The Summer of Pestilence - Pages 13-74



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LETTER I.
ANNOUNCEMENT OF THE EXISTENCE OF YELLOW FEVER IN NORFOLK--EFFECT OF THIS 
ANNOUNCEMENT--WAY IN WHICH IT SEEMS TO HAVE BEEN INTRODUCED--REASONS FOR 
AND AGAINST ITS GENERAL SPREAD--PRESENT CONDITION OF THE CITY--COURSE OF 
DUTY.

Wednesday, Aug. 1, 1855.

On the day before yesterday it became generally known here that the yellow 
fever existed in our city. As you have probably learned from the daily 
papers, this terrible disease has prevailed in Gosport for some time past; 
and within the last ten days, quite a number of cases have occurred in 
Portsmouth, just across the river from us. Now, I think there is no 
reasonable doubt

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that it exists in our city also. I use this expression, "no reasonable 
doubt," because there are some who do doubt the existence of the yellow 
fever here; calling the disease which is causing great alarm among our 
citizens "the Upshur fever," after our good friend, Dr. Geo. L. Upshur, in 
whose practice most of the cases, thus far, have occurred.

It is a very difficult matter for a physician, situated as Dr. Upshur has 
been, to know just what he ought to do. It seems now that cases of fever 
have existed in our midst since the 16th of July, which Dr. Upshur, 
although for a time unwilling to admit it, now that the disease has had 
time to show its true nature, has become thoroughly convinced are cases of 
yellow fever. On Monday, he took the responsibility of making known what 
he believed to be the truth in the case. And now, while some are blaming 
him for not having made known these facts at an earlier

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date, so that, the instant the first case occurred, provision might have 
been made for the removal of the sick beyond the city limits, and such 
other sanitary measures adopted as would have prevented the fever 
spreading among us; others are blaming him just as loudly for having made 
the declaration he has, at all, speaking of the doctor as an alarmist, and 
calling the fever "the Upshur fever,"--affirming that, without cause, he 
has injured the business of the city to an amount which many thousands 
will not cover. For my own part, I have no doubt that Dr. Upshur has acted 
conscientiously in this whole matter; nor have I any doubt that he has 
acted rightly, too, and that the yellow fever does exist among us at this 
time.

If this be so, how has the fever come among us? you will ask. In the 
present excited state of the public mind on this subject, it is next to 
impossible to tell what to believe and what not. Rumours,

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almost without number, are afloat; but most of them, I presume, so changed 
and distorted, that, could they return to those with whom they originated, 
they would not be recognised. Your old friend, T. Broughton, Sr., Editor 
of the Herald, and Secretary of our Board of Health, appears to have about 
as cool a head upon his shoulders as any man I meet with; and as I know he 
has taken pains to get at the truth, I regard the statements in his paper 
as containing the most reliable information to be gotten at the present 
time. In his issue of yesterday he states, that about ten days ago a 
number of poor families removed from Gosport to "Barry's Row," in our 
city,--the section to which the disease is thus far confined; and that it 
is thought they brought the disease with them, some having the poison in 
their system then which has since developed itself, and that others have 
taken the fever from them, or perhaps, from the infected

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clothing and bedding they brought with them.

The origin of the fever in Gosport is traced by all, I believe, to the Ben 
Franklin, a steamer, bound from the Island of St. Thomas, where the fever 
is prevailing, to New York, but compelled to put into Hampton Roads in 
distress. This vessel arrived in our waters on the 7th of June, and after 
remaining at quarantine for twelve days, came up to Gosport on the 19th of 
June, and was at once taken to Page and Allen's ship-yard, for the purpose 
of having certain repairs made upon her. From the time she left St. 
Thomas, she is said to have been in so leaky a condition as to render 
constant pumping necessary. And it is now reported--upon how good 
authority I cannot learn--that two deaths among her crew, which occurred 
on her passage, and which her captain reported to our health officer as 
caused by other diseases, were in fact deaths from

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yellow fever. This much is certain: that her passengers left her in 
Hampton Roads, not one of them remaining to meet our health officer when 
he visited her. This, together with several other suspicious circumstances 
attending her entrance here, led to the exaction of a promise from her 
captain, as a condition for allowing her to go up to Gosport, that, in 
effecting her repairs, her hold should not be broken up. This pledge has 
been violated; and the first case of fever in Gosport is said to have been 
that of a labourer employed in breaking up her hold, who, after a short 
illness, died on the 8th of July, exhibiting all the characteristic 
symptoms of yellow fever. So soon as this case was reported, the vessel 
was ordered back to quarantine, where she now lies, with the yellow flag 
at her masthead.

Page and Allen's ship-yard is in the southern part of Gosport, almost 
immediately adjoining the main entrance to the

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navy-yard. The row of buildings in which all the first cases of fever 
occurred there is a row of the same general character with "Barry's Row" 
in our city:--the buildings small, sadly out of repair, overcrowded with 
inhabitants, and filthy in the extreme. I was told by a gentleman in 
Portsmouth, the other day, that when the authorities of that place made an 
examination of these buildings, preparatory to the adoption of such 
sanitary measures as the case might call for, they found in one of the 
tenements the dead body of a calf, in a state of partial putrefaction. I 
mention this fact, because I believe that it alone will give you a better 
idea of the condition of things in those buildings than could be given by 
any description in general terms. The dead body of a calf rotting in a 
human dwelling has its natural accompaniments, which there is no need that 
I should tell you of. Barry's Row, in our city, is of the same general 
character, and, as I knows from having

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passed it frequently in the course of the last two months, in an 
exceedingly filthy condition.

The infected district in Gosport was fenced in some two weeks ago; and 
until within the last week, it was reported by the sanitary committee of 
Portsmouth that all the cases of fever in Portsmouth could be clearly 
traced to that infected district. Within the last week, however, cases 
have occurred which cannot be easily, if at all, traced to Gosport; and 
the opinion is pretty generally entertained that the infection has now 
spread into Portsmouth.

