A short account of the yellow fever in Philadelphia, for the reflecting Christian / by J. Henry C. Helmuth, Minister of the Lutheran congregation ; translated from the German by Charles Erdmann ; copy right secured according to law.

  • Justus Christian Henry Helmuth
Date:
MDCCXCIV [1794]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A short account of the yellow fever in Philadelphia, for the reflecting Christian / by J. Henry C. Helmuth, Minister of the Lutheran congregation ; translated from the German by Charles Erdmann ; copy right secured according to law. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    terrified minds. When death had robbed them of fome relation or acquaintance ; there was fuch a mixture of melancholy, of pain, of fadnefs, and alfo of an anxious fear of the diforder, that it was impomble to diftinguifh the one from the other ; in fome, thefe emotions would break out in loud lamentations, yea, fhrieks, which were heard in our grave-yards by day and by night at thofe funerals, where fear would permit fome of the nearefl relations or acquaintances to be preient. Many of the dearefl. relations were hurried out of the houfe as quick as poffible, perhaps even before they were cold ; coffins and graves were befpoken beforehand for fome ; every one wanted to be the firfl to have his dead buried out of his fight; for immediately after the death of a fick perfon, the body would turn to putrefaction, and would increafe the cadaverous fmell confiderably, which had been fpread through the houfe and neighbourhood during; the ficknefs. The whole neighbourhood generally infilled very earneftly upon it, that the danger mould be removed as quick as poilible. Very few had the courage to approach a houfe where any lay dead, much lefs to enter it. Having fpoken of the houfes wherein people di- ed, and likewife of the fick, and defcribed the feelings of thofe who, (till in health, were prefent at thefe fcenes, it will undoubtedly not be difa- greeable, nor may it perhaps be without a bleffed effect, if I add fomething more on this fubject. [State of mind of the Sick.] I have been called to feveral fick perfons, who till that time, had looked upon the religion of Je-