Dr. C. Creighton, M.D. and vaccination : a review / by J. McVail.

  • McVail, John C. (John Christie), 1849-1926.
Date:
1890
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Dr. C. Creighton, M.D. and vaccination : a review / by J. McVail. 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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    that the legend was believed only by credulous people, or officious gossips, and not by those who had some real practical knowledge of either or both diseases. It is strange that all this adverse testimony receives no notice from Dr Creighton. But a still stranger thing remains to be stated regarding the evidence which he himself adduces. One man in particular he brings prominently forward as a witness. He says some of Jenner's professional neighbours knew a good deal about it [cow-pox], particularly Mr Fewster of Thornbury (p. 19). The man who knew most about cow-pox sores in milkers was Fewster of Tliornbury; and Fewster, as well as others, had unfortunately good reason to scout the milker's protection from small-pox as an old wife's fable (p. 24). Fewster, tlie chief authority on cow- pox (p. 54). Fewster and the rest knew there was nothing in it (p. 55). Thus while Croft, llolph. Wall, Giffard, etc., are all against him, our author can at least depend on Fewster of Thorn- bury. We need not therefore quarrel with him if he tends to exaggerate a little the special knowledge and capacity of his chosen autliority. What, then, says Fewster, the man who knew ? Listen : I can now with truth affirm that I have not been aUe to produce the small-pox, in a single instance, among persons ivho have had the true cow-pox. Tliese are the iptsissima verba of Fewster of Thornbury, italicised by himself! They occur in a letter from him, published in Pearson's Inquiry, pp. 102-3. And lest an isolated sentence should misrepresent his meaning, 1 give the whole passage :— In the spring of the year 1768 I came to live at Thornbury, where I have resided ever since. In that very year, from the following occurrence, I became well acquainted with the disease called cow-pox. The late Mr Grove and myself formed a connexion with Mr Sutton, the celebrated inoculator ; and to inoculate for the small-pox we took a house at Buckover. We found in this practice that a great nmnber of patients could not be infected with the small- pox poison, notwithstanding repeated exposure under most favourable circum- stances for taking the disease. At length the cause of the failure was discovered from the case of a farmer who was inoculated several times ineffectually, yet he assured iis he had never suffered from the small-pox, but, says he, ' I have had the cow-pox lately to a violent degree, if that's any odds.' We took the hint, and, on inquiry, found that all those who were uninfectable had undergone the cow-pox. I communicated this fact to a medical society, of which I was then a member, and ever afterwards paid particular attention to determine the fact. I can now with truth affirm that I have not been able to produce the small-pox, in a single instance, among persons who have had the true cow-pox, except a doubtful case which you are acquainted with. I have, since that, inoculated near two thousand for the small-pox, amongst whom there were a great number who had gone through the cow-pox ; the exact number of these I cannot tell, but I know that they all resisted the infection of variolous matter. Then Fewster goes on to state that he never knew one mortal or even dangerous case of cow-pox, but that at the same time lie thinks it a much more severe disease in general than the