1775 Dysentery Epidemic

Looking at the Little Picture

Countryside at War August 2013, Hartwell Tavern Minute Man National Historical Park

In Memory ofMrs Esther wife of Mr Joseph

DanielsWho died Aug’st 1775 in ye 34th

year of her age & 7 children of Mr Joseph

Daniels & Esther his wife.

Martha Dies August 31 in the 5th Year

Sarah Died Sep’r 2nd in her 9th YearEsther Died Sep’r 4th in her 12 Year

Anna Died Sep’r 7th in the 2th year

Josiah Died Sep’r 7th in the 6th year Elizabeth Died Sept 12th in her 11th

year1775

Joseph Died June 1st 1777 in his 16th year

“The Dysentery soon prevailed in the American Army & extended itself more or less through the country. Although it prevailed most in the Town near camp, my Parish partook largely of this calamity. We buried about 50 persons in the course of the season. Some families were dreadfully bereaved. One in particular a Mr. Joseph Daniels buried an amiable wife & 6 very promising Children in about 6 weeks—we often buried 3 or 4 in a day. My time was wholly devoted to visiting the sick, attendance on the dying & the dead.”  Memoirs of the Rev. Samuel West, Pastor (1764 – 1788), First Parish, Needham Massachusetts

Some perspective, 4 deaths in Needham in 1775 would be about 200 people a day today.

These are frightening figures for a single disease - and still missing is the data on how many people became ill without dying of dysentery. Dysentery in Sweden 1750-1900 Helene Castenbrandt

Dysentery: A disease characterized by inflammation of the mucous membrane and glands of the large intestine, accompanied with griping pains, and mucous and bloody evacuations. OED

CDC classifies the 1775 epidemic as “unknown”, possibly due to shigella.

Outbreaks of dysentery were more frequent and accounted for more deaths than smallpox.

In the 18th Century there was no expectation that a child would live to adulthood.

Charles Willson Peale, Rachel Weeping 1772

Dysentery was known as the “summer complaint”

Every Man His Own Doctor, Or, The Poor Planter's Physician John Tennent 1760

Treatment not discovered until the 1960s

According to UNICEF only 39% in of children underdeveloped countries get rehydration therapy. The WHO estimates 80 million cases and 700,000 deaths from Shigella annually.

Letter from Nathanael Greene: Prospect Hill, August 9 1775 “Our troops are now very sickly with the dysentery. There was about a week of exceeding hot weather, and it is thought brought on this distemper, but now they [are] getting better, and from the change in air and the healthy situation we are posted in, I hope we shall recover a perfect state of health very soon.

Greene by Charles Willson Peale 1783

“Death has so long stalked among us that he is become much less terrible to me than he once was…Funerals are now so frequent that for a month past you meet as many dead folks as live ones in Boston streets, and we pass them with much less emotion and attention than we used to pass dead sheep and oxen in days of yore when such sights were to be seen in in our streets” Jonathan Sewell, Summer 1775

Abigail Adams to John Adams

Our House is an hospital in every part, and what with my own weakness and distress of mind for my family I have been unhappy enough.And such is the distress of the neighbourhood that I can scarcly find a well person to assist me in looking after the sick Sept 8, 1775

In Weymouth it is very sickly, but not Mortal. Dr. Tufts [tells] me he has betwen 60 and 70 patients now sick with this disorder. Sept 16, 1775

Providence Gazette September 2, 1775

New York Journal September 21, 1775

In Memory of Lieut John Bowen of

Roxbury who died in this

town Augt ye 16th 1775

in ye 38th year of his Age

Westford Gravestones 1775

Deaths in Towns August-October 1775

Westford 25 deaths, 23 of them children. Several families lost 2-3 children, one family lost 3 children and a father

Lexington 15 deaths, 10 of them children. 2 widows of men killed on the Lexington Green April 19. Capt. John Parker also died during this time, cause noted as TB.

Lincoln4 deaths, only one of them a child

Concord3 deaths, one child

Acton No deaths

Stow10 deaths, 8 of them children

History of the town of Medford, Middlesex County Massachusetts by Charles Brooks, William Henry Whitmore, James M. Usher  1775: During this and some following years, there was fatal sickness in Medford from dysentery. Out of fifty-six deaths in 1775, twenty-three were children.