USA > Rhode Island > Providence County > Providence > State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations at the end of the century : a history, Volume 2 > Part 2
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"To the Honorable Town
Counsel of Providence."
On June 2, 1789, an address was submitted to the council as follows :
"The Subscribers Freemen of the said Town pray the Town Council not to allow Inoculation to be carried on in the Hospital in this Town."
This petition was signed by one hundred and six citizens, indicat- ing the extent of the opposition to the operation.
11
EPIDEMICS AND MEDICAL INSTITUTIONS.
The closing decade of the seventeenth century was marked by the appearance in Rhode Island and Providence Plantations of an epidemic disease that was variously called by different physicians malignant fever, pestilential fever, putrid fever, and yellow fever. It is quite certain that there were many fatalities from the latter deadly malady. It should be stated that long before the outbreak of this epidemic, in the year 1723, a disease visited Providence and its vicinity which was called "burning ague", and from its effects eighteen men, sixteen women, and nine children died in three months, from July 1 to October. This disease was characterized by an amazing percentage of fatalities, all who were attacked with the exception of two having died. There is little further existing information obtain- able regarding the visit of this malady. The outbreak which occurred in Providence during the last years of the eighteenth century was by many physicians of the time believed to be largely dependent upon the filthy condition of many parts of the town at that time. This out- break was doubtless yellow fever, and even at the present time the cause of the disease is in dispute, and it is by most physicians believed to be propagated chiefly through the agency of filth. The writer does not consider it by any means proved that such is the case, but in con- sideration of the generally received views as to its origin, it is of much interest to inquire into the conditions existing in Providence at that time. As the following pages will show, it must be admitted that the filth origin of the disease is contravened by the facts of that outbreak.1
Those conditions will be better understood through a brief description of the natural surroundings of the young city of Provi- dence a hundred years ago. The settled part of the city was more than half surrounded by water. To the northward the Moshassuck River constituted the western boundary of the business and most of the residence district down to Broad lane (now Smith street). South of that for a considerable distance the Cove formed the west boundary and swept away westward nearly on the line of Westminster street to the westward of Eddy street and to the junction of Mathewson and Washington streets. Between Westminster and Broad streets and east of Stewart street was Stow Pond, a shallow body of water which ultimately became an unbearable nuisance and was filled up, leaving as its only memorial, Pond street, which started from the west shore of
'Since the above was written investigations by U. S. Army surgeons have made it very certain that mosquitoes are the chief factor in the spread of yellow fever. It will be seen from the following pages that yellow fever pre- vailed in those parts of Providence where there were many stagnant pools which are the breeding places of these insects.
po
A MAP OF THE TOWN OF
PROVIDENCE. FROM ACTUAL SURVEY, BY DANIEL ANTHONY 1803.
N. BURIAL GROUND
HERRENDONS LANE
MOSHASUCH
. D.B.
OLNEY'S LANE
RIVER.
PART OF N. PROVIDENCE.
BROAD L.
1133N38
PROSPECT SY,
·M.B
GREEN
GAOL LANE
COVE
75 NIL VW
R HAND
-
VERS
GEORGE ST.
BENEVOLENT_
ST
WASHINGTONDC
POWER
LANE
AVMOVONS
HIGHIST.
RIEND
SO CHIP
FURT
3NI7 NOGNHOP
WEST
PEN
BURIAL GROUND
INDIE
.
NRC
CRANSTON LINE
HAWKINS COVE
1. College.
2. Church.
3. Court House.
8. New Light Church.
9. Town House.
10. Brick School House.
11. North School House.
12. South School House.
13. West School House.
A. Academy.
B. Bridewell.
C. Cook's Lane.
E. Bank.
M. Mathewson Street.
P. Bank (Providence).
R. Bank (Roger Williams).
U. Union Street. Work
House.
J. Jail.
MA. Market Square, Market House, St. John's Hall.
C. H. Constitution Hill.
4. Friends' Meeting House.
5. First Baptist Meet- ing House.
6. Benevolent Congre- gational Church.
7. Beneficent Congrega- tional Church.
F. Washington Insur- ance Office.
G. Great, or Weybosset, Bridge.
PART OF MASSACHUSETTS
PAWTUXET ROAD
MON OL:08
4402
TAR BRIOCE
JONNSON
OROAD
ROAD
WESTHUISTER STRUC
ANGELL
SEACONCK
JUCKETT RIV .
