• DOI:10.2307/2211218
• Corpus ID: 165415029

The Saffron Scourge: A History of Yellow Fever in Louisiana, 1796-1905

@inproceedings{Carrigan1994TheSS,
  title={The Saffron Scourge: A History of Yellow Fever in Louisiana, 1796-1905},
  author={Jo Ann Carrigan},
  year={1994}
}

• J. Carrigan
• Published 1994
• Medicine

The history of American medicine and public health is a relatively new field of endeavor for the academic historian; countless areas remain thus far almost complete­ ly unexplored. The subject of epidemic disease and its impact, for example, deserves a more thorough investigation and consideration as a significant aspect of social and intellectual history. Representing an essay into that particular area, this dissertation involves a study of yellow fever in Louisiana from the first recorded epidemic in New Orleans in 1796 through the final outbreak in the state in 1905. Contemporary sources have supplied the bulk of material utilized. The abundance of references to yellow fever and its effects in virtually every type of historical source is itself a good commentary on the pervasive influ­ ence of the disease. Manuscript material such as personal and business correspondence, diaries and medical treatises, revealed individual reactions to epidemic yellow fever. Newspapers, medical journals, travel accounts, government Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. documents, and contemporary works on yellow fever and health furnished ample information about epidemic conditions as well as an insight into medical and lay ideas, attitudes, and reactions regarding the pestilence and its behavior. Secondary sources included works on Louisiana history, medicine, and public health. Introduced by infected persons or mosquitoes on vessels from Latin American centers of yellow fever endemicity, the disease appeared in New Orleans almost every summer and frequently erupted into a severe outbreak, extending its ravages along the lines of trade and travel to other communities throughout Louisiana and the South. Between 1796 and 1850, New Orleans experienced a few cases every year and some twenty serious epidemics; the 1850's witnessed the climax of yellow fever's activity in Louisi­ ana when the scourge struck violently four times during the decade (1853, 1854, 1855, and 1858). During the second half of the nineteenth century, yellow fever outbreaks diminished in frequency and virulence, appearing in severe epidemic form only on three or four occasions. Neverthe­ less, the constant threat of the disease occupied the attention of Louisianians until its final conquest in 1905.