In our city, the Board of Health had the infected district, including 
Barry's Row and the building immediately adjoining, fenced in on Monday, 
and took prompt measures for having a temporary hospital erected at Oak 
Grove--a grove just beyond the corporation limits, on the north side of 
the city. These buildings are now so nearly completed that to-day they are 
removing the

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sick to them; hoping by these measures to stay the spread of the 
pestilence among us.

As you would naturally suppose, the announcement made on Monday, that the 
yellow fever existed in our midst, caused no little excitement among our 
people; in fact, a much greater excitement than the occasion seemed to 
justify; and many families are already leaving our city. In those places 
in which the yellow fever frequently prevails, its advent is looked upon 
as so much a matter of course, that, I am told, it causes little or no 
alarm. Not so with us. Nearly thirty years have now elapsed since it 
prevailed to any extent in Norfolk. A few scattering cases there have 
been, from time to time, such as occur in all our commercial cities 
trading with the West Indies; but, then, these cases have caused but 
little alarm, as the disease has shown but little disposition to spread 
from them. For my own part, I know not what

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may be before us, But I cannot help taking a more hopeful view of our case 
than many do; while, at the same time, I must admit that there are some 
things which seem to wear a very threatening aspect; and I am not much 
surprised at the panic which has arisen among us. Should the yellow fever 
prevail here with any thing like the violence it did last year in 
Savannah, with the three long hot months which must intervene between this 
and frost to do its work in, it must make terrible havoc; and in prospect 
of such a probability, I can only say, "God help us! for the help of man 
is vain."

By those who are disposed to take the most cheerful view of our case and 
prospects, it is said this fever appears to be of a very mild and 
manageable type. "Only seventeen cases in fourteen days, and three deaths 
out of that number." (Report of our Board of Health for to-day.) Gosport, 
too, the report on the 24th--the

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last report I have at hand--was that in the nineteen days which had then 
elapsed since the first case came under the care of the physician, there 
had been but six deaths, and there were then but fifteen cases under 
treatment. Since then it has spread into Portsmouth, but has not assumed a 
malignant type anywhere. It is also said that in former years,--in 1822 
and '26,--when the yellow fever last prevailed in Norfolk to any extent 
and in a violent form, it was confined to the part of the city south of 
Main Street, and west of Market Square, no case ever having been known to 
originate out of this, the infected district in those years; that persons 
living in that district had just to remove to the north of Main Street, 
and they were as safe from the fever as they would have been a thousand 
miles off. Since then, in consequence of the growth of our city, the part 
south of Main Street has been almost entirely given up to business, four-
fifths

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of our people now residing north of that street; and hence, judging from 
the experience of the past, as little likely to take the fever here, at 
home, as they would be anywhere.

By those disposed to take a more gloomy view of our prospects, it is said, 
the fever now existing in our midst is not the ordinary yellow fever, but 
the African fever, as some say, or, as others say, the yellow fever in an 
epidemic form, differing from the ordinary yellow fever just as epidemic 
malignant scarlet fever differs from that disease in its ordinary form; 
that it is a "travelling epidemic," like the cholera some years ago; that 
it appeared first in Rio in 1850, and has been gradually making its way 
northward, along the Atlantic coast; that it was this "travelling 
epidemic" which caused such a terrible destruction of life in Savannah, 
last summer; and that its appearance among us at this time is in 
accordance with predictions

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made several years ago by physicians who had made the "epidemic yellow 
fever" their study. And further, it is said, it has now located itself in 
a new spot, entirely beyond the old infected district, and in a spot very 
well adapted to spread it generally though the city.

What to think of our prospects, as already intimated, I hardly know. Could 
I be persuaded that this was the same disease which decimated Savannah 
last summer, I should rejoice to see every one of our citizens who could, 
flee to some place of safety "until the storm be over-past;" for in 
Savannah the only safety seemed to be in flight. But all the known facts 
respecting the origin of this fever among us seem utterly at variance with 
the idea that this is the "travelling epidemic" which some suppose it to 
be. It seems clearly to have been imported in the Ben Franklin; and I see 
no reason to think that, if that ill-fated vessel had never been suffered 
to

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come into our harbour, or even if the pledge given by her captain, that 
her hold should not be broken up, had been observed, there would have been 
a case of yellow fever, among us now. It was by the breaking up of the 
hold of that steamer that the fatal miasm was let loose which has caused 
all the threatening consequences we see. It may be that there are facts 
which, if I knew them, would change my opinion on this point; and I know 
that it is a thing improbable in itself that, in the present excited state 
of public feeling, and in the midst of the almost innumerable reports 
which are passing from mouth to mouth, we should be able to separate the 
true from the false, or to get at all the facts which bear upon this 
question. The opinion which I have expressed, therefore, is nothing more 
than an opinion based upon the facts now known to me, and as I have stated 
them above.

Besides all this, I have another ground

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for hoping that the yellow fever will not assume an epidemic form among 
us--and that is, the present condition of our city. As you well know, 
within the last ten years our streets have been so generally paved, that 
Norfolk is now one of the most thoroughly-paved cities in the Union; and 
although the site of the city is level, the streets have been so carefully 
graded that the water runs off almost as soon as it does in Richmond, with 
all its hills. In consequence of this, and the general substitution of 
rain-water for the brackish well-water once used, a careful comparison of 
our bills of mortality with those of other cities will show, that for the 
ten years last past Norfolk has been one of the healthiest cities on the 
Atlantic seaboard. At the present time the general health of the place is 
as good as usual. And although our city is no exception to the general 
rule that, in every place of any size, there are particular localities, 
such as Barry's Row,

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where poverty and filth seem to hold possession by a sort of "fee simple," 
yet our city is, at the present time, by no means a dirty one. I have 
heard some persons express a different opinion on this last-mentioned 
point; but this, I think, is owing to the fact that the existence of the 
fever in our midst has made them more sharp-sighted than usual; and they 
see and notice filth now which, at other times, would escape their notice 
altogether.