WANASO
CENTRAL B.
CRANSTON ROAO
UR.B.
13
EPIDEMICS AND MEDICAL INSTITUTIONS.
the pond. This pond long stopped the western advance of the settled part of the town. To the eastward of Benefit street a small but dense settlement had within a few years gathered about Tockwotton; this, with the dwellings and other buildings on Wickenden street, was sometimes spoken of as a part of the settled portion of the town.
The original west shore line of "the salt river", within the early town bounds, began at a point about sixty feet south of Point street and about ten rods west of Eddy street, extending thence northwestwardly mostly between the lines of the present Richmond and Chestnut streets, nearly to the line of the present Pine street. Thence it ex- tended northeasterly across the Pine street line and reached Weybosset street not far from the present line of Eddy street. Northwardly of this point the shore receded westwardly till it merged in the shore line of the Cove near the present corner of Mathewson and Washington streets.
The eastern shore line, beginning a little west of the present west abutment of the railroad bridge over the Seekonk River, swept southerly, westerly, and then northerly around a low tongue of land extending out from the higher land at the north, to where, at the head of a small cove, it reached the abrupt bank of this high land at a point about forty rods from the place of beginning, now in the line of India street, near the end of Ives street. Thence the shore line followed the line of this cove and finally reached a point on the line of the present India street near its junction with Hope street; thence it passed along the foot of a bluff near the India street line to South Main street, thence northward to what is now called Link street. At about the center of Link street was the mouth of Mile End Cove, a shallow body which extended in to the south of Wicken- den street as far as Brook street. This cove was long ago filled up and its precise bounds cannot be defined. Between Mile End Cove on the north and the harbor on the west and south was the high plateau, a noted landmark of early days, called Fox (or Fox's) Hill. From the northern shore of Mile End Cove rose the southern slope of "ye Greate Hill of Moshassuck", now College Hill, Prospect Hill and Beacon Hill. At the northern side of the mouth of Mile End Cove the shore line projected westward to about the present easterly line of South Water street, and extended thence northerly in an irregular line between the present South Water and South Main streets to the present Market Square. Main street was actually washed by the water on some occasions at high tide, while the land below what is now the easterly sidewalk of Market Square was covered at high tide. It
14
STATE OF RHODE ISLAND AND PROVIDENCE PLANTATIONS.
should be understood, however, that the grade of Main street has been materially changed from its original undulating surface. At the north end of Market Square the shore line projected westward, form- ing a point of land beyond which it again receded until it came to the "Towne Streete", at the east entrance of "Weybosset" (the place of the ford), which was near the present junction of Steeple and North Main streets. Still farther northward the shore line was irregular, the west line of Main street at some places nearly or quite touching high water mark. In the vicinity of what was in colonial days known as the School House lot, near the present North Court street, the shore was low and flat and probably bare of water at low tide. At Smith street the shore line receded so near to Main street that it is traditionally claimed that the first Baptist meeting-house, which stood about thirty feet north of the present north corner of Smith and North Main streets, was built with its front end resting on the ground and its rear end on piles driven into the water. About a hundred feet north of this a small tongue of land projected into the river, while still farther north the tide rose against the foot of Stamper's Hill, covering the base of the hill to such an extent that one of the first pieces of road engineering was the construction of a cause- way to elevate the road from Main street to the mill above high tide mark.
To the eastward of the shore line, which extended from Eddy's Point to the Cove, was an expanse of tidal marshes and shoal water, terminating in places with a series of islets, including what were generally called Cowpen Point, Eddy's Point, and another smaller one between. These were submerged at times, during high tide. Northward of Eddy's Point the shoal continued into the deeper water of the channel until a series of islands was reached, extending northeastwardly across the river towards the north side of the present Market Square. This series lay mostly within the bounds of the pres- ent Weybosset and Westminster streets, and consisted first of a tidal marsh running to a clear water passway within the lines of the present Dorrance street and extending into the Cove. This passway was ford- able at low tide and from its muddy bottom was called the Muddy Ford; later Muddy Bridge was built across it at Weybosset street, and after the passage north of the bridge was filled up, the part of it south of the bridge was called Muddy Dock. East of the Muddy Ford was a stretch of tidal marsh, and then came an island where the Arcade now stands. East of this was another piece of tidal marsh and then a small elevation called Weybosset Hill, at the junction of Weybosset
Pian showing the Original Water Line ON THE WEST SIDE OF Providence River.
