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Stories

  • Article

The stranger who started an epidemic

New Orleans, 1853. James McGuigan arrives in the port city and succumbs to yellow fever.

  • Article

The tradesman who confronted the pestilence

The City of London, 1665. As the Great Plague hits the capital, John New faces a deadly dilemma.

  • Article

The big freeze

In recent years we’ve come to realise that global heating is our biggest threat. But it’s hard to shake off the fear of a return to ice-age conditions, the predominant narrative since the late 17th century.

  • Article

Why pandemic denial is nothing new

Could today’s Covid-deniers be taking lessons from history? After all, it’s nearly 200 years since frustrations at a cholera-induced lockdown erupted in Sunderland.

All stories (27)

Images

  • Ships used as smallpox isolation hospitals.
  • Ships at Rangoon, Burma. Coloured aquatint by William Daniell after James Kershaw, c. 1831.
  • South Wharf, Rotherhite where patients were received for embarkation to the Hospital Ships, 1901-02.
  • South Wharf, Rotherhithe where patients where received for embarkation to the Hospital Ships, 1901-02. Twenty years later.
  • Polyphemus attacking the companions of Odysseus and their ships, or the companions and ships of Aeneas. Etching with engraving.
  • Condition of British ships and fate of prizes after Trafalgar
  • Condition of British ships and fate of prizes after Trafalgar
  • Bridges: a double drawbridge for ships to pass through. Engraving.
  • Slave ships on the ocean. Wood engraving by Smyth, 1858.
  • Masters, seamen and apprentices serving on foreign-going ships or ships engaged in regular trade on foreign stations : Class A.(M.) : national health insurance contribution card.
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