For all these reasons, I could wish that our people who are now leaving 
could take a different view of matters, and quietly remain at home; yet I 
am not willing to take the responsibility of advising any to remain. It is 
enough for me to decide that question for myself; and my own convictions 
of duty were never plainer than they are at this time, that home is my 
place, come what may. The physician and the Christian pastor are, by their 
profession, called to minister to the sick, the

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dying, and the afflicted; and, certainly, a time of pestilence, when their 
services are most needed, is no time for them to flee. Not that there may 
not be, in particular instances, circumstances which may render it the 
duty of a physician or a pastor to leave home, even at such a time; but 
the presumptions are, in both cases alike, all against their leaving. The 
question which they should ask is not Why should I stay? but Why should I 
not stay? and no mere danger to themselves personally should enter into 
the decision of this question. For myself, I can say that, in the prospect 
of the possible spread of the fever throughout our city, I have no anxious 
thought. The pestilence, when raging in its most terrible violence, and 
when man stands appalled before it, is yet ever under God's control, and 
can claim no victims but such as are given it. That mighty God I have been 
taught by his spirit, I trust, to look up to as "my Father in heaven."

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His I am, and him I have vowed to serve. If he has work for me here, in 
time to come, he can protect me; if he has not, and my work on earth is 
nearly done, then sooner comes, I hope, the perfect, blessed rest of 
heaven.



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LETTER II.
SPREAD OF THE FEVER--ITS MILD TYPE--VISIT TO PORTSMOUTH--DESERTED STATE OF 
THAT PLACE--PANIC--CAUSES OF THIS PANIC--QUARANTINE REGULATIONS--
QUARANTINE ORDER OF WELDEN--DEATH IN THE STREET--HOWARD ASSOCIATION 
FORMED--BURNING OF BARRY'S ROW--DAY OF PRAYER APPOINTED.

Monday, Aug. 13, 1855.

Since I last wrote you, the yellow fever--for all regard the disease 
prevailing among us as the yellow fever now--has continued to spread in 
our city. As compared with the fever prevailing here in former years and 
in other cities, this appears to be the disease in a mild and manageable 
form. According to the best information I can get, although it has now 
existed in our city for nearly a month, there had been, up to Saturday 
last, but about sixty cases treated by our physicians, and out of those

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but about twenty had proved fatal. The fever has spread, from the point at 
which it first appeared, into the infected district of former years, and 
several cases have occurred on Wide Water Street, west of Commerce Street. 
This was to be expected, and I believe was anticipated by all. Thus far, 
no case has occurred in any other part of the city which is not clearly 
traceable to the infected district or to Portsmouth in its origin; and the 
deaths have been almost altogether among our foreign population, where 
want of acclimation, intemperance, poverty, and filth, mark them out as 
the proper food for any such disease.

Several deaths which have occurred at the Oak-Grove hospital, and reckoned 
among the twenty, are clearly attributable to the obstinate imprudence of 
the patients. On yesterday I was told of one who had passed the crisis of 
the disease, and had every prospect of a speedy recovery, who,

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in some way, procured a bottle of whiskey, and, having drunk to 
intoxication, was subsequently found, some twenty yards from the hospital, 
lying on the bare ground, at ten o'clock at night. As a matter of course, 
he was dead before morning. But two cases have occurred in my 
congregation, both now decidedly convalescent.

In Portsmouth the infection has spread, until now the whole central 
portion of the town is considered infected. On Tuesday of last week, 
hearing that Rev. Isaac Handy, pastor of the Middle Street Presbyterian 
church, was sick with the fever, I went over to Portsmouth to see him. It 
was the first time I had been there for several weeks, and I was most 
forcibly struck with the scene of desolation presented on every side. It 
was a clear, bright, sunshiny day, not warmer than usual for the season; 
and as I passed through our streets on my way to the ferry-wharf, although 
there was not the same bustle and appearance of activity

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in business which I have often seen, (many of our citizens having gone 
away,) yet every thing seemed to wear a cheerful aspect; and I doubt 
whether a stranger would have noticed any thing to remind him of the 
existence of the yellow fever in our city. I felt more cheerful, myself, 
than I had for several days past,--the report of our Board of Healthy, 
published that morning, giving "no deaths" for the day before. I heard the 
remark made by a gentleman I met, "Now that the more excitable portion of 
our people have fled, we shall have a quiet time again."

On landing on the Portsmouth side of the river, all seemed changed. There 
had been no change in the weather; and yet the atmosphere presented a hazy 
appearance, much like that which you have often noticed during our Indian 
summer. The streets were literally deserted. In passing from the ferry-
wharf to Mr. Handy's house, I had to go through fully half the length

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of the main street of Portsmouth; and yet in all that distance I met but 
one white person, and saw but one store open. As I passed the end of the 
market-house, looking down toward Gosport, in the part of the market 
usually crowded by the country-people, I saw but two market-carts. The 
negro drivers of these carts were sitting on the curb-stone beside them, 
and they, wish their horses, looked as if wilted down by the heat; and I 
saw no one there present to buy their marketing.