-
COPYRIGHT BY CHARLES W. HOPKINS.
1356.
9
ORA
4 3.41
VEST
16
STATE OF RHODE ISLAND AND PROVIDENCE PLANTATIONS.
and Westminster streets. From the northcast side of this hill ex- tended a strip of low land called Weybosset Neck, terminating in Weybosset Point, the extremity of which was only a few feet beyond the present sidewalk of Westminster street and Washington Row. The shore of Weybosset Neck extended northerly along the west side of Washington Row about two-thirds of the distance from Westminster street to the present Exchange Place then in an irregular line until it reached the northern side of Weybosset Hill in the present Exchange street, a little north of Westminster street. North and west of Wey- bosset Neck were flats or shoals extending into the Cove. Northeast from it was a shoal extending across the river towards the present corner of Steeple and North Main streets. Along this shoal was the Indian Weybosset, the place of the ford, which was used by them and the settlers as late as 1738.
Until about the time of King Philip's war the homes of the settlers were so located that nearly all of the land on the shore line was left untenanted as the property of the Proprietors. One of the principal reasons for this was the tenacity with which the Indians clung to their rights to the shore for landings and the free use of the clam beds and oyster grounds. Moreover, although trading voyages were made from Providence to New Foundland as early as 1652 (see Providence Town Papers 069 et seq., and 0280), with probable voyages to New Amster- dam, yet the general pursuit of the early settlers was agriculture. It was not, therefore, until about 1680 that the value of the water front for storehouse and wharf purposes was fully appreciated. This change in sentiment led to the following petitions :
"To ye Towne mett this 27th day of July, 1704
"Gentlemen
"These are to desiar you to be pleased to order that there may be no lot nor lots granted on Wayboset side from mudey bridge to ye point of Waybosct but that it may be stated common forever.
"Joseph Whipple.
"(Indorsed) This bill is granted."1
"To the Town now met upon ajurnment ye 3d day of ffebuary, 1703-4 "Gentlemen.
"Considering the many bills that are now and may be Presented to the Towne for forty foot Lots it is Prayed that it may be ordered that no person may take a Lot that may damnific Creators Passing over the River at Wayboyset which may be by reason of the Streame ; from a Rock that Lieth upon the shore against Thomas Fields house
1Providence Town Papers, 0608.
17
EPIDEMICS AND MEDICAL INSTITUTIONS.
to the north side of Thomas Olneys house lot where his father dwells Tree that stands against James Angells.
"The request of your ffriends
"Nathaniel Waterman "Thomas ffield."1
A lengthy and favorable response was made to these petitions, which ordered among other details that "from henceforward there shall not at any time be any land appropriated to any person, whichi lieth upon the side of the Salt Water by the Town Streete, from the pice of land, laid out for a Town wharfe to be, which is against the southerne part of the sd Thomas ffield his said home lott, therefrom a bigg Rock, up the river northward along the Towne Streete unto the north side of the now Thomas Olney senior his house lott which was formerly his ffathers dwelling place" (the northerly part of the east end of Market Square). This document may be found entire, E. R. vol. ii, p. 88. This was in 1704, and in 1711 a bridge was built from Weybosset Point to the point opposite on the other side of the river.2 After the construction of this bridge the necessity of maintaining so wide an open space at the crossing was not so great, and in response to the prayer of "Mr. Nathaniell Browne of Rehoboth, shipp wright", January 28, 1711-12, he was granted "the liberty to make an improve- ment of halfe one acre of land lieing on Weyboset Neck, . . the
which he might have the use of for building of vessels thereon, on the East side of ye said Neck adjoyning to ye salt Water.">3
Prayers, petitions and demands for the laying out of lots on the water front had already begun, and almost before the Proprietors realized the fact, they had granted away the greater part of the land so solemnly dedicated to the public in 1704. This pressure for addi- tional lots was maintained on the west as well as on the east side, but the Proprietors determined to divide what land was left there among themselves, and incidentally to create more or less new acreage. Accordingly, in 1717, they laid out an artificial shore line (on paper), extending into the flats east and south of Weybosset street from the present No. 32 Westminster street, around nearly to Muddy Dock, platted the land between this line and Weybosset street into lots, leaving gangways where are now the passways through those lots, and at the same time laid out a highway "down to the sea" on the west side of the Cowpen (now a portion of Eddy street), dividing the land
1Prov. Town Papers, 0613.
