Evening star., 1911-08-27
CHOLERA ON THE BORDER.
A New Yorker's Reminiscence of
the Visitation of 1849 in the Wes..

From the New York sun.
The cholera epidemic of 1Sts was a
merciless pestilence in the west said a
New Yorker. who is perhaps, the Only
person in this city who witnessed the
visitation of the disease in one of the
prairie towns of what was then, the bor-
der country. There was not a single
sanitary device to stop the onsweep of
the malady In our town. My father and
his partner and two other physicians
constituted the medical force of the little
town, with q population of less than a
thousand. and of the county.
AT that time farmers lived so far
apart that there were no country doctors.
The streams were shallow and sluggish
in the dry season. and when they became
swollen by rains they were not to be
forded, and such a thing as a bridge was
unknown. we'll in the yard of cit-
zen of the town was luxury. 1t fire.
quently supplied half a dozen families.
When the epidemic came it made in
roads among the living like the course
of an avalanche in a forest The only
nurses were neighbors and servants, and
these often were stricken while they
were trying to alleviate the suffering of
those who were already helpless. The at
tendants thus stricken were often buried
in the same graves with the victims, and
al the same time.
There were no drug stores. The coun-
try merchant carried the staple patent
medicines of the day! The village doc
tors had such antidotes and remedies for
the scourge as they were able to get or
compound. AS the town was remote
from places where medicines were pur-
chased they not infreuuently ran short
OF needed medcaments.
MY fathers partner, young man
who had recently come into the country,
in returning one day from a patient out
of town. was stricken down with the dis
ease ond fell from his horse. The animal
galloped home riderless. That told the
tale. \ posse that could be spared from
nursing was sent to find the body. The
prairie wolves found it first and there
was hardly enough of the BODY left for
interment
While the California gold fever was at
its most excitable stage an old physician
Of the town went to the fields of fortune
He took with him his old body servant
The doctor died In the gulches. He had
accumulated some Of the gold for which
he had searched This was intrusted to
the old negro, who returned from San
Francisco by way of Cape Horn, and
travelled from New York to the home of
his old master, carrying his treasure wit
him.
He reached the stricken little town
while his mistress was Ill with cholera
He threw the gold at her bedside and at
once began ministering to her. She died
in the servants arms. The negro did not
know that his wife was already dead
from the same disease. He was over
come while trying to reach his old mate
and died before he reached her room
The three were buried side by side in a
field.
Some citizens We're so terror stricken
that they moved to the prairies and lived
in such shelters as they were able to
construct. More than half the population
of the little town and the county died in
that epidemic. Many were buried in
trenches. Few. if any. had the benefit of
clergy, and frequently those who dug the
trenches and graves and acted as pail
bearers died few hours later People
Of this time cannot conceive of the ter
rors of the plague that swept over the
border in 1S49.''