In returning, I took a somewhat circuitous route, going around by the 
courthouse, then taking my way through parts of the town which I had not 
seen in going. Everywhere the same deserted appearance met the eye. I 
noticed in one place a man knocking at the door of a house; and, instead 
of the door being opened, a woman appeared at an upper window and 
conversed with him from thence, as if afraid to come

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any nearer to him, lest she might take the infection. But that which 
arrested my attention more particularly than any other evidence of the 
deserted state of the place was the fact that, although it was about ten 
o'clock in the day, the principal sound I heard was the crowing of the 
cock; and this I heard on every side, and with all the distinctness with 
which it may be heard in the otherwise unbroken stillness of early dawn. 
Later in the day, when man has gone forth to his labour, the sound of 
business and the noise of rattling wheels in ordinary circumstances 
completely overpower it. At the ferry-house I found three or four citizens 
of Portsmouth, and their only subject of conversation was the sickness and 
death of their friends and neighbours. One, an undertaker, told me he had 
received orders for seven coffins that morning.

I know not to what extent my own feelings may have given their tinge to the

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scene. I describe it just as it presented itself to me. I have been in 
Portsmouth several times since; and the appearance of the place, instead 
of becoming less, is becoming, if possible, more gloomy than it was then. 
Three-fourths of the population are said to have fled. This, I am inclined 
to think, is an over-estimate; but certain it is, Portsmouth presents the 
most deserted, forlorn appearance of any place I have ever seen. Never 
before have I had as lively a conception of the utter desolation of a 
plague-stricken city as now.

Such was the state of things on Tuesday last. Since then, Norfolk has been 
rapidly assuming the same deserted appearance with her sister across the 
river. The day before yesterday, the Editor of the Herald expressed the 
opinion that one-half of our population had gone. The panic, during the 
last four or five days, has been greater even than it was ten days ago. 
You will say, why is this, if the disease is

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of a mild type, and spreading so slowly as represented in last Saturday's 
report of the Board of Health--not more than sixty cases and twenty deaths 
in a month? This panic is owing in part to the apprehension excited by the 
present condition of things in Gosport and Portsmouth, where the fever at 
first seemed to spread as slowly and to present the same mild and 
manageable type it now does with us, but where, within the last ten days, 
it has spread rapidly and assumed a malignant form. The same causes, it is 
said, which have produced that change there, must soon produce a similar 
change here. It is owing mainly, however, I think, to the quarantine 
regulations, by which our communication with all the cities and towns 
around us, and even with some of the counties to which our citizens would 
naturally flee, has been cut off, or rather, I ought to say, has been 
attempted to be cut off,--for to sever all such communication effectually, 
in a country like ours, is an impossibility.

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New York took the lead in this matter, issuing her quarantine order on the 
30th of July. Since then, almost every mail has brought us the information 
that one place after another--Suffolk, Richmond, Petersburg, Welden, 
Hampton, Washington, Baltimore--has shut us out. The counties on the 
Eastern Shore of Virginia and Matthews county, to which a boat runs tri-
weekly from our city, are an exception to the general rule. They, instead 
of adopting quarantine regulations, shutting us out, have generously 
thrown their doors wide open, and sent us a hearty invitation to come. The 
Hon. Henry A. Wise, our governor-elect, I am told, has not only thrown his 
house open, but has actually fitted up his outhouses, so that he may 
accommodate as many as possible, particularly of the poor, whom the 
pestilence may have driven from their homes. For this I say, "God bless 
him!" This kindness comes to us like the summer shower to the parched 
field in time of universal

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drought--all the more precious because unexpected. Along with this 
shutting of us out from one place after another to which we might have 
turned, there has prevailed, from day to day, the report, now partly 
realized, that each trip of the boats regularly plying to and from our 
city would be their last; and thus a fear has been excited on the part of 
many, that, if the present opportunity of getting away was not improved, 
all means of flight would soon be wanting.

In these ways, a panic has been created and kept up for the last four or 
five days, even greater than that caused by the first announcement that 
the fever was among us. It has not been any appearance of present danger, 
so much as the idea of being shut in to grapple with the pestilence, no 
matter how deadly it might become,--not so much any present apprehension 
as the prospect of having every way of escape closed, even though our city

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should become one vast charnel-house,--which has sent our people fugitives 
in every direction. I have said above that it was impossible, in such a 
country as ours, to shut out fugitives from a city by any quarantine 
regulations which that city may adopt. Since Baltimore has quarantined us, 
our citizens take the boat for the Eastern Shore in the morning, and, 
returning on that boat in the afternoon, enter the Baltimore boat, as from 
the Eastern Shore, and thus pass on unchallenged, uninterrupted; the only 
practical effect of the quarantine being, by giving the fugitives a whole 
day's exposure in crossing and recrossing the bay, to increase the 
likelihood of their sickening in Baltimore, if they have the poison 
lurking in their systems.

I have never had much opportunity of judging, by personal observation, of 
the danger of fugitives, such as those leaving us from day to day, 
spreading the yellow fever in the places into which they

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may enter. But I well recollect, although then a child, that, in 1822, 
when the fever prevailed in New York City, great numbers of the 
inhabitants of the city came out to Bloomfield, New Jersey, where I was 
then living; and one, at the least, died of the fever there, and yet no 
case originated in the village. And I know, too, that during the last 
summer a French steamer came into our waters, with the yellow fever among 
her crew, and that some seventy cases were treated at the Naval Hospital, 
just across the river from Norfolk; and yet no one, either in the vicinity 
of the hospital or in our city, took the fever from them.

Speaking of these quarantine regulations, what think you of the following 
order adopted by the town authorities of Welden? I copy from one of our 
daily papers:--"Ordered--That if any person or persons shall visit the 
town of Welden, within fifteen days after such person or persons shall have

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been in such infected cities, such person, if white, shall be fined one 
hundred dollars for every day he or she may remain in the town of Welden. 
And if a slave, the owner shall be fined fifty dollars, (if within the 
knowledge of the owner;) if not, nine-and-thirty lashes on his or her bare 
back. If free coloured, shall be fined fifty dollars, or shall receive 
nine-and-thirty lashes." That is, in substance, if any poor negro, likely 
to have the fever in his blood, shall enter our town of Welden,--where God 
has laid his afflicting hand,--we'll strip to the skin and lay the lash, 
and then turn the fugitive out into the swamps to die. And this from a 
southern town, too. Verily, if I did not know better, I should be inclined 
to believe some of the "Uncle Tom" representations of southern men and 
southern manners. Terror must have driven the people of Welden mad when 
they adopted such an order as this.

