Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1884-12-05

THE DREADFUL PLAGUE WHICH SEVERE
DROUGHT HAS CAUSED IN WESTERN VIRGINIA
AND EASTERN KENTUCKY.
despatch from Hinton, West Virginia,
under date of Nov % says: New rumors Of
the plague in the extreme southern part Of
this state, in Western Virginia aud in East.
ern Kentucky are fast giving way to startling
facts. The centre Of the afflicted district is
in the centre Of Dickinson county, Virginia.
10 the midst of the Cumberland mountains
and over 100 miles from the nearest railway
station. The greatest desttuton prevails
aud the cold weather is sure to cause such a
mortality as even the present state of affairs
has not begun to equal. The last rainfall
WAS on August 3, unless it has fallen within a
week. The last person arriving here from
that section was a commercial traveller for a
Baltimore house, who left l. L4esburg one week
ago yesterday. He says business is at a
standstill. Crops are a failure. Many fam
lies have not bushel Of grain nor head of
live stock left Medicine are exhausted
aud physicians are nearly all dead from over
work. Corpses lie for days unburied. In
many instances water is carried three and
four miles in buckets. There il no running
water left, that which is used being found in
pools in the deeper holes in creek bottoms.
Louisa river has not sufficient water in it to
10y tons Indeed it is asserted that there is
not live fish in six or seven counties. As
the water evaporatod, that which was left
naturally retained all the salts and minerals.
1t is believed that drinking this water caused
the disease.
The disease is not contagious. That belief
arose from the fact that every body was taken
with the same symptoms, the ignorant popu-
laiinu not reasoning as to the real cause.
Lack Of sufficient and proper food greatly in
creases the mortality. The latest estimates
place the number OF deaths at 1000. The
patient is seized with vertigo, heavy fever,
completJ Inconsistencies, With involuntary
discharges much colored with blood. Death
ensues IN about ten hours, the victim suffer
ing intensely. The scenes Of distress are
terrible. All the people are poor mountain
eers, most of them living in log houses of
two rooms, occupied by from two to a dozen
persons. Iu some instances the disease has
swept of whole families, the last members
to die being left uuburisd.
Up the mountain passes and along tho
small streams in the valleys are to be found
scores of houses unoccupled because their
owners are dead. Animals suffer from the
same symptoms as the men. The cries Of
the children begging for food are pitful. II
relief is sent it must be soon, before the
roads are blocked with snow There is little
of the plague in West Virginia. only portions
of four counties suffering
The Louisville Courier-Journal recently
sent a staff correspondent to Investigate the
reported rayages OF the disease, aud he sends
the following from Williamsburg, Kentucky
W. c. Lester, a prominent attorney of this
place, has just arrived from Mount Pleasant.
the county seat of Harlan. He says that in
Harlan poupty the rnyaotg appaar a le the
worst 1t il most fatal and prevails to the
greatest extent up about the head waters of the
Poor Fork and Clover Greek, in the noun
talns about % miles from Mount Pleasant.
THIS large territory is terribly afflicted, the
people dying rapidly. In one neighbOrhood
twelve persons died IN a single day in the
latter part Of last week, and there were
scarcely well people enough to make them
coffins and bury them. On Browns creek,
which rises in Harlan county, and emptes
into the Cumberland river, in Bell county,
the disease is raging with frightful rapidlty,
aud there is no means of keeping a record Of
the dead. All along the banks of the stream
people are sick, aud physicians and medicines,
outside OF herbs and roots with whose cuTa-
tive properties the natives are acquainted,
are unknown aud unobtainable. The cpl
domic is rapidly spreading in Harlan county.
Mr.. Lester says that no one seemed to know
the exact nature Of the pestilence. Most Of
the people called it "fiux, and it is probably
an aggravated form of that disease. 1t be-
gins with gripping pains in the stomach, fol
lowed by deblitating diarrLoei and swell
lDg Of the throat aud If not fatal in three or
four days the patient as rule RECEIVERS. All
reports agree as to the cause Of the epidemic,
1t J,iug attributed to the use Of impure wa.
Ter by the natives. The season has been un-
usually dry, the streams, as a rule, consisting
only OF narrow threads Of murky, foul.smell.
lug and toul-'astiug wnter The corn crop
IN all the counties named is good, and starva-
tion and want only exist because the people
can spare no time from the sick to gather it,
No mills are running on the smaller streams.