at all must have been far from accurate. It would be safe to place the number at one hundred during the two years of 1832-4. The year of 1833 was an unusually healthy one, there being but seventeen deaths, nine of that number were less than one year old. The population of Syracuse in 1832 was 3100, with eleven practicing physicians, prominent among whom were Drs. Day, J. W. Hanchett, George Hooker, Lyman Clary, James Foran, R. R. Davis and Hiram Hoyt.
Among those most affected by fear were Mr. Holcombe and Dr. Kirkpatrick, both gentlemen of refinement and culture. The village of Syracuse probably never con- tained a man of more rare qualities than Dr. Kirkpatrick. He was a graduate of Princeton College, N. J., and first settled in Whitestown, N. Y., where after ten years of practice he felt a growing desire to abandon a profession which required him to constantly mningle with those in pain and suffering. Notwithstanding his education was
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of the highest order, acquired by years of close applica- tion to study, he resolved to discontinue the practice of medicine, and accept the office of Superintendent of the Onondaga Salt Springs, which position he filled with ability for a period of more than twenty years. His leis- ure hours were devoted to study and research, there being but little of interest in the world made known by the press which escaped his notice. When the cholera scourge made its appearance in Central Europe and other places, he was at once interested and thus became acquainted with its dangers. He had read accounts of its ravages in the island of Java the previous year, how many persons attacked died within an hour and some in twenty minutes, and that in many instances no time was allowed to administer remedies of any kind, many of the laboring poor dying on the streets. He well un- derstood its nature and history, how at one time it was found creeping along with slow and steady pace, through a country at an average rate of thirty miles per day, and at another time bursting out in the midst of a devoted city containing a million of souls, with the violence of an surcharged volcano, leaving its dismayed inhabitants con- founded in all their speculations on the cause of a fatality that numbered the living with the dead, at the rate of one thousand a day when operating in the fullness of its deadly powers, which was literally true in the city of Paris. In the city of Mexico, with a population of about 200,000, the deaths at one period, were 700 per day. Accounts like these would cause a man with a nervous temperament like Dr. Kirkpatrick, to be dismayed at the
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danger which was daily carrying to the grave numbers of his friends and neighbors. He was also deprived of that hope and confidence which sustain some in the belief that death is only the gateway to a more beautiful and happy existence. On the contrary, it was said of him that the thought of death brought an awful horror, the idea of exchanging this beautiful world, with its sunshine and flowers, its songs of birds and the love of friends, to sleep in the dark, cold grave. "To lie in cold obstruction and to rot," was to Dr. Kirkpatrick, as with the re- nowned Dr. Johnson, too horrible to contemplate. It was said that a near neighbor came rushing into Dr. Kirkpatrick's house in great alarm to borrow a syringe, as a member of his family had cholera. It was believed at that time to be a contagious disease, Dr. Kirkpatrick felt that by this circumstance he had been exposed, the person coming directly from the bedside of the patient. This so affected his mind, that he was taken sick and died in a few hours. I have heard this case alluded to as here stated by Drs. Foran and Hiram Hoyt, as showing the effects of mind upon the body. On the last Sunday in July of 1834 more cholera victims were buried than on any other one day in that year. Theodore Ashley having charge of ten funerals of which number seven were assigned to Charles F. Williston, who was appren- ticed to Mr. Ashley to learn the cabinet makers trade. In those days cabinet makers performed all the duties which have since been assigned to undertakers.
From its earliest days to the present time Syracuse has been most fortunate in escaping epidemic diseases, the
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cholera above described being the only occurrence of this most to be dreaded affliction. Some evidence will be offered to show that Syracuse, aside from the preval- ence of one endemic disease, is more healthy than any other part of the county or even the state. Onondaga and Pompey Hills and other elevated portions of the county, are credited with being more healthy by far than Syracuse, yet this might be difficult to establish as a fact as these localities have suffered by what appeared to be local epidemics, while Syracuse has escaped. About 1830 a fever of a low grade visited Pompey Hill and afflicted many of its inhabitants; it was considered con- tagious and in many instances proved fatal. So trouble- some was this malady that Dr. Stearns wrote a lengthy article at the time in description of its character. About 1845 the elevated locality of Otisco was afflicted by a disease called "black tongue," which was so prevalent that it caused great alarm among the people. It made its ap- pearance in the district schools which were discontinued, and Mr. Loomis, a teacher, died with the disease. The most destructive epidemic that ever occurred in this county was in 1828, when it appeared in every variety of grade, from the mildest to the most stubborn and malig- nant affection, and undoubtedly resulted from animal and vegetable decomposition. In July of that year im- mense rainfalls had occurred and the county was com- pletely deluged with water, the ensuing weather was extremely hot and with this state of things the epidemic commenced its ravages. During the spring of 1834, Onondaga Hill was visited with scarlatina, which pre-
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vailed there with malignity, the population at that time being 400 and in so small a number as many as fifty or sixty cases appeared, in some instances proving fatal in thirty-six hours. The winter had been very unusual for its mildness, the month of February was without a storm and as warm as April. What was most remarkable dur- ing this period of epidemic diseases Syracuse was in un- usual health. The object of thus referring to the health- fulness of our surrounding locality, is to strengthen the belief that the health of the inhabitants of Syracuse is protected to a greater extent than we are aware by the Saline influences in our atmosphere. This subject has been too much neglected by the medical profession. Syracuse hardware dealers find that it is not safe to expose their cutlery to the atmosphere, as rust so soon corrodes the polished surface. I recently had an oppor- tunity to observe this condition, in its effects upon tin roofs, one of which covered a roof in the city, and the other at Onondaga Valley, the tin was precisely the same and both roofs were laid at nearly the same time. In a few days the roof in Syracuse became rusty, and to save it from destruction required painting, while the roof at the Valley for months remained bright and free from rust. These conditions in our atmosphere are too obvi- ous to need farther proof. The effect upon this immedi- ate vicinity of large masses of vegetation, indigenous to the sea coast, such as samphire, which covers with a deense growth acres of marsh lands near our lake, should be considered. At one time samphire chimed some attention from the belief that it contained iodine, and it
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was most carefully analyzed by Stephen Smith, for many years connected with our salt interest, and Prof. Stillman, and not the slightest trace of iodine was detected, but the plant was discovered to be composed almost entirely of muriate of soda. From these facts it would seem that this vast amount of vegetation yearly depositing its prop- erties in the soil, and constantly evaporating would exert an influence upon the atmosphere of Syracuse. Hun- dreds of acres have been covered with salt vats contain- ing the strongest of brine, some of which has percolated into the soil, and must continue to affect the atmosphere by imparting to it a degree of pungency and keenness, whether arising from their saline particles or their elements, matters not. How fir these vapors may be of value in warding off and protecting us from the influence of miasmatic diseases, is a difficult matter to establish, but of its efficiency in destroying mephitic animal gases there can be but one opinion, and if so, the atmosphere of Syracuse is to a great extent freed from those sources of malignant diseases, which may arise from any cause. In support of this theory, it has long been observed that men employed in the manufacture of solar salt, though they be ignorant and careless in regard to the laws of health, are as a rule healthy and are very seldom num- bered among the sick. During the cholera visitation here, there were about one hundred men employed about the solar salt works, and their habits were such as were supposed would attract the disease, yet they all escaped. Typhoid fever usually claims a large number of victims from all parts of the land, and in many
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