USA > Tennessee > Shelby County > Memphis > A history of the yellow fever : the yellow fever epidemic of 1878, in Memphis, Tenn., embracing a complete list of the dead, the names of the doctors and nurses employed, names of all who contributed money or means, and the names and history of the Howards, together with other data, and lists of the dead elsewhere > Part 14
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# The following list of colored soldiers, who died during the epidemic, attests their devotion and their courage: MeClelland Grands-Peck, sergeant ; Cobb, sergeant ; Ilarri-, private; Lane, private; Crutcher, private; Carey, private. Zouave Guards-W. N. Hanson, lieutenant : A. W. Brown, private; Tom Lewis, private.
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would have courted and been punished by instant and merited death. Idle many of them were, and shiftless and thriftless, as is to be expected of those who are in the A, B, C of civilization; but they were neither cruel nor criminal in this direction. The only case of the kind that was reported, was that of a young white man, who was arrested charged with outraging the person of a woman who, her-elf, had called him to nurse her. Investigation, extending over many months, proves this to have been baseless, and that the woman invited the exhibit of depravity on which the charge was based .* . 1 contrast to this debauchery was furnished by a few of those whom society deliberately abandons to a shameless life. One unfortunate " woman of the town "-a phrase that only too well tells her trade-gave up her house to be used as a hospital ; and herself, until she fell in the act, nursed the sick, and closed the eyes and covered the faces of the dead. Others, doomed like her to become a curse instead of a blessing to humanity, followed her example. One such came from a great city of the West, disguised as a widow, and faithfully and assiduously continued to do her duty, running the gauntlet of death every hour ; even after all, like her, were denounced in her presence as irreclaimable, and abandoned of God. by an earnest Christian woman, whom she nur-ed to convalescence. The physicians were greatly aided by hun- dreds of faithful and competent nurses-men and women of experience. These are indispensable to recovery. Where they were not to be had, and patients recovered, it was regarded as little less than miraculous. But not all of the deaths were attributable to ignorant or badly-disposed nurses. The patients themselves, many of them, were solely responsible; some died of fright ; not a few died after but a few hours in bed -- what is known as walk- ing cases-victims of their stubbornness in refusing to yield to treatment. More than three hundred died in the convalescent stage-one from the simple exertion of writing a note, another from changing his position in bed, another from reading newspapers, another from reading letters, another from drinking tea and eating toast ; and others, not a few, from sexual excesses, which were sure to end in death. One man, whose convalescence seemed certain, dropped dead only a few steps from the saloon where, a moment before, he had indulged himself in a glass of beer. A treacherous disease, the yellow fever usually leaves its victims in that condition where the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. In vain doctors advised and the press plead. Deceived by the clearness of their mental vision, convalescents, to the last, continued to take counsel of their fancied strength, and threw away their lives. The horrors of the fever were thus increased, and the despair of the living was made more desperate. But there were not wanting some cases of another character: a few who were afHieted with chronic complaints found themselves completely restored to all
The young man referred to was found by a woman nurse helplessly drunk, lying across the body of the dying woman, who was naked and exposed. The nurse, who de- clared to thus finding him, was, on the trial, proven to be herself in love with him, and that her jealousy of the poor creature, whose weakness for him had induced her to call for him to nur-e her, impelled her to make a charge that was groundless. A few hours after the arrest of the young man, his alleged victim died, a typical case of yellow fever.
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their faculties by attacks of the fever. One such case was that of a little girl approaching her twelfth year, who had. three years before, lost both hearing and speech ; she was paralyzed also on one side, and was afflicted with some- thing akin to St. Vitus' dance on the other; thus, more dead than alive, a burden to all about her, she was attacked by the fever, a long siege of which she not only withstood, but emerged from completely restored. Her hearing and speech come back to her, the paralysis disappeared, and with it it- opposite, the excessive nervous affliction ; her nerves were completely restored to their normal condition, and she is to-day mistress of all her powers of mind and body, as fresh and vigorous as if they had never been impaired. Thus while some were crippled for life, all their functions partially or wholly suspended, others were restored to powers, the exercise of which they indulged in at first as if not sure of them, as if they could not trust their suddenly acquired sense of them. But these blessed results were so few as to be a special wonder, bordering on the miraculous.
