Ship fever

“ A very small apparatus, in laws and officers, would be sufficient to prevent the landing of persons affected by the ship fever in our cities, and the more dangerous practice, of ships pouring streams of pestilential air, from their holds, upon the citizens who live near our docks and wharves. ”

“ A ship is considered as infected which has plague, cholera or yellow fever on board, or which has presented one or more cases of plague or cholera within seven days, or a case of yellow fever at any time during the voyage. ”

“ The suddenness with which fever sometimes attacks individuals on board a ship, or even an entire ship’s crew, on the approach of the vessel to a shore where this poison is generated in large quantity, and in a high state of concentration, illustrates its operation, perhaps, in a still more striking manner. ”

“ When, from a neglect of the means above mentioned, an infectious fever comes actually to prevail, and the infection, perhaps, adheres obstinately to the ship in spite of cleanliness, good air, and diet, and all the other means, which, if employed in due time, would have prevented it, then some measures are to be taken for eradicating this subtile poison. ”

“ The second of the diseases by which passenger-ships have Cholera on shipboardbeen infested is cholera. The open air generally puts an end to typhus or ship fever, whereas cholera is controlled by no such corrective. ”

“ In connection with this branch of the subject, another source of the development of ship-fever demands notice. In the cabins and hovels the homes of these famine-stricken people typhus fever raged a long time, and doubtless prevails extensively yet, produced by the same general and specific causes as have been described. The emigrants leave for the seaboard, and straightway enter the ships, unpurified and unwashed, reeking with the fever miasma of their habitations. Into the crowded and confined steerage they hasten for rest and escape from starvation and death. ”

“ The crew of the Eclair contracted Yellow Fever on the coast of Africa, and a number of them died. The remainder, sick and well, landed at Bona Vista, one of the Cape de Verde Islands, and the vessel underwent a process of washing, whitewashing, and fumigating. Nevertheless, on the return of the ship's company, the disease broke out again with equal intensity, and the vessel was ordered home. Sixty-five out of 146 officers and men, who composed the crew, died of the disease before reaching Portsmouth, and twenty-three were sick at the time of arrival. ”

“ Those who have put these methods strictly in practice, have been sensible of their great utility; and the most exact attention is necessary, as a single infected man, or even any part of his clothing, may spread sickness through a whole ship’s company. When we reflect what havock an infectious fever sometimes makes in a ship, it will appear 252 how very important this fort of attention is ”

“ In place of three or four different squadrons, English, French, Brazilian, Portuguese and American, riding at their moorings, like a flock of water-fowl, not a solitary ship was discoverable: nor was there a sign of movement of any kind, on the whole bay. This we thought ominous of bad news, but happily without just cause. The first boat from the shore, assured us of the good health of the port. Whatever malaria may exist has lost its malignancy, and exhibits itself only in cases of imprudence and special exposure, in the milder types of intermittent fever. ”

“ We learn the reason why the disease sometimes spreads through a whole ship's crew, apparently from one or more affected persons. It is either because they have been confined to small and close berths by bad weather, or because the fever has been protracted to a typhus or chronic state, or because the bodies of the whole crew are impregnated with morbid miasmata, and thus predisposed to have the disease excited in the manner that has been mentioned. ”

“ If there has been any sickness of an infectious or contagious character, the vessel is examined by the Customs medical officer, who, if he find infectious cases on board, communicates with the medical officer of the ship-hospital at Greenwich. But the arrangements in force at this moment for preventing the importation of disease into the port of London are exceedingly defective, insomuch as—unless the disease be cholera, plague, or yellow fever—there exists no power by which an infected vessel can be detained at the entrance to the port. ”

“ But there is one more cause of this fever which remains to be mentioned, and that is, the sudden assembling of a great number of persons together of different habits and manners, such [273] as the soldiers of the American army were in the years 1776 and 1777. Doctor Blane informs us, in his observations upon the diseases of seamen, “that it sometimes happens that a ship with a long established crew shall be very healthy, yet if strangers are introduced among them, who are also healthy, sickness will be mutually produced.” ”

“ Under the most favorable circumstances it is impossible to maintain perfect purity of atmosphere between decks, even when ports are open, and every device is adopted to secure the greatest amount of ventilation. But a crowded emigrant sailing-ship of twenty years since, with fever on board!—the crew sullen or brutal from very desperation, or paralyzed with terror of the plague—the miserable passengers unable to help themselves, or afford the least relief to each other; one-fourth, or one-third, or one-half of the entire number in different stages of the disease; many dying, some dead ”

“ It is easy to understand that, as a general rule, seamen are less exposed than other classes to any of the injurious effects of heat, but it is remarkable that they should enjoy complete exemption. Cases are not very uncommon among seamen going ashore in hot countries, but I have not found a well-authenticated case of sun-stroke arising on board ship; and cases of thermic fever in the Red Sea usually arise in the engine-room of a steamer rather than among the men on deck. ”

“ But, as the cotton contained in these bales may not only have been collected from different villages at different times, but packed up under various circumstances relative to the materials used for embalage, and the persons employed in embaling or steeving them; it may easily be conceived how the cargo of a ship, coming even from a place where the plague actually rages, may be only partially infected, or not infected at all. The warmest advocate for contagion never contended for every bale of a ship’s cargo being equally infectious. ”

“ All strangers at Rome are cautioned not to cross the Pontine marshes after the heat of the day is over. Sixteen of a ship's crew, touching at one of the West India islands, slept on shore several nights, and thirteen of them died of yellow fever in a few days, while of two hundred and eighty, who were freely ashore during the day, not a single case of illness occurred. ”