And terror seems to have driven some

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of our people mad, too. On yesterday morning, a poor Irishman, of the name 
of Stapleton, was seen to come staggering up toward the door of Dr. 
Constable's office, and there he fell, and, before any one could get to 
him, was dead. Subsequent inquiry disclosed the fact, that he had been a 
boarder in a boarding-house in the lower part of the city, and there had 
taken the fever. The family who kept the boarding-house, becoming 
terrified, after a day or two went off, leaving him sick in one of the 
upper rooms of the house, with no one to attend him, not even to give him 
a glass of water, and giving information to no one, in so far as can now 
be learned, of the utterly helpless condition in which they left him. When 
poor Stapleton discovered his deserted condition, as is supposed, he got 
up and dressed himself, and started for Dr. Constable's office, that he 
might obtain some relief. His strength held out until he reached the door, 
and there he fell and

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died in the street, before any one could get to him or learn what was the 
matter. And what makes the case the more sad is that he is said to have 
many friends at home; but here--he was a stranger in a strange land. The 
formation of a "Howard Association" in our city was announced in our 
papers this morning; and surely, when such cases as this of Stapleton can 
occur in our midst, it is high time we had a Howard Association, or 
something of the kind, for the protection of the sick and suffering from 
the inhumanity of men mad through terror.

You will have learned through the public prints, before this letter 
reaches you, that Barry's Row--the row of buildings in which the fever 
first appeared--was burned down on the night of Tuesday last. There can be 
no doubt, I think, that the buildings were set on fire, though by whom, I 
suppose, will never be known. The alarm was given while my family were at 
the

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tea-table, and on going to the front doo? I saw at once where the fire 
was. I do not often go to fires, but in this instance, having a poor 
member of my church living in the immediate vicinity of the burning 
buildings, I went for the purpose of rendering her any assistance she 
might be in need of. On reaching the place, I found the upper end of the 
row fully on fire; and, I suppose, not less than three thousand persons 
standing as idle lookers-on. The fire-companies had their engines all 
there, to protect the houses around, but not a drop of water were they 
attempting to throw upon the burning buildings; and thus, I am told, they 
continued to stand until the whole row was consumed. The feeling of the 
crowd you will gather from this fact alone.

Judging from what I had heard during the day, this feeling was owing not 
to any idea that by burning these buildings the progress of the fever 
would be checked, but

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to a report currently believed--how true the report is I cannot say, for 
at such a time as this it is impossible to tell what rumours are worthy of 
credit and what not--that after the city had been at the expense of having 
all the inhabitants of "the row," well and sick, removed, and had boarded 
up the streets in the immediate vicinity, their owner has suffered other 
poor families from Gosport to move in, there to take the fever, and thus 
become a further source of danger as well as expense to the city, and at 
the same time lose their own lives. This report, whether true or not, 
seemed to be generally believed; and the feeling of indignation which it 
excited caused the people to stand by, idle spectators, while the 
buildings were consumed.

I mention this simply for the purpose of giving you correct information 
respecting this occurrence, and not for the purpose of justifying the act. 
Even granting all that was reported to be true, it will not justify

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the burning of the buildings in the way in which they were burned; and I 
greatly fear that some of those who stood by approving may yet have 
occasion to repent the countenance they have given to lawless violence. In 
the unprotected condition in which our city must soon be, if the fever 
should rage here as it is in Portsmouth now, the effect of such a 
precedent as this none can tell.

To-morrow has been set apart by our mayor as a day of humiliation and 
prayer, in prospect of the danger which now threatens us. Oh that the 
humiliation of our people might be like that of Nineveh, at the preaching 
of Jonah, so that "God might repent him of the evil which he had said that 
he will do unto us, and do it not"!



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LETTER III. FIRST DEATH AMONG THE MEMBERS OF THE PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH--
ARRIVAL OF PHYSICIANS AND NURSES FROM ABROAD--REMOVAL OF THE HOSPITAL--
REPORTED FLIGHT OF THE PROTESTANT CLERGY--TRUE STATEMENT.

Thursday, Aug. 23, 1855.

The fever is yet spreading in our city, and yesterday the first death from 
the fever among the members of my church occurred. Would that I could hope 
it would prove the last! but I cannot; for several other of our members 
are now extremely ill. The one that has died was my nephew, Edmund James, 
and he died in my house. On Saturday last we had a cold, stormy day; and, 
on returning from some pastoral visits, about twelve o'clock, I found that 
Edmund had come home sick a little while before, with all the symptoms of 
yellow fever--violent pains in the head and back, a yellow

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infusion in the eyes, a dark costing down the middle of the tongue, while 
the edges of the tongue appeared almost raw, and a very rapid pulse. I 
procured medical aid for him at once; and, through the kindness of the 
Howard Association, the services of an experienced nurse also. From the 
first his case presented very bad symptoms, and his disease progressed 
steadily and rapidly to a fatal determination. On yesterday morning, about 
eleven o'clock, he died. Thus has our Heavenly Father taken one suddenly, 
in the very prime of manhood,--taken him, I trust, to that land where 
there is no more death. A little more than a year ago, he made a public 
profession of religion, connecting himself with our church; and since then 
his Christian walk has been witness to the sincerity of his profession. 
One of the last to enter among us, he is the first to be taken.

With several other young men, his companions, Edmund had taken part in 
watching

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by night with a friend, sick with typhoid fever. This friend was lying 
sick in a part of the city to which the infection had spread some ten days 
ago, as is now perfectly evident from the number of cases occurring there, 
although this was not thought to be so at the time. In this way it was, I 
think, he took the fever--and not by contagion, from any person having the 
disease--since every one of the young men who took part with him as 
watchers, during the last ten days, is now down with the fever.