"Ibid., 023 to 026 and 01142.
3Early Records of the town of Providence, vol. 11, p. 158-159.
2
18
STATE OF RHODE ISLAND AND PROVIDENCE PLANTATIONS.
east thereof also into lots, thus leaving only the triangular space now lying bewteen the bridge and No. 20 Westminster street of all the area south and west of Weybosset street which had been dedicated to the public. Through certain changes in the course of the "Towne Streete" and by reducing the width of Dexter's Lane (now Olney street) from one hundred feet to its present width, other forty-foot lots were provided. All of these lots were divided by lot, one to each Proprietor.
At some time in the period under consideration it was discovered that the clay of which Weybosset Hill was largely composed would make excellent bricks. The hill also was directly in the line of needed street improvements. Brick-making was early established and in 1724 the growing town constituted a market for them.1 Thomas Staples was authorized "to dig clay at Waybauset hill for to make bricks". While the hill was thus being removed, the accumulating debris was used to fill out the shore lots, and at the same time a course was opened for a "Back Street" which was laid out about 1750 from the present eastern junction of Westminster and Weybosset streets to the western junction of the same streets, and with later changes became the Westminster street of to-day. At about the same time, in 1752,2 a street was laid out on the east side, which also was called "Back Street" for a time, which with important later changes became the Benefit street of the present time. Among the city's documentary possessions may be found a "Report of Committee naming the streets", in which it will be seen there is no street mentioned as run- ning west from the old Towne Streete, whichever of the names given to different portions of it are there used, anywhere along the harbor or salt water frontage. There were gangways laid out between the ware- house lots "down to the low water mark" long before this time, as shown in various Proprietors' plats, but the raising and filling out of the shore lands had not proceeded to such an extent as to make them worthy of mention in the committee's report, which bears the date of 1771. The same is true of the streets and gangways on the west side of the river running to the east and south of Weybosset street; the gangways from which they have developed had been laid out on paper fifty years earlier; but, excepting Nightingale lane, or Dock street, none of them had been filled in or out to such an extent as to make them a subject for the report of the committee of 1771. At that time there were no paved streets in the town with the exception that the
1Early Records of the Town of Providence, vol. xiii, p. 21.
2Providence Town Papers, No. 207.
19
EPIDEMICS AND MEDICAL INSTITUTIONS.
Towne street, as it was termed in this report, was paved for about two hundred yards south of the "Market Parade", and King street (now North Main street) for about the same distance north of the same point. There were no sewers in the town; hygienic precautions were unthought of by the average citizen and his household; the water, whether from the skies, from springs, or the refuse water from houses and shops, found its own devious course down to the sea, and if its course was obstructed by filling in of tidal lands, it gathered in the lowest places and there fostered and gradually evaporated. In the passing of years down to the last quarter of that century great changes had taken place in business activities, in relative land values, and in the development of commercial operations depending largely for their prosperity upon easy approach to the waters that washed the shores around Providence. It had been learned that a lot of even "forty foot square", if so situated as to be available for commercial purposes, might have more value than five acres on or behind a hill; consequently the low flat lands at the river front became crowded with small build- ings, many of which served alike for dwellings, warehouses, and shops for their owners. The front portions of the original home lots were cut into small house lots and densely built up as far back as Benefit street. Meanwhile the back lands of the town, originally granted in five or six acre tracts, had been consolidated by purchase or inheritance into a few large farms, so that it is a fair estimate that out of a popula- tion of about 4,000 in 1771, at least three thousand lived within the limits of what was designated "the compact part of the town". The streets of the then lower portion of "the compact part of the town" west of the harbor were not the high, dry, paved avenues of to-day. The Ship street of that time, from where it left the hillside to go towards Cowpen, was a combination of low causeway and a bridge, through which the waters ebbed and flowed with the varying stages of the tide, running over eventually to Eddy's Point. Many thou- sands of tons of stone and earth were carted into this street between 1771 and 1800. The Weybosset street, the main thoroughfare on that side, was largely a mere "cassy way", as one document called it, of small stones and shells, through which the water percolated from the sunken lands on either side, and its height above the high tide mark might properly be expressed in inches. Market street (lower West- minster street) was of the same character, while the gore between the south side of the old Market street and the present south side of lower Westminster street, was open water and a source of danger to people and teams straying into it in the night. This gore was not wholly
20
STATE OF RHODE ISLAND AND PROVIDENCE PLANTATIONS.
