The Impact of Yellow Fever on 1800s New Orleans

The Impact of Yellow Fever on 1800s New Orleans 

By Alexandra Rumford 

A good archive is a dive into history in an in-depth way. The Library of Congress is arguably one of the biggest and most well-documented archives in the United States of America and even the world. The Library of Congress is the oldest federal cultural institution in the US and it aims to preserve a large, diverse amount of information and knowledge to help inspire and engage visitors in their intellectual endeavors. It contains over 171 million items, ranging from periodicals to images. There are 74 million manuscripts in total in the Library. Among other things, sheet music, physical artifacts, and legal materials are all documented in the Library and it is a good place to find primary sources about virtually any topic.

 Since there are so many items in the Library, a special classification system was developed in the late 19th century called the Library of Congress Classification, or LCC. Essentially, the materials inside the Library are divided into twenty-one different classes, lettered from A-Z but excluding I, O, W, X, and Y. These classes contain different subject matter, usually a broad idea such as “science” or “law”, which then separates into subclasses marked by two or three-letter combinations. For example, a general class such as art (N) has different subclasses, including architecture (NA). Individual topics are classified further with numbers that can range from one to four digits. This system is used around the world as a library classification system. It is different from the Dewey Decimal System in that the “hierarchical relationships among topics are not shown by numbers that can be continuously subdivided”, rather, they are shown by letters and subclasses. 

The Library of Congress is located in Washington, D.C, across the street from the United States Capitol. When you enter the physical Library, there are four stories of various reading materials and information. The Library is open seven days a week to the general public. The online archive is a little different, as the main way of finding information is to use the search bar at the top of the website. Located at the online URL loc.gov, there are millions of images documented for a researcher to find. When searching for a topic, different filters can be applied to a search. For example, it is possible to filter by either “original format” or “online format”. The original format is the type of media, such as newspaper or periodical. The online format is the way the media is presented, whether that be a PDF, image, or online text. You can also search by location, time period, subject, and language, among other filters. These make it easier to find a resource that may have been buried under thousands of other results. 

The sheer amount of information present in the archive makes it somewhat hard to navigate, however. Although there are resources for essentially every topic, the proliferation of materials poses a unique challenge because you have to search for quite a while to find something you’re looking for. It’s possible to increase the number of search results per page, which makes it easier to scroll, but it is still entirely likely that you’ll end up looking for some time. Also, there seems to be a lack of physical materials (such as artifacts), probably because they’re harder to transfer online due to their inability to scan. Since most people don’t live close to the Library, they have to rely on the website. There are thousands if not millions of images online, which is great, but it would be even better if there were more images of the physical artifacts held in the Library. Additionally, the filters that narrow down searches could be more specific. Although I utilized these filters, the search results were still numbered in the thousands. One other problem was that the website often crashed, showing an error message citing “technical difficulties”. Perhaps this may have been due to the software on my computer, but I had to keep refreshing the site and opening it on new tabs. Despite these shortcomings, the Library of Congress has a cohesive and easy-to-navigate website that contains a veritable fountain of information. 

This information makes it easy to look deeply into the past for primary source documents, records of events that happened lifetimes ago. One such event was the yellow fever epidemic in New Orleans that happened annually for decades during the mid to late 1800s. This recurring epidemic impacted the citizens of New Orleans in many ways, but it had a significant negative impact on social life and society as a whole. For background, yellow fever was spread by mosquitoes that thrived in the muggy and dirty city, but the true cause of the outbreaks wasn’t discovered until the turn of the 20th century. Therefore, yellow fever ravaged the city for years, leading to a collapse of the New Orleans government and social structure. The lack of knowledge on how to effectively treat yellow fever also led to the prevalence of fake news and ineffectual treatments. One such guide, “Dr. Holt’s Prescription for the Treatment of Yellow Fever”, advised a foot bath in which the patient “immersed [themselves] in a hot foot bath from fifteen to thirty minutes…” and drank copious amounts of orange tea. Then, they would ingest senna tea, barley water, castor oil, and peppermint extract, among other oils and hot water. Dr. Holt guaranteed that “yellow fever will be disarmed of its terrors” if the patient followed every step of the regimen religiously. This prescription could not have worked effectively, but many people still used “medical” advice such as this due to fear or ignorance, or the limited technology of the time. Similarly, during the COVID-19 pandemic, many resorted to homemade remedies such as essential oils and herbal teas to fight off infections (despite there being modern medicine available). During every pandemic or epidemic, usually there is a widespread belief that is incorrect, and usually, it harbors some type of xenophobic sentiment. In the case of yellow fever, there wasn’t necessarily one particular group being attacked. However, the idea of “immunity” from yellow fever became a type of social bartering chip. This immunity, also known as acclimation, helped white businessmen get capital, success, and power because lenders knew they wouldn’t suddenly die of fever and leave debts unpaid. On the contrary, immunity only made black slaves more valuable to sell because they were immune to yellow fever and could work in the fields without infection. This double standard justified many slave owners’ rationale to continue supporting slavery. According to a letter written by John McDonogh to a New Orleans newspaper, slavery and the continued selling of slaves was reasonable because “…what master will refuse to do so much good, when it will cost him nothing in the doing it, and afford him at the same time such high gratification…” In this quote, the impact of yellow fever is shown in that white slave owners were allowed to prosper if they were immune, while slaves were sold for higher prices. The racial inequality of yellow fever is still present in the current pandemic, COVID-19. Racial and ethnic minorities are disproportionately affected by COVID, almost 4.7 times more than the average white person, most likely because of living circumstances, types of work, pre-existing health conditions, and limited access to healthcare. Overall, the treatment of minorities during epidemics and pandemics usually led to the rise of xenophobic thinking and discrimination, and the yellow fever outbreaks in New Orleans, although long ago, still resonate today. 

The familial structure was torn apart during the yellow fever epidemic in New Orleans. Families were destroyed, parents and children alike passing away after contracting the “black vomit” while survivors experienced a bittersweet end: mourning their loss while being grateful for immunity. In “The Summer of the Pestilence”, the universal destruction of the familial structure is demonstrated. The father of the family lays on his deathbed, and the family’s only question is if the author can help them move his body away. The author states, “No question I have heard today has struck so sadly upon my ear, heard where it is, as this; for to me it tells of the terrible ‘destruction’ now wasting us.” The prevalence of death in this time desensitized the survivors to loss and made it difficult to maintain a family structure due to the high infection rates and the sheer amount of death. In many pandemics, there is a disintegration of traditional familial groups. Even in ancient Greece, the Great Plague of Athens killed so many Athenians that not only family groups disappeared, but also law and order. 

In conclusion, the yellow fever epidemic of New Orleans had a huge impact on the city’s social and familial connections and caused the proliferation of misinformation and inequality within the social structure. This exact scenario has happened with many pandemics and seemingly will continue to happen. 

Bibliography: 

Emily Perkins and John Magill. “In the Late 1800s, Devastating Yellow Fever Epidemics Forced New Orleans to Confront Its Sanitation Problem.” The Historic New Orleans Collection, 12 May 2020, www.hnoc.org/publications/first-draft/late-1800s-devastating-yellow-fever-epidemics-forced-new-orleans-confront. 

Olivarius, Kathryn. “Immunity, Capital, and Power in Antebellum New Orleans.” American Historical Review (April 2019): 423-455.

Source One: Holt, D. Dr. Holt’s prescription for the treatment of yellow fever … D. Holt, M. D. New- Orleans, October 1. New Orleans, 1843. Pdf. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/resource/rbpe.0240200b/?st=gallery#

Source 2: Armstrong, George D. The summer of the pestilence. A history of the ravages of the yellow fever.” A. D. Philadelphia, J.B. Lippincott & Co, 1856. PDF. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, <www.loc.gov/item/03028195/>.

Source 3: Mcdonogh, John, and African American Pamphlet Collection. Letter of John McDonogh, on African colonization; addressed to the editors of the New Orleans commercial bulletin. New Orleans, Printed at the Tropic Office, 1842. Pdf. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, <www.loc.gov/item/05031457/>.