III.
On the 14th of September, the day of the heaviest mortality, many buoyant natures sueeumbed. They looked about them for convalescents, but they were not to be found ; a few were reported, but they seemed nearly all of them to have been permanently disabled. The ery for food, for clothing, for money, for doctors, for as many as a thousand coffins, went out by telegraph to the ends of the earth, and a prompt and generous response came back. By telegraph, by express, through the banks, by private hands, money was for- warded by hundreds, by thousands of dollars-New York City alone sending altogether 843,800. Long trains of railroad cars were loaded with provisions and elothing, and medical supplies were sent in plethorie abundance, aecom- panied always with a heartfelt sympathy, and often by advice and by theories of treatment, earnest .. but generally ill-advised. One train came almo-t altogether loaded with coffins. The people of the North were especially urgent ; it seemed as if they could not do enough. "We send," they said, " what we can ; but you, who know what you need, must ask-'Ak, and ve shall receive.'" The Republic, to its remotest confines, was moved, as if by a divine impulse. The leading artists of the lyrie, as well as the dramatic stage, were especially conspicuous in good gifts, in generous contributions. Personally, they gave freely, and, with the aid of their brothers and sisters less gifted, gave benefits that netted large amounts. No class surpassed them in the expression of a profound sympathy, or in the efforts they made to mitigate, as far as possible, the results of the dreadful visitation. The miner in the Nevada lill-, the ranebero in far California, and the farmer in distant Oregon vied, in dispensing a charity equal to the growing exigencies of the time, with the people of the older States of the East, where organiza-
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tions in every city and village were eagerly engaged in the good Samaritan work. This contagion of kindness passed beyond the limits of our own country, and France paused amidst the festivities of her International Exhi- bition to express her sympathies and send her share of succor. England, too, and Germany, were early in the fieldl; and from India and Australia, a> from South America, contributions pourel in upon a people who have vainly tried to express their gratitude for it all. Hundreds of men and women volunteered as nurses, who were destined to a speedy death. They poured . in from all the States. Those from the South Atlantic and Gulf coast cities were especially welcomed on account of their experience, and because they had had the fever, or were acclimated by long residence in cities or sections of the country that had been frequently visited by it. They were to a certain extent proof against it. Northern and Westeru men and women, on the contrary, had hardly begun work ere they fell victims to it. They went down so fast that the medical director of the Howard Association, Dr. Mitchell, felt called upon to admonish them as they arrived of their liability, and give them the option of returning to their homes. In but few instances they refused to go back. They came, and they would remain to nurse. So long as they could, they did so patiently and assidu- ously. A long line of graves in Elmwood Cemetery tells the story of their filelity to a mission that was one purely of mercy and loving-kindness; to which they brought great powers of endurance, a much needed discretion, and the courage of the veteran of many wars; some of them a previous prepara- tion in the best hospitals of the country. Moved to the work by a feeling the most profound that can stir the human heart, they began where their dead com- radles left off, eventually, and in a few hours sometimes, to fall on the spot hal- lowed by their martyrdom. Like the advancing column of a forlorn hope, on which the fate of empires hang, they pressed forward in the face of a foe whose mysteries have never yet been fathomed. The sense of danger was dumb; the sense of duty was eloquent. If they had moments when the step faltered, the hand became unsteady and the heart wavered, it was never known but to themselves. Theirs was a work of love, to which they grew the more the demands of the unfortunate pressed upon them. They lived to save life, and died in an heroic effort to conquer death. They fought nobly against dreadtil odds. Out of a population of not more than 20.000, they lost 5,150, 1 in tot the whole number, or 70 per cent. of the white people who remained in the city .* By comparison with the statistics of other campaigns with this fever, these.