“ The people who remain, on ship-board, upon the open coast, if not accustomed to the climate, are liable to the attack of an inflammatory fever, which is not often fatal, unless the concurrence of unfavourable circumstances makes it so. ”

“ FEVER SHIP
There’ll be no weepin’ gells ashore when our ship sails,
Nor no crews cheerin’ us, standin’ at the rails,
’N’ no Blue Peter a-foul the royal stay,
For we’ve the Yellow Fever—Harry died to-day.—
It’s cruel when a fo’c’s’le gets the fever!
’N’ Dick has got the fever-shakes, ’n’ look what I was told
(I went to get a sack for him to keep him from the cold) :
‘Sir, can I have a sack?’ I says, ‘for Dick ’e’s fit to die.’
‘Oh, sack be shot!’ the skipper says, ‘jest let the rotter lie!’—
It’s cruel when a fo’c’s’le gets the fever!{16} ”

“ The breaking out of the fever has produced, even among us hardened to misfortune, something like a panic. The crew are in mortal terror of the infection and will not allow passengers to go on the forecastle, as was their wont. The ship being sent to sea purposely shorthanded, the owner relying on saving something by getting the emigrants to help, a few of our lads, who had been given bunks in the forecastle and allowed sailors’ rations, have been warned, if they go down the hatchways to see their people, they need not return. The captain and cabin passengers never leave the poop. ”

“ Several thousand persons were attacked by the disease; it was rarely fatal. Persons who had been affected, when convalescing, felt languid and debilitated, both in body and mind. Yellow fever at this period was fatal at Key West, East Florida, in the United States. Early in 1841 remittent fever occurred among the crew of the ‘Wanderer’ a ship belonging to the Royal Navy, chiefly among the boats’ crews who had been employed in the rivers Nunez and Pongos. ”

“ Infectious diseases are sometimes caused by the foul air arising from a ship's hold, owing to the decomposition of vegetable substances in a hot climate, or to an accumulation of filth, without ventilation, when crowded with passengers. The malignant, pestilential disease, caused by inhaling this noxious atmosphere, often sweeps off portions of the crew and passengers; and those who visit a ship under such circumstances, and breathe the poisonous gases, even in a northern latitude, are liable to be attacked by this fatal disease. ”

“ It certainly cannot be accounted strange that infectious diseases, once started among them, should have run through their ranks like fire, taking both old and young. Nor is it strange that—though more inured to hardship and the conditions of sea life—with the extreme and unusual exposure of boat service on the New England coast in mid winter, often wading in the icy water and living aboard ship in a highly infected atmosphere, the seamen should have succumbed to disease in almost equal ratio with the colonists. ”

“ Exceptional cases of epidemics breaking out on ships can not be regarded as arising from contagion from person to person, but always from previous communication of the ship or its crew or passengers with some place infected with the disease. ”

“ I have, however, known a few instances of bilious fevers in men who never had been on shore from the time they left England; I have even known men of the same description attacked with intermittent fevers, which are supposed to depend still more on land air. This is perhaps owing either to the quantity of water in a great ship, part of which is always more or less putrid, or to the fresh-cut wood of the country taken on board for fuel, the steam of all which must resemble a good deal the effluvia of woods and marshes, which are supposed to give rise to intermittents. ”

“ This hospitable Chinese informed us it was at the period of our visit the least unhealthy season in Nangkauri harbour: that as soon as the S.W. monsoon sets in, all foreign ships hurry away, through dread of the illnesses that follow in its track. However, feverish attacks are of daily occurrence throughout the 58year. Of the thirteen men who formed the crew of the barque, ten were laid up with fever. The disorderly habits of life, however, of foreign visitors are much more to blame for these frequent attacks of disease than the unhealthiness of the climate. ”

“ I have seen so many instances of filth and 277 crowding in ships and hospitals in the West Indies, without contagion being produced, and which in Europe could hardly have failed to produce it, or to render it more malignant, that I am convinced there is something in tropical climates unfavourable to the production and continuance of infectious fevers55. The ships which bring this fever from Europe in general get rid of it soon after arriving in a warm climate; and nothing but the highest degree of neglect can continue or revive it. ”

“ But if the state of infection renders separation necessary, the best part for the accommodation of the sick, in a ship of the line, is under the forecastle in a warm climate, and on the fore part of the main deck in a cold one. 263 When they are under the forecastle, however, they ought to occupy only one side, as they would otherwise be disturbed by the men who must pass to and from the head, and the men in health would, in this case, be exposed also to contagion. As infection is most likely to arise among the sick, attention to cleanliness and air is doubly requisite where they lie ”

“ Some time before a man's arrival a health sheet is sent to me on which is indicated any disease which he may have had during his period of service, together with information as to whether or not he may have been exposed to anything infectious in the interval immediately before he is sent to us. Any treatment for minor chronic ailments which may be in progress is continued in the ship. A general disinfection of kit and a daily reporting for twenty-one days for examination makes it practically impossible for a new rating to bring disease to the Ship's Company. ”

“ It would appear also, from what has been formerly mentioned102 that those men, who have been exposed to that sort of infection that prevails in ships in cold climates are more particularly the subjects of the yellow fever when they arrive in a hot climate. It is farther in proof of the same opinion, that there are medical gentlemen, natives of the West Indies, who have hardly ever seen it, their practice lying at a distance from any sea-port town where strangers usually arrive. Of these strangers, those who are young, fat, and plethoric, are most apt to be attacked ”

“ At 10 A.M. we took a pilot on board: he informed us the disorder at Philadelphia is the yellow fever, imported in a french schooner from the West Indies; some of the passengers of this vessel died of this fatal disorder, at a lodging-house in Water-street, and communicated the infection to the family. It is now spreading rapidly through the city, in all directions. ”