184
STATISTICS OF THE JAIL POPULATION OF BENGAL FROM 1859 TO 1876.
[ Section III.
fevers known to be enteric ; the fever was not attended by the characteristic eruption, and
bowel affections did not complicate the course of the fever.
In my Cholera Report of 1868, I noticed a parallel case, that of Her Majesty's 79th Regi-
ment in 1866-67, well illustrating the effects of a localised malaria. It throws light on the case
of the 85th ; and no suggestion was made that this outbreak was enteric in its nature, or
resulted from the use of impure water.
It was attributed, probably with reason, to early marching and the damp of an unhealthy
camping ground. Nine men died from the fever. As a sequel to the fever, phthisis was in
some cases developed, and 14 men died or were invalided on this account ; and, also as sequelæ,
there were 230 admissions on account of rheumatism and 54 from orchitis.
Historical record of Epidemic Typhus and Relapsing Fevers of India, and
their association with Malarious Fevers and Famine.
Besides the typhus period 1852—56, during which contagious fevers established themselves
on the Punjab Frontier, and showed themselves in Rajpootana,
in Rohilcund and in the Himalayas, the history of the past sixty
years brings up three special occasions on which typhus was
spread over India from the Himalayas, through the North-
Western Provinces and Rajpootana, to Catch and Guzerat. These periods are 1816—20, 1836
—
38, and 1859—65. The history of the first period in Western India, has been preserved by the
publication, in the first volume of the transactions of the Medical and Physical Society of
Bombay, of the memoirs communicated to the Medical Board by the officers of the Northern.
Division of the Presidency who saw and treated the fevers. We can supplement these for Northern
India by jail records, which prove the presence of typhus at this time in the North-West, and
which we know to have prevailed then or very shortly afterwards in the interior of the Hima-
layas as the Mahamurree of Kumaon. Ranken's account of the Pali Plague of 1836-37, contains
the history of typhus spread from the foot of the hills to Western Rajpootana, and I find the
disease as late as 1838 decimating the prisoners of the Agra Jail. The third general outbreak,
commencing in November 1859, has been the subject of many interesting memoirs, chiefly
by medical officers who have met with it in the jails under their charge.
In all three periods we find the association of epidemic malaria, famine and typhus. But
if I should assert that famine in each case has developed the typhus, the facts, as far as I know
them, would not bear out the statement. In 1859, I can trace contagious fever in several jails
of the North-West early in the spring ; and this was the same in character as that which broke
out so universally in these jails in November of the same year, which were, as the rule,
quite beyond the limit of the province of the epidemic malaria of October and Nov-
ember. The year 1859 was characterised by the abundance of the harvests in Central
India ; and yet it is possible that typhus may have prevailed before the great fever
of the year, which I take to have been a malarious fever, was developed. It was not until
1861 that the population generally was suffering from famine. So in the previous period ; the
great famine was in 1837-38, the typhus began in 1836, and the malaria epidemic was the
fever of 1834-35. In the earliest period, also, the malaria epidemic of 1815-16 seems to have
preceded the famine and the contagious fever, which was said to have taken on its special
character from the debilitated state of the population.
In the north, the famine years 1818-19 succeeded the famine year 1803. Colonel Baird
Smith, in the report of 1861, reviewing the famines of Bengal,
remarks (paragraph 27) : " Regarding the drought of 1818-19,
I have been able to learn even less than of that of 1803. I can
judge of its severity only from the references made to it by
intelligent native informants, who invariably placed these among the very bad years."
The failure of the rains of 1816 is, however, described in Jameson's report.
"In the Upper Provinces," he writes, "the extraordinary scantiness of the rains was yet
more remarkable, and was attended by more deplorable results. In the month of July a few
showers fell, but they were partial and of short continuance. From Benares upwards, the
districts within the Doab, and those west of the Jumna, were dried up by the long-continued
and unceasing heats. The parching westerly wind kept blowing through August and the first
fortnight of September. Not a shower fell ; and so excessive was the heat, that tatties were
in use at Futtehghur, Coel, and other stations during the whole of this period. Since 1803,
the memorable year of the commencement of Lord Lake's campaigns, no such season had been
experienced." A universally spread epidemic of malarious fever followed. He continues :
"It was not to be expected that so great a deviation from the common course of nature
should prove wholesome to the human constitution. Sickness exhibited itself in the shape of
a bilious remittent fever of a violent inflammatory type, accompanied, like the yellow fever of
the West Indies, with suffusion of the skin, and, unless when
cut short by bleeding and other powerful auxiliaries, rapidly
running its course, and, in spite of every remedy, terminating
fatally at the end of two or three days. The mortality pro-
duced by it in Delhi, Saharunpore, Futtehghur, Benares, and
other large cities was very great. But Cawnpore was the chief seat of its ravages among
Europeans. The 87th and 66th Regiments suffered dreadfully. From the time of their reaching
The association of epidemic male-
rious fever with famines and conta-
gious fevers. Epidemic periods.
Malarious fevers, famine, and con-
tagious fevers between 1815 and
1820. Famine of 1818-19.
Epidemic malaria preceding the
famine. The fever in the Gangetic
provinces, Northern and Western
India.