* The medical estimate puts the total population, during the epidemic, at 19,600, and the total sick at 17,600. the deaths, as stated, being 5.150. a little less than one-third. Members of the Howard Visiting Corps, who have resided in the city many years. and know it well, and whose business, during the epidemic. it was to visit every ward. every day, say that at no time was there more than 20.000 persons in the city, if so many, and that of these fully 14.000 were negroes, leaving only 6.000 white people. Di the 14.000 negroes, 946 died of the fever, and of the 6,000 whites 4,204 died, being 70 per cent. of the whole namib ... Not more than 200 white people escaped the fever, and most of these hal been victims of it in previous epidemics.
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though significant of the havoc it made, were not so discouraging as annihila- tion. So long as all were not sick or dead there was some hope. Building ou this hope, inspired by narrow escapes, they continued to the last, growing fewer in numbers every day, so that only a squad of a once division could. answer to the roll-call on the day of discharge. The doctors fared no better than the nurses. Death revenged himself upon them. Less exposed to the poison than the nurses -- who were confined for days to the same rooms as their patients-and with some advantage of exercise in the open air, riding or walking, it was hoped they would escape in numbers sufficient to justify the hazards they took. It did not prove so. Their proportion of sick and dead was quite equal to the general average .¡ The physician could not heal himself. Some of them, as some
* Nearly as bad as this, in proportion-worse when the greater number is considered- is the havoe of siuall-pox, fever. and dysentery (and some think the black plague. in Brazil. Of this a New York Herold correspondent writes that paper as follows: " The whole number of registered deaths in November for the two cemeteries of San Juan Bap- tista and Lagoa-funda was 11,075. Of these 9.270 were small-pox cases. But I think we must add to this at least one thousand buried, as I have said, in the woods, or sunk in the sea. At this time there were 30,000 sick-more than a third of the population. Still the death-rate increased. On December 10,808 small-pox dead were buried in the ceme- tery of Lagoa.innda, at least 75 in San Juan, and probably 150 in the woods and the sea-a total death record of over 1,000 in a single day-and this out of a population (now reduced ) of only 75,000. The great plague at London reached this death-rate, but that was from a population of 300,000. After this the mortuary rate decreased, but only because the disease had nothing more to feed on. A certain per centage of a community are exempt from small-pox. A few, no doubt, were saved by vaccination. By the end of the year the death-rate had gone down to 200 per day. The entire number of deaths for the month was not far from 21,000. In all great epidemics, it is said, the people become indifferent to their danger. In Fortaleza this indifference was sufficiently aston- ishing. When I reached the place, on the 20th of December, the death rate was 400 per day ; but business was going on much as usual, and hardly any body had been driven ont of the city by the danger. . I only know what has been-a province utterly ruined ; a population of 000,000 reduced to 400,000, and those dying at an enormous rate. Probably there have been 300,000 deaths in the other drought-stricken provinces of which I have few notices. There is nothing in history that will compare with it. God grant that there never may be again !"
t The following isa complete list of the physicians who died: Resident Physicians.
Volunteer Physicians.
Avent, Dr. V. W. Armstrong, Dr. . A. J.
Bond, Dr. T. W .. Brownsville, Tenn.
Bankson, Dr. J. S. Stevenson, Ala.
Beecher, Dr. P. D.
Bartholomew. Dr. O. D., Nashville, Tenn.
Clarke, Dr. S. R.
Burcham, Dr. R .. Columbus, Ohio.
Dawson, Dr. S. R.
Chevis, Dr. L. A., Savannah, Ga.
Dicker-on, Dr. P. M.
Easley, Dr. E. T., Little Rock.
Erskine, Dr. John H.
Force. Dr. F. H .. Hot Springs, Ark. Forbes, Dr. J. G., Round Rock, Texas.
Hopson, Dr. H. R.
Fort, R. B., Howard. Gorrell, Dr. J. O. G .. Ft. Wayne, Ind.
Ingalls. Dr. Lowry, Dr. W. R. Otey, Dr. Paul II.
