Not the War We Expected
By: Jordan Jones
Tags: Public Health, Pandemic, Family History, Genealogy, Influenza

Origins of the “Spanish” Flu

It’s unclear where the virus originated. Due to the limitations gathering data in 1918, scientists have not been able to determine the origin of the virus. One thing epidemiologists agree on is that it certainly did not start in Spain. Much of the world was at war and military censorship stopped reporting of the flu. Spain was not at war, and when the pandemic reached them, they reported on it and it ended up being associated with them.

One prominent theory — supported by early medical evidence of cases of a new and deadly flu — is that it started at Fort Riley, Kansas, and spread from there with US troop movements.

“Emergency hospital during influenza epidemic (NCP 1603).” Camp Funston, Fort Riley, Kansas, circa 1918. Otis Historical Archives, National Museum of Health and Medicine. Photograph. https://www.flickr.com/photos/medicalmuseum/3300169510/

Whatever the source, the disease spread quickly. Unlike most other influenzas, it killed people in the prime of life (20–50 years old) while sparing many older and younger people. In some cities, such as St. Louis, preparedness and lock-downs minimized the impact.

In October of that year, [Dr. Max] Starkloff [the city’s health commissioner] shut the city [of St. Louis] down. He issued an order closing movie theaters, pool halls, schools, churches, bars, conventions and any large gatherings. Washington University canceled a football game and later suspended classes. (Messenger)

In other cities, such as Philadelphia, reckless disregard for the risk of the virus led to many deaths.

700 would die in one day in Philadelphia. (Crosby, 53).

Family History

When I began doing family history research, one of the first stories my mother told me was about the death in 1919 of her grandmother — Alice Margaret (Gregg) Johnson — and then, three days later, of her aunt — Bethene Blanche (Johnson) Harris. This happened nine years before my mother was born, but it was a defining event in the family and the effects of the losses would linger for decades.

When Blanche died, she left an invalid husband, Ralph, and a two-year-old son, Ralph Jr.

Ralph Sr. had been kicked in the head by a horse some time after Ralph Jr. was born. Because it was felt that Ralph Sr. could not raise Ralph Jr., my mom’s cousin Ralph Jr. was raised by John E. Young and Louellen (Johnson) Young, who picked him up at the dual funeral of his mother and grandmother.

My mother’s stories were correct, but — as with many family stories — incomplete. Through further research, I found another cousin who died of the Spanish flu at the age of 8 and another cousin who died while in the medical corps of the US Army at Fort Riley, Kansas, probably of the pandemic at its source.

… the most likely site of origin was Haskell County, Kansas, an isolated and sparsely populated county in the southwest corner of the state, in January 1918. — John M. Barrie, “The site of origin of the 1918 influenza pandemic and its public health implications”

Robert Dudley Atkins (1893–1918)

Robert Dudley Atkins was born 27 August 1893 in Genoa, Nance County, Nebraska, the son of John William and Lora Elizabeth (Gregg) Atkins. He was a younger brother to Virgil Ruby Atkins and John William Atkins Jr, and an older brother to the fraternal twins Allen Bryan Atkins and Alice Hazel Atkins. The family grew and prospered on a farm in rural Nance County.

On 5 June 1917, as the war was spinning up for Americans, Robert Atkins registered for the draft. He listed his occupation as “druggist apprentice.” It is unclear whether he was drafted or enlisted. What is clear is that very soon he was in the Army as a Private working in the medical department.

Six and a half months after registering for the draft, he died at Fort Riley, Kansas, on 16 January 1918. He was brought home to be buried in Valley View Cemetery, Genoa, Nance County, Nebraska.

Flag-Draped Casket of Robert Dudley Atkins. Personal collection of the author. Note the photograph of Robert Dudley Atkins in the center.

Charlotte M. Gregg (1910–1918)

Charlotte M. Gregg was Robert Dudley Atkins’s first cousin. She was the middle of five children of William Blakeway Gregg and his wife Emma Carolina (Larson) Gregg, and was born 20 Mar 1910 on the family farm near Ord, Valley County, Nebraska. When she got ill and died of the Spanish influenza of 30 Dec 1918, her younger brother Russell Boyd Gregg (1918–2009) was not yet three months old.

“Charlotte Gregg,” The Ord Quiz, (Ord, Nebraska, 2 January 1919), p. 1; cited on FindAGrave Memorial 154916678.

Russell told me when I met him that the loss of his sister was a constant point of discussion in his family when he grew up. Russell Gregg became an agronomist with the Agency for International Development, traveling the world helping impoverished people produce more viable crops to feed their families. I cannot help but imagine that his desire to help others developed out of the loss his family experienced in the Spanish flu.

Alice Margaret (Gregg) Johnson (1870–1919)

Nels Johnson family. Left to right: Wallace Gregg Johnson, