Medical letter September 7

Newspapers in the late 18th century were less able than today's media to reflect the current anxieties of the day. By September 7, 1793, the outlines of epidemic were evident and the first wave of panic about to begin. But the lead article in the American Daily Advertiser was a discussion of the causes of typhus by an anonymous author Araeteus, Jr. (Araeteus was a celebrated Ancient Greek doctor.) However, it was apropos in this sense: it sought to prove that putrefaction making the air impure caused typhus. Benjamin Rush would soon argue that yellow fever took hold in the city in the same way.

On the same page as the letter of Araeteus, Jr., is a report from Charleston, South Carolina, on the aid that city was giving to refugees from Santa Domingo who had just landed in the city. Modern historians generally blame those refugees for bringing yellow fever to Philadelphia. This article reminds us that refugees went to other American ports but only Philadelphia had a yellow fever epidemic in 1793.

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