Harlan, Dr. L. B., Hot Springs, Ark.
Hieks, Dr. John B., Murfreesboro, Tenn.
Rogers, Dr. J. M. Robbins, Dr. W. H.
Heady, Dr. Sherman, Texas.
Keating. Dr. M. T., New York.
Rogers, Dr. John C.
Kim, Dr. N. MeKim, Dr. J. W., St. Louis.
Watson, Dr. P. K. Woodward, Dr. J. W.
MeGregor, Dr. T. II., Tipton Co., Tenn.
Hodges, Dr. W. R.
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nurses, proved unmanageable as patients. Even " with their eyes open " to the extreme dangers that resulted from fatigue, they rushed on to destruction. Que of them, a volunteer from abroad, is recalled as a type of nearly all the rest. He was a man in middle life, small of stature, with a healthy mind and a healthy body, a trained thinker, and with some pretensions as a philosopher. His experience with yellow fever was as extensive as that of any of his brothers on duty. He had walked the wards of the charity hospital of New Orleans with the elder Stone, who, long before he died. had compassed and had lectured on all that is to-day known of yellow fever. He was proud of his profession. and practiced it skillfully, and with all the assurance of an adept. Broad and liberal in his views, he did not disdain the practice or experience of others in or out of the profession. He was anxious to save life, and counted his conva- lescents with an almost unspeakable joy. He visited every patient three times each day and carefully noted the changes from the first diagnosis. He went into the sick-room with an air that re-assured the sufferers, and gave hope and imparted courage to desponding friends. He was diligent and earnest, and drawing from a rich store of experiences in the old as in the new world, made for himself a place in the hearts of all who have survived him. He went delib- erately to his death. So, too, did the priests of the Roman Catholic Church. The fever has always been to them singularly fatal. Only two escaped. This doctor was called to see one, the last of eleven-a man whose excessive nervous constitution forbade even the faintest hope of his recovery. He determined to save him. He did so at the cost of his own life. For 65 hours he remained by the bedside of this priest. When he emerged from the sick-room he was ex- hausted. His clothes stained with black vomit, his blood was poisoned beyond the power of any neutralizer. He was taken with the fever in a day or two, and after a few hours of " life in death," passed away, a " type of his Order." Another case, a type of the home physician, is recalled. He was a man of large mold. Physically he was perfect. Very tall, very stout, he was the piet- ure of health. His handsome face was lighted by a perpetual smile. Good nature, good heart, and a cheerful soul were the convictions his manner carried to every behokler. He was a manly man. He had been a soldier, and he bore about him the evidences of gallant service. Nervous and eager, devoted and anxious, he went down to his grave the victim of overwork. He was an inspiration to his friends, an example of constancy, steadiness, unflinching courage, and unflagging zeal. To the sick-room he brought all these quali- ties, supplemented by an unusual experience, an inexhaustible stock of knowl. edge, and a sympathy as deep as the sad occasion. Tender as a woman, his heart ached at the recital of miseries he could not cure. Besides his duties as health officer, John Erskine was earnest in his attentions to patients. whose demands were incessant. For days before . he succumbed, observant friends
·
Mones, Dr. T. W., Nashville. Montgomery. Dr. R. B., Chattanooga. M-ade, Dr. W. C., Hopkinsville, Ky. Nelson. Dr .. St. Louis. Nagent, Dr. P. C., St. Louis. Pierce, Dr. Hiram M., Cincinnati.
Renner. Dr. J. G., Indianapolis.
Smith, Dr., druggist, Shreveport. Tuerk, Dr. P., Cincinnati.
Tate, Dr. R. H., Cincinnati.
Williams, Dr. R. B., Woodburn, Ky.
