The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1878-10-03
THE CITY OF HORRORS.
What 4 Washington Doctor Saw In Nom
phis.

| phis.
DR.. William T. Ramsey, one of the
physicians who went to Memphis with
the corps of Washington nurses, has re-
turned to Washington, in company with
DR.. TIP Pease and Miss Wallis. The
following interview with DR.. Ramsey dis
closes some of the horrors and necessi-
ties of that plague-stricken city:
"Before reaching Memphis, even when
FIVE miles out, the air was laden with the
yellowfever poison, and as we approach
ed the city the stencil was absolutely
sickening. DR.. Pease and myself went
to Peabody Hotel, the only one now open,
and were shown into room from which
dead body had just been removed.
Vessels of black vomit were standing
about the room, but the bed-clothes had
been changed. The hotel itself is
perfect pest-house, and victims of the
disease are in two.thirds of the rooms.
Sulphur pans are kept burning in the
halls, and the clothes, bedding, &C., are
constantly disinfected, but they cannot
get help enough in the hotel to do one
half what ought to be DONE"
"What seems to be their greatest
need"
Provisions, clothing, physicians, mon
ey, nurses and medicines, and about in
the order named. The best thing that
can be done now is to send plenty of
provisions and clothing. The negroes
and many poor whites, for section of
$50 miles around Memphis have Aocked
in there hearing they could get something
to eat, and as for clothes, hundreds Of
poor people are going about the streets
especially colored women-with hardly
anything on at all. The sights in this
respect are distressing"
"Where do these people 60 to who
comein from the country?"
"They wander about the city in bands,
aud when they find vacant house they
break into it and take possession and
appropriate whatever they want. The
authorities are powerless to prevent such
outrages."
"About the physicians ?"
"There are seyenty-five there now from
abroad and fully one hundred and fifty
more are needed. The volunteer physi-
clans are doing noble work, and with
out pay, except such as are paid by their
home friends and societies. They are
not paid by any in Memphis, and don't
ask or expect it. At the same time how
ever, q volunteer physician going there
ought to be literally supplied with funds,
for he is under constant personal ex-
penses."
GLOW did you protect yourself from
the fever 2
"On my arrival Mr.. Langstaf, Presi-
dent of the Howards, and one of the
noblest men God ever let live, urged
my immediate return, but I determined
to stay. DR.. Pease and myself took each
of US thirty grains of quinine and 120
drops of tincture of iron every day, and
the only effect it had was to increase
the perspiration. Such doses could not
be taken here, which leads me to believe
that it is in some sense powerful anti
dote to the fever. Of course we used car
bolic acid freely as q disinfectant. l
wore linen suits, changing them every
day, and they turned fairly yellow from
the effects of the iron. At night we
wore thick wells, soaked in carbolic acid,
! over our faces, for there is no language
| to describe the awful stencil in the city
1t is now filthy to the last degree. The
bayous which set in from the river and
the surface drainage with which they are
filled, the uncleansed streets and alleys,
rotton wooden pavements, deep dust of
the macadamized streets, dead animals
and putrefying human bodies and the
half.buried dead all combine to make the
atmosphere thick with poison and some
thing fearful to endure. Bonfres of tar.
barrels and sulphur fires are kept burn
ing all over the city, but with little effect.
Nearly all the physicians and nurses
smoke all the cigars they can. That
helps them little while visiting the sick.
On Popular, Carroll and Vance streets,
for instance, where the better classes live,
the plague is not so malignant, but even
there terror prevails and great suffering
Ills experienced. On Winchester street
the scenes are terrible. On Monroe
street I found five women all sick with
the fever whose husbands had fed"
us that common ?"
"Quite common among the lower class
es. One can have no idea of the panic
existing there. Indeed, it is no uncom-
mon thing for the sick to be entirely de-
serted. When it is noticed that there
are no signs of life about house, it is
broken open and the dead are found in
advanced stages of putrefaction. The
work of their removal is q job before
which the stoutest quail"
"Who suffer the most-the women or
the men?
"The women by far. Of the number
attacked fully 80 per cent. died. They
hardly ever get we'll, and suffer much
more than the men from hemorrhages,
and the children come next"