Several physicians from abroad--physicians of experience in the treatment 
of yellow fever--have come to our relief within the last few days; and I 
am glad to find that those having most experience in the matter, and whose 
opinions therefore are entitled to most weight, do not consider it a 
contagious disease. This is contrary to the opinion I have always 
entertained--though, I must confess, my opinion on the subject has been 
one held without

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my being able to give any good reason therefor, excepting that it was the 
opinion commonly current throughout the country. If they are right in this 
point, it is a matter of great importance that the popular belief should 
be corrected; for some, like poor Stapleton, whose case I mentioned in my 
last letter, have died in our midst, through neglect, arising altogether 
from fear on the part of those who would have attended to them that, by so 
doing, they would themselves contract the disease. On this point, I 
intend, should my life be spared, carefully to observe facts, that 
hereafter I may be able to give a reason for any opinion I shall 
entertain. Thus far I have seen nothing irreconcilable with the idea that 
yellow fever spreads through an infected atmosphere only, and not by 
contagion, using both these terms in their popular sense.

I mentioned above that several physicians from abroad had come to our 
relief. They

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have not come before they were greatly needed. Several of our own 
physicians are away, and those that are here are overworking themselves; 
and one, Dr. Sylvester, has already died. In this disease, prompt 
attention and frequent visits from the physician, that the changing phases 
of the fever may be carefully noted, and threatening danger guarded 
against, seem to be of the utmost importance:--the difference of a few 
hours in procuring medical aid often making the difference between 
recovery and death. Careful nursing also seems to be a matter of great 
importance; and I am happy to say that several nurses from abroad have 
recently arrived, most of them employed for the present at the hospital.

The hospital has been removed from Oak-Grove to Lambert's Point, some five 
miles down the river. This change was made mainly for the sake of the 
better accommodations which could be obtained there, in the buildings 
belonging to the old racecourse.

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The new location of the hospital is at a greater distance from the city 
than the old, and, therefore, not as easy of access; but the disadvantages 
resulting from this source, it is thought, are more than made up for by 
the purer air which the sick will there enjoy, Lambert's Point being on a 
wide part of the river and fully open to the breeze. Those who have been 
removed there, thus far, have done much better than at Oak-Grove: a larger 
proportion of them having recovered, or being now decidedly convalescent. 
I find, however, a great prejudice existing, especially among the poor, 
against going to the hospital; and this owing mainly to the idea that the 
patients at an hospital are considered by the physicians as fit subjects 
to experiment upon--an idea to which the conduct of those having charge of 
our hospital certainly has given no countenance.

Our citizens continue still from day to day to flee, until now, I do not 
think that

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more than one-third of our white population remain in the city. Of the 
coloured people but few have gone, partly on account of the difficulty of 
getting away, but more especially because the yellow fever is a disease 
from which they have, comparatively, very little to fear. In New Orleans 
and other southern cities, coloured people are pretty generally exempt 
from attacks of yellow fever. Up to this present time there have been some 
cases of fever among this class, in our city, and several deaths; but yet 
not so many as to form any very marked exception to the general rule 
established by the experience of cities south of us.

You are aware that most of the business of our city is done on West Main 
Street and the part of the city between it and the river. The infection 
seems now to have spread through all this part of the town; and, as a 
consequence, it is almost entirely deserted by our business men. Our post-
office

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was moved up to the Academy building on the 10th; and almost all the new 
advertisements which appear in our daily papers now are to the effect that 
such or such persons may be found at their residences, or at some place 
they have temporarily rented, north of Main Street, their business stand 
being closed for the present.

This morning I received a letter from my old friend and class-mate, Dr. 
Leyburn, of Philadelphia," calling my attention to a report which he tells 
me has been widely circulated in the papers published at a distance,--that 
the Protestant clergy in Norfolk and Portsmouth had all, or nearly all, 
deserted their posts, leaving their congregations to shift for themselves 
as best they could in this time of pestilence; while the Catholic clergy 
were nobly confronting the threatening danger, and ministering to the 
necessities of the sick in so far as was in their power. For two weeks 
past, I have been so constantly engaged in visiting the

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sick and afflicted, and in helping to bury the dead, that I have not had 
either the time or the disposition to read the secular papers; and, until 
Dr. Leyburn's letter informed me of the fact, I was not aware that such a 
report was going the round of the papers; and even now, did I consult my 
own feelings, I should take no notice of it. What man may say of me 
appears a matter of very little moment, provided I can keep a conscience 
void of offence before God. Unless a miracle preserve us, when the 
pestilence shall have passed there will be more than one green mound in 
our cemetery to bear witness to the falsehood of this report respecting 
the Protestant clergy of Norfolk.

I have just written to Dr. Leyburn, giving him, in answer to his inquiry, 
a statement of the facts in this case; and as you may not have read the 
report referred to, I will give the same statement in substance to you. 
And first--that I may do justice to a faithful

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pastor, although his course has not been called in question in this 
report--let me say that Rev. M. O'Keefe, the priest in charge of the only 
Catholic church in Norfolk, has been labouring most indefatigably among 
the sick, ever since the fever first appeared. As I mentioned in a former 
letter, the fever at first was confined almost entirely to the foreign 
portion of our population. Most of these were Catholics in their religious 
belief. To their own clergyman they naturally looked; and he, disregarding 
all considerations of personal danger, went promptly to them and 
ministered to their necessities. Thus much truth demands should be said of 
him; and now, justice to others requires that I add that the Protestant 
clergy here, when the fever extended to the Protestant portion of our 
population, visited the sick and ministered to them just as promptly.