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folt that he must fall. He had ta-ked his powers far beyond endurance. His heart was, to the last, keenly sensitive to the sorrow about him. The mitigation of it was his anxiety. He chided himself because he could not do more for the people who loved him, and by whom he will ever be remembered ; and, to the last, was questioning himself for a remedy for a disease that has so often conquered the ablest of a noble profession. No better man ever laid down hi- life in the cause of humanity. Oddl and young men vied with each other, and enthusiastically, not only in the infirmaries, in the hotels, and in houses of comfort and ease, but in the cabins of the negro, the absurd architecture and grotesque interiors of which were the comic settings of a deep and awful trag- edy. Every call was obeyed, no matter when it came, or from whom. They made the most of time, and distributed their skill among as many as they could. While thus employed, every energy strained, they did not forget the cause of science. Observations were made and treasured, and nearly three hun- dred autopsies, at a greatly increased risk to health and life. They met every night to compare views and report results. These meetings were the light and life of each day. There they refreshed themselves in social intercourse, and gathered fresh hope for a struggle that seemed endless. Each day brought the same duties and similar experiences. Only one change was noticeable-the decrease of their numbers. And so it went on to the end.
IV.
The same earnestness and devotion characterized the priests, preachers. and nuns who committed themselves to good offices as ghostly counselors, and to all the tender solicitudes as nurses. As has already been said, the Roman Catholic priesthood suffered most severely .* Only two of the resident clergy escaped. One of the-e. Father Kelly, had survived an attack in 1873; the other, Luiselli, whose life was at one time despaired of, was preserved by the almost superhuman exertions of his physician. They were tireless in the ad- ministration of their sacred offices. They obeyed every call. These came every hour, accompanied by urgent appeals from the relatives of the dying. who stood appalled at the suddenness of dissolution. Absolution is, by all the members of the most ancient of the Christian sects, considered a prerequisite to an assurance of final happiness-hence the pleading demands upon the priests, who, in every instance, were found worthy of the sacred trust committed
# The following is a complete list of the Roman Catholic clergy who died : Rev. Martin Walsh. Pastor St. Bridget's Church, born in Ireland. 40 years of age; Rev. MI. Meagher. A-sistant Pastor. Tipperary County, Ireland : Rev. Father Asinus, Assistant Pastor, Germany, age unknown : Father Maternus, St. Mary's Church : Rev. J. R. Mc -. Garvey, a volunteer from Harrodsburg, Ky .. aged 32; Rev. J. A. Bokel. from Balti- more, MIA., aged 27; Rev. Van Troostenberg, from Kentucky, but originally from Bel- gium, aged 35; Rev. J. P. Scannell, a volunteer from Louisville, Ky., aged 27; the Very Rev. M. Riordan. Pastor, born in Ireland, aged 35; Father Marley.
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to them. Every visit made by them was a step toward death -- yet they went on. Every prayer for souls pluming for flight brought them nearer to the heay- enly shores to which they sent confessing sinners. Overworked, their energies taxed beyond all that men under ordinary circumstances can endure, they fell easy victims to the disease, the poison of which they inhaled, in strongest infu- sion, with every act of shriving. In vain the best physicians were taxed for skillfal treatment ; in vain the best nurses watched every hour and every mo- ment, every change. There was found no medicine in the whole range of the world's experience that could bring back health and life-they died as certainly as they were taken with the disease. So did the sisters of the Church, the nuns, who, as one, fell in the sacred work, were quick to volunteer, so that their saintly habit might not altogether pass away from the eyes of a world which had closed on so many forever. Their days and nights were devoted to the sick and dying. Their schools closed, there was nothing to distract them from what they loved as the most ennobling of duties. If they were to die (as they did, in numbers sufficient to give rise to the belief that they were specially marked by the destroyer), they would make their election sure. They were incessant in their visitations and attentions. They had no rest, no time for recuperation. Unlike the or linary nurses, they never suspended to re-vitalize their wasted energies. What sleep they could get at brief intervals in the exer- cise of an occupation that more than ever required a sleepless vigilance, they con- sidered a heaven-sent relief. This was not enough. Tired nature, wanting the sweet restorer, broke under the strain. They went down before the reaper like ripened grain. Theirs were not long to be beds of pain and anguish. A few hours of consuming fever, the pulse in the nineties, and the temperature as high as 1063º, and death came mercifully to their release. Life ended, their tasks were done. But their mission was not completed. Other feet were al- ready treading in the same path ; other sweet and saintly lives were solemnly pledged to the same heroic sacrifice. The endless chain of events so sad as to shock the world beyond and summon from the remotest parts of the earth a benevolence that illumined the time with the blessed light of an abounding charity and hearty sympathy, still demanded that these brides of Christ should endure a long agony and literally bloody sweat before translation. They came and went willing sacrifices. No murmur escaped lips that had been sealed, save in prayer. Serenely, as to some feast, they went, bearing with them al- ways the aroma of lives made precious by self-denial, and flooding the sick chamber with the glory of hearts wholly given to God .*
All members of the Christian Church are alike in their aspirations. They are inspired by the same hopes and restrained by the same fears. They pray, if not in the same language, in the same spirit. With or without ritual, with or without ceremony, they call upon the same name and build upon the same basis of faith.
