Letters on the yellow fever of 1822 / [Grant Thorburn].

  • Grant Thorburn
Date:
1824
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Letters on the yellow fever of 1822 / [Grant Thorburn]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    8/14 (page 8)
    s Neic-York, March, 1823. Gentlemen, One beautiful moon-light evening, towards the end of Sep¬ tember, I walked up Broadway to view its desolations. I stopped fifteen minutes near the spot in Chamber-street, where the man used to fix his spy-glass to look at the moon. It appeared as if I then stood on the line between the living and the dead. Below was the stillness of death, only interrupted now and then by the groans of the sick and dying, the rattling of the hearse, the voice of the solitary watchman, and the squalling of the starved cats. Above, was the usual bustle of street-walkers ; and the wind blowing gently from the north, I could plainly distinguish the broad, hoarse laugh of the crowds around the doors of the Circus, whose interior was crowded with our citizens, who only a few days previous had fled before the face of death, but now, in the full tide of fancied security, joining chorus with master sweeps and their apprentices, made the air resound as if all hell had broke loose. I thought if these people had any feelings, they could by no means be of the finer kind. I will now, gentlemen, conclude my remarks, by giving you a few of my thoughts on things as they passed. I thought the machine used for conveying the sick poor to the Hospital, was the most im¬ proper that could be contrived for that purpose, as 1 never could discern any difference between it, either in shape, size, or colour, and the one used for carrying the dead to Potter's Field. The rich who were removed after being taken sick, fared little better; only they were dragged off in a gilded chariot, while the former rode in a hearse : but few, very few, of either rich or poor, who were removed when sick, ever returned. I thought the life of the patient was generally decided by the treatment they received during the three or four hours after being attacked by the prevailing disease. On the 14th of September, I received through the post office letters from two respectable physicians then out of town, exhorting me by all the arguments of religion, nature, and friendship, to fly from the infected district, as a man ought to fly whose house was on