On the local origin of the yellow fever epidemic of British Guiana / in a letter from Daniel Blair to John Davy, with appended documents.

  • Blair, Daniel.
Date:
[1851?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the local origin of the yellow fever epidemic of British Guiana / in a letter from Daniel Blair to John Davy, with appended documents. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

    16/38
    No. 2. Georgetown, 28th December, 183S. My dear Sir, I REGRET that I cannot noAA' enter into all tte particulars that may be required in order to refute totally the opinion of Dr. William Fraser, in reference to the contagious nature of the yellow fever now prevalent in Georgetown. The reason is, the letters I expected from Berbice have not yet arrived, and therefore I am yet without au- thentic accounts as to the commencement and spread of the yellow fever in that county. As, however, I promised you to have some: answer prepared to his strange epistle by to-day, I now proceed to - notice some of the proofs of the contagious nature of the yellow fever as addressed by him in the Medical Gazette of the 20th January last. If you please to read over the ninth paragraph of Dr. Fraser's ■ letter relative to Mr. Schomburgk and the Indians, you will find the: particular propositions in reference to the point of dispute, viz., thatt Mr. Schomburgk and his Indians had yellow fever; that Mr. Schom- ■ burgk got it by sleeping in a bed, and residing in a bed-chamber,, where a person had previously died of yellow fever and black vomit;; and thirdly, that the Indians carried this disease into the interiorr where it spread. This is the most tangible of the cases adduced as^ proofs by Dr. Fraser ; the rest of his cases are either anonymous orr hypothetical, or placed beyond the reach of easy inquiry. On seeing: this proof, I immediately went to Mr. Stutchbury's, a respectable l chemist and druggist in America Street, and an intimate friend oft: Mr. Schomburgk, where Mr. Schomburgk had resided during hisf last visit to Georgetown from his expedition up the Corantyne; River, and I made all the inquiries necessary, in order to obtain the; true statement of facts. I also inquired of the medical gentleman *' who attended the sick Indian in the retinue of Mr. Schomburgk, andi read over the several letters which have been received from Mr. Schomburgk since he quitted Georgetown on his present expedition. What was my surprise to find that every assertion in the ninth para- graph of Dr. Fraser's letter is unfounded, first because Mr. Schom- hvsgh. never had an attack of yelloxo fever; that his only sickness- while in town was a pulmonic disease, to which he is occasionally; subject, and a slight attack of his usual fever, for which he took his usual remedy, quinine; secondly, that he came to reside at Mr. Stutchbury's a month after Cherrington's death, but never inhabited: the room where the patient had died, nor even the same floor, nor- • * Dr. Bonyun.