We have in Norfolk, besides the Catholic church, two Episcopal, two 
Methodist, two

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Baptist, one Methodist Protestant, and one Presbyterian church, and two 
churches for the coloured people, having white pastors. Dr. Minigerode, 
the pastor of Christ Church, the largest Episcopal church in the city, had 
started for Germany before the fever first appeared in Gosport, and, in 
all likelihood, has not yet even heard of its existence in Norfolk. His 
place is temporarily supplied by Rev. Lewis Walke, now labouring 
faithfully from day to day among the sick and dying. One of the Baptist 
churches is vacant, in consequence of the resignation of its pastor, some 
two months ago. Rev. T. G. Jones, the pastor of the other Baptist church, 
is now absent, I believe, on account of the state of his wife's health; 
and thus both the Baptist churches are without their pastors; but a young 
Baptist minister--Rev. Wm. C. Bagnall, a native of our city--is here, and 
labouring, in so far as his strength will allow, among the members of 
those churches and congregations.

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Rev. J. G. Whitfield, the pastor of the Methodist Protestant church, (the 
smallest church in the city,) is at the same time president of the 
Virginia Conference, and required, in the discharge of his official 
duties, to spend the summer in visiting the churches throughout the state. 
The pastor of one of the coloured churches is here; whether the pastor of 
the other is I do not know, but I believe he is not at this time. The four 
remaining pastors are all here. Remembering, now, that this is the season 
of the year when city pastors are accustomed to leave their charges for a 
season, that they may recruit and be the better prepared for their more 
arduous duties in the winter, it seems to me that it is rather remarkable 
that, for ten churches, one being vacant and another temporarily vacant by 
previous arrangement, we should have seven ministers here, actively 
engaged in the discharge of ministerial duty. I will venture to say that 
at this present time neither Baltimore, nor Philadelphia, nor

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New York, can show as full a supply for their pulpits as Norfolk can; and 
I will venture to say, further, that in our own city there is no one class 
of the population--not even the physicians, nor the undertakers--of which 
so large a proportion have remained at their posts, as of the clergy.

I cannot speak so particularly of others; but this I can say for myself, 
that shortly after our Howard Association was formed, I offered my 
services to them, in any way in which I, as a minister of the gospel, 
could be useful; and I am confident, from what I have seen of them, that 
the other Protestant ministers here, if they have not formally offered 
their services, are just as ready to render aid as I am. This I know, that 
on yesterday, when the extreme sickness and death of my nephew prevented 
my visiting as usual, Rev. Lewis Walke came and kindly offered to visit 
any sick in my congregation that I thought needed a pastoral

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visit. All this I say, not boastingly, I trust, but simply to correct a 
false report which it seems has been widely circulated to our discredit, 
and, what is a matter of far graver importance, to the discredit of that 
Christianity which we profess. In staying, we are doing nothing but what 
duty plainly demands of us.

Such reports bear hardest upon those pastors who in God's providence are 
absent, the fact of their absence being made known without the reasons 
therefor, and thus the world left to infer that they have fled through 
unmanly, unchristian fear of the pestilence. Surely, no reasonable person 
can think that there may not be circumstances which render it the duty of 
a pastor to leave his church even in such times. Surely, no reasonable 
person will contend that a pastor is chained to his post, as a criminal to 
the stake. Christianity, true Christianity, does not aim to make its 
votaries--either clergy

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or laity--heroes of romance, but simply good men--good men in all the 
relations of life; and I can well conceive of circumstances which would 
make it just as plainly my duty to leave this city as it is now my duty to 
remain.



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LETTER IV.
EFFECTS OF COLD STORMS IN THE SPREAD OF THE FEVER--PEOPLE BEWILDERED--
BURIAL OF REV. A. DIBBRELL--DEATH OF MAYOR WOODIS--AID FROM ABROAD--
ESTABLISHMENT OF THE HOWARD HOSPITAL.

Saturday, Sept. 1, 1855.

The pestilence, long darkling over us, has now burst upon us in its 
terrible might. On Tuesday last, we had another of those chill 
northeasterly storms, so frequent for five or six weeks past, and although 
at the beginning of the week there were not over three or four hundred 
cases of fever in the city, there are now, I think, not less than from 
twelve to fifteen hundred.

I had supposed, from all I had heard and read of yellow fever in other 
places, that it spread most rapidly in dry, hot weather. I am certain that 
I have seen it spoken of, in some medical work,--although I cannot

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now tell just where,--as a disease belonging to seasons of drought. This 
is not the case here. The present summer has been throughout what farmers 
call an unusually "seasonable" one; and I doubt whether a finer crop of 
corn was ever made, in this part of the country, than will be made this 
summer. We have had hot days from time to time; but, as compared with 
other summers, since I have been a resident of Norfolk, not so much 
extremely hot weather as is usual.

During dry, warm days, the fever has seemed to spread but slowly; but when 
these chill northeasterly storms have come, it has taken whole sections of 
the city in a night. During the storm occurring the early part of this 
week, the infection has spread through the very heart of our city; and now 
they are sick by households, over one-half of that portion of the city to 
which the fever never extended in former years. In my own congregation 
there are some

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houses in which they are all sick; and there are many others which have 
suddenly been converted into hospitals--hardly enough well ones being left 
to attend upon the sick. Whether these cold storms ought properly to be 
considered the immediate agents in the spread of the infection, or whether 
that infection has spread during the dry, warm weather, the only effect of 
the cold storm being, by inducing a chill, to bring out the latent 
disease, I will not attempt to decide; but this is certainly true, that it 
is during these storms it appears to spread most rapidly. On last Tuesday 
night, judging from what I felt myself and from what I have since learned 
from others, there were very few that were not conscious of the influence 
of the storm. It did seem as if the flap of the wing of the unseen 
pestilence sent a chill to almost every heart; and the terrible 
consequences of this we have now before our eyes.

