Two letters relative to the Vaccine Institution, addressed to the members of the Hon. the General Assembly of Maryland / by James Smith, United States' agent of vaccination.

  • Smith, James, 1771-1841.
Date:
1818
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Two letters relative to the Vaccine Institution, addressed to the members of the Hon. the General Assembly of Maryland / by James Smith, United States' agent of vaccination. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    81 escape, created all at once an uncommon degree of confi- dence in vaccination. Every one was eager to try it as soon as possible, so that about one hundred persons, all of whom were living near enough to this case of Small Pox, to have been infected by it in a few days, immediately submitted to vaccination. By this process, they were all saved from any injury, and the Small Pox was prevented from spread- ing any further. From this time, until the month of January following, our city was perfectly free from this contagion, when it was again unhappily imported by a groom, attached to the Cir- cus, who had received the infection in Philadelphia, and brought it hither with him. His fever was at first supposed to be the spotted fever; its true character was notwithstanding afterwards fully ascertained. His death, it is said, took place about the 20th January; but no information was given re- specting the nature of the disease. The coloured servant boy however, who attended on him, took sick on the 5th day of Fe- bruary, and his disease was soon discovered to be the natural Small Pox; he died on the 15th of the same month. I was then absent from this city, vainly endeavouring to persuade the le- gislature of Pennsylvania to pass an act for the more general distribution of the vaccine matter in that state. The favoura- ble moment to have checked the spreading of this disease, was suffered to pass unheeded—every necessary precaution was neglected from the beginning. As soon as I returned from Pennsylvania, however, I immediately set about tra- cing the origin and extent of the injury which had been done; and on the 5th of March, I was the first to sound the alarm, or to inform the public of the introduction of the Small Pox into this city. Seven cases of this plague were then discovered, and as I conceived it to be my duty, I publish- ed the names and places of residence of all of them, and in- formed the citizens, that all who wanted the vaccine matter, could be supplied with this remedy free of any charge. My publication, however, instead of producing the desired ef- fect, or rousing up every citizen to make an immediate effort to extinguish aflame, which had already caught in so many different parts of our city, had quite another, and an unex- pected effect. Some thought my publication would be inju- rious to the city, and that it would prevent the people from the country coming to market, others threw out their sur- mise, that I wished to excite an alarm from the most des- picable motive of wishing to gain custom to my vaccine D