Report on epidemic cholera and yellow fever in the Army of the United States, during the year 1867 / By Brevet Lieut. Col. J.J. Woodward.

  • Woodward, Joseph Janvier, 1833-1884.
Date:
1868
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Report on epidemic cholera and yellow fever in the Army of the United States, during the year 1867 / By Brevet Lieut. Col. J.J. Woodward. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service. The original may be consulted at London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service.

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    At Paducali, Kentucky, four cases and two deaths are reported during August out of a strength of 108. No particulars liave been received. At St. Louis, Missouri, wliere cholera had prevailed during 1866, it reappeared among the citizens during the month of June, 1867. (See St. Louis Medical and Surgical Journal for July and August, 1867, p. 394.) Cases continued to occur with increasing frequency during the summer and fall. Only one case, however, is reported at the St. Louis arsenal out of an average strength of 125. This case occurred during October ; the man recovered. At Jefferson Barracks, near St. Louis, where cholera had prevailed extensively among the 56th U. S. Colored Infantry during the previous summer, 256 cases and 134 deaths having been reported, one case of cholera and six of cholera morbus occurred during July, all of which recovered. Several fatal cases of cholera were reported, however, among government employes, It may here also be mentioned that, during June, prior to their movement from the post, a considerable number of cases of diarrhoea occurred among the soldiers of the 38th U. S. Colored Infantry at Jefferson Barracks. To the story of these troops we shall |)resently recur. On the 26th of October, Companies C and H, 125 colored volunteers, arrived at Jefferson Barracks for muster-out. ^They had marched from Fort Bliss, Texas, across the plains, to Port Harker, and thence been brought by railroad to St. Louis, where cholera was then prevailing. Two days after their arrival at Jefferson Barracks cholera appeared among them, thirteen cases and five deaths occurring before the close of the month, and two cases and one death during November. At Fort Riley, Kansas, where there had been 59 cases and 27 deaths of cholera, and 641 cases of diarrhoea and dysentery among the troops during 1866, a quartermaster's employe was attacked June 22d, 1867, and died the same day. Company K, of the 38th Infantry, which left Jefferson Barracks June 9tli, and reached Fort Riley June 12th, had moved for Fort Harker on the 19th; and companies D and F, which left Jefferson Barracks on the 19th for Fort Riley, also left that place for Fort Harker on the 22d, arriving on the 25th. All these troops were suffering much from diarrhoea, and Companies D and F' left behind them, when they moved, a number of men sick with diarrhoea. After this, however, no cases of cholera occurred at Fort Riley, where the most stringent hygienic means appeared to have been adopted, until July 11th, when an employe of the Pacific Railroad was attacked and died the same day. He had just arrived from the vicinity of Fort Harker, where cholera was then prevaihng. No other cases occurred until Novem- ber, when two colored recruits for the 10th Cavalry were attacked; one of them recovered; the other died December 1st. Of these men, the first had arrived two days before his attack from St. Louis, Missouri, where he had been taken sick with diarrhoea. No par- ticulars have been received with regard to his comrade. These two cases are included in table 10, Appendix I, p. 6; but the garrison of Fort Riley, averaging for the six months 26 white and 197 colored troops, wholly escaped. At Fort Harker, Kansas, the disease appeared shortly after the arrival of Companies K, D, F and H, of the 38th Infantry. Th ere were three cases and one death among the colored troops in June; fifteen cases and ten deaths during July and August. Among the white troops, twenty-eight cases and twenty deaths are reported during July and August. The average strength of the command for July and August was 84 white and