You have, no doubt, seen persons, when

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some great calamity has come suddenly upon them,--although all is not 
lost, and there is yet hope, if they will exert themselves,--sitting down 
in a sort of sullen indifference, bewildered. I know not how better to 
describe the state of things existing among us at this time than by saying 
that our people seem to be bewildered; and, could you be here, and go 
around through the city, you would not be surprised that such was the fact.

As illustrating this state of things, I may mention an incident which 
occurred but a few hours ago. I had gone to attend the funeral of the Rev. 
A. Dibbrell, pastor of one of our Methodist churches,--a man respected and 
beloved in our community, and well deserving the sentiments with which he 
was regarded. He had fallen at his post, dying in the midst of his people. 
But so few of the members of his church are now here, and of this few, so 
many are either sick or attending upon the sick in their own families, 
that there

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were hardly enough present to perform the ordinary offices on such an 
occasion; and his own son and I helped to put his coffin in the hearse.

On Thursday morning I called at a house occupied by two families, and 
where one in each family had been sick for several days, and, on entering, 
found every member of both families prostrated by the fever. Coming to the 
door, and seeing one of our physicians passing, I called to him, and 
begged him to come in and prescribe for the sick, if nothing more, and 
received for answer, "I have already so many cases in hand that I cannot 
conscientiously undertake another;" and, showing me his memorandum-book, I 
saw at a glance that he spoke nothing but the simple truth; and he was one 
of our younger physicians, having but a limited practice in ordinary 
times. Our older physicians, and most of those from a distance who have 
come to our aid, have now so much to do

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that it is sometimes impossible to get a physician for hours. What we 
should have done had none come from abroad, I cannot tell.

On last Sabbath, Hunter Woodis, Esq., our excellent mayor, died and was 
buried. His loss was a loss indeed to our city. My personal acquaintance 
with him was but slight; but this I know, that since the fever commenced 
among us he has been indefatigable in the discharge of duty,--especially 
active in doing all that he could for the sick--never seeming to regard 
for a moment the personal danger to which be thus exposed himself. While 
he lived, although many of our public officers are away, our government 
had a head, and there was some one to whom we could look for guidance. His 
death is to us a great misfortune; for at a time like this one such man is 
in himself a host. Our good friend, Dr. N. C. Whitehead, as senior 
magistrate, now discharges the duties of

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mayor; and, I need not say to one so well acquainted with him as you are, 
will perform the duties of that office most faithfully, in so far as it is 
in his power to do. But he is not the young, active man that Woodis was, 
and, having at the same time the duties of President of the Farmers' Bank 
upon him, he cannot give the time and attention to them which Woodis both 
could and did give.

I rejoice to learn that most of the towns and cities around us have 
repealed their quarantine orders, so that those who are able and disposed 
to flee can do so without having to take circuitous routes or depart from 
that straightforward honesty which Christian men should always maintain. 
When I saw so many going away, a few weeks ago, I felt disposed to find 
fault with them; and although not willing to take the responsibility of 
advising any to stay, I yet wished that they would for themselves decide 
to remain where they

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were. I feel very differently now. Had all remained, and from among them a 
proportional number been taken sick, as undoubtedly would have been the 
case, I know not what we could have done. As it is, there are more sick 
than those who have as yet escaped--with all the aid of physicians and 
nurses from abroad--can properly attend to; and some are dying just for 
want of proper care. Had all remained, and we had three sick where there 
is now one, our case must have been greatly worse than it is. In the 
flight of those that have gone I see most clearly God's good providence; 
and the panic, under the influence of which they fled, I look upon as like 
"the sound of a great host" heard by the Assyrian army encamped before 
Samaria--God's means for scattering them that they might be saved.

We are beginning to receive aid, in money and provisions, from abroad 
also; and this help is not coming before it was

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greatly needed. Our bakeries are all closed, and yesterday not a loaf of 
bread was to be bought; our provision-stores are almost all closed, our 
market pretty much deserted; and I had begun to fear that we should have 
great scarcity, if not famine, to contend with, as well as the pestilence. 
The poor were beginning really to suffer for food. The sick now suffer, in 
some instances, for food suited to their circumstances; and for the dead--
it is becoming a matter of great difficulty to procure coffins in which to 
bury them. Should any thing like the same proportion die from among those 
now sick which have died hitherto, I fear we shall be driven to the 
necessity of burying in pits, as has been done in New Orleans, and as was 
done during the great plague in London. May God preserve us from a 
necessity so revolting to the feelings of the friends of those that die!

I have mentioned the death of Rev. A.

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Dibbrell, Rev. J. Wills, and Rev. S. W. Jones. The other ministers of the 
Methodist church, stationed here, are now both down with the fever, the 
latter thought to be dangerously ill. Rev. M. O'Keefe, the Catholic 
priest, is also sick. In my own family I have now another case. My eldest 
daughter, Mary, was attacked on Wednesday, but her case, thus far, seems 
to be a mild and manageable one, and I hope the crisis has been passed. 
She was just recovering from a slight attack of bilious fever; and I had 
thought that this, or rather the cleansing of the system by the medicine 
she had taken, would have served as a protection against yellow fever. 
Instead of this, it seems to have laid the system more fully open to 
attack.

I wrote you, in my last, that the temporary hospital, established at Oak 
Grove, had been abandoned, in order that we might avail ourselves of the 
better and more extensive accommodations furnished

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by the buildings at Lambert's Point. During the last few days, the number 
of the sick has increased so rapidly that it is found impossible to remove 
them to Lambert's Point; and the building known as the "City Hotel," in 
the very centre of the city, has been taken, and fitted up as an hospital, 
under the direction of the Howard Association. On Thursday (Aug. 29) the 
sick began to be carried thither. This new hospital, extensive as are its 
accommodations, is fast filling up; and what other measures we may yet be 
compelled to adopt, God only knows.