# The following are the names of those who died : Alphonso, Mother, aged 34 years ; Rose, Sister, aged 30 years ; Josepha, Sister, aged +4 years ; Bernardine, Sister Mary, aged 40 years ; Dolora, Sister Mary, aged 24 years ; Veronica, Sister Mary, aged 19 years ; Wilhelmina, Sister. aged 30 years ; Vincent. Sister, aged 22 years ; Stanislaus, Sister, aged 21 years ; Gertrude, Sister, aged 28 years; Winkelman, Sister, St. Louis.
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To the sick, ministers or priests speak of heaven, urge repentance and preparation for death, and give absolution in the name of Him by whose commission they officiate, or repeat his assurances of pardon and eternal peace. Confronting the inevitable, doctrine and dogma almost wholly disappear. The terms of forgiveness and restoration to the Father's love are the same with all. What difference there is, to the sick does not appear. They have their thoughts fixed upon the end, and their vision is strained to see beyond. The Protestant pastors visit all who are distressed in mind, body, or estate, very much to the same purpose as their Roman Catholic brethren. They desire to lead souls to the solemn contemplation of death, and all that it involves, and smooth the way, so doubtful and so dark even to the best, with the assurance of Him who, in the agonies of dissolution, prayed to the Father, " If it be thy will, let this cup pass." Honest, earnest mon, convinced of the truths they preach, they take with them on their mission of mercy not only hope for the dying, but compassion for the living, whom death most distresses. During the epidemic the demands upon them were in proportion to the " new cases" that every day developed. Men of family, they found themselves besieged at home, their hearts hedged round about with a profound anxiety for those whom nature as- serted had first claims upon them. Sharing their faith, believing in their mis- sion, their wives, no less courageous, sustained them and upheld their hands .* But even thus fortified, they could not wholly dismiss the apprehensions of a situation horrible in the extreme. They, nevertheless, were true to their obli- gations. But few in number (a majority of their brethren having fled at the breaking out of the epidemic), they were in constant demand. 1 German, Rev. Mr. Thomas, was the first to die. He had been a diligent, faithful, ear- nest minister, a pastor to his people. Another of them, a Presbyterian, Rev. Dr. Daniels, fell early in the action, and did not regain his strength until the scourge had disappeared. Indeed, he has not regained it yet. Another, a Meth- odist, Rev. Dr. Slater, whose heart beat in unison with all who needed his coun- sel and advice, and who was universally beloved for an abounding charity and most amiable disposition, was borne to his grave after a few days' sickness, mourned by all in the city-still lamented by his people. Still another, a Baptist, Rev. Dr. Landrum, who differed widely from the preceding in, at least, what he considered one essential, after toilsome weeks, during which he officiated as a member of the Relief Committee, besides attending to pastoral calls, was arrested in his noble career, and, while in the throes of a sorrow be- yond words to express-for the loss of sons whose promise was brighter than young men now often give-to the dismay of the then little band of heroes. was seized by the fever, and, with his wife-taken about the same time-made a
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