filled and paved until after the ciose of the yellow fever period. That part of Westminster street between the two junctions with Weybosset was mainly a eauseway so open in construction that the water from the land south of the street drained through it into the eove on the north, and so narrow that as late as 1785 it was filled in at points to only half its width. The town voted to fill it to the full width if the owners on the north side of the street would pay one-fourth of the eost and "make such a good and sufficient barrieado upon the north side of the street as shall be sufficient to eonfine the earth to the street".1 Again, in 1792 the street was reported as having its road- way so narrow in places that at high tide two teams could not pass each other; moreover, its eourse westward up the hill was so steep as to render its use for loaded teams impraetieable. This was only about one hundred years ago.
Weybosset street was gradually built higher to the westward, eut- ting off the natural drainage from the low land north of it south- wards. Union street, paved between Westminster and Weybosset streets in 1780, and Orange street as it then stood (which was later raised), eut off the east and west drainage, while the upbuilding of Westminster street eut off the northern drainage into the Cove, leav- ing all low plaees between them mere shallow pits for the retention of stagnant water. This condition, with the extension of Snow (now Pine) street along the marsh and the construction of Richmond street and other streets east of Ship, now Chestnut street, at about this period, eaused a large part of the town to be covered with water, which lay stagnant and festering in the sun, instead of being daily removed by the aetion of the tides, as formerly. As the numerous "shore lots" were filled out, similar eondi- tions were produced ; the grade was frequently higher than that of other nearby lots, leaving receptaeles for rain water and household and shop refuse to gather and become foul. The same tendeneies were manifested on all of the low filled lands on the east side of the river, and as inereasing business operations pressed the shore line out from the Town street, the area of steneh-breeding territory was inereased. As far as now known no covered drain or sewer was laid longitudinally along any street in the place until 1788, wlien one was placed in what is now Thomas street, to carry the water of a brook flowing from hill- side springs down through the street ; this and a few others of a similar eharaeter were not strictly sewers. No sewer for sanitary drainage
'Providence Town Papers, 3717.
21
EPIDEMICS AND MEDICAL INSTITUTIONS.
was constructed until after the town had been swept by the yellow fever.
In the latter part of the eighteenth century the principal manu- facturing business of Providence was the distillation of rum. The river front was marked at short intervals with distilleries, which were then termed still-houses. To economically dispose of the refuse grains, large droves of hogs were kept, generally in the cellars of the still- houses, with a yard at the back, fronting on the water, where the' animals rooted and wallowed in the slime. This practice of course created an insufferable nuisance. Another large industry was the slaughtering of cattle and hogs. One of the slaughter houses stood, in 1791, on the west side of the bridge; another, belonging to Governor Fenner, was located adjoining the north side of the east approach to the bridge, and a distillery stood just north of this, all three of which were treated as nuisances.1 Just to the south of the market was another distillery, with its accompanying comple- ment of hogs. Aside from ship-building, the next largest industry was tanning, the establishments for which were mostly scattered along the valley of the Moshassuck River. Here were tanned not only the skins taken off in the slaughter houses, but also large importations of green hides from the warm countries of the Spanish main. After being taken from the vessels the hides were usually placed in storage near the harbor until needed in the tanneries. A manufactory of spermaceti candles was also early established. Every one of these industries was in some degree a nuisance, and at the present day would not be tolerated within any municipal corporation. By the year 1795 the district known as Tockwotten had become a very active center of business, with a flourishing East India trade, which gave the name to India Point. Here were found the evils of a densely congested tenement population, inviting disease. The water supply, moreover, was inadequate and at least in some localities impure. For example, when the "Market Parade" was filled in, a spring of water came up through the salt water to the northwest of the market house; this was walled up and a town pump placed therein for the use of the market. On the west side of the river the filling in and occupation of the land was first done mainly on the islands before mentioned, and on them wells were sunk; but as these changes progressed, this supply was insufficient, and in 1772 the "Field Fountain Society" was formed to supply this section from a central reservoir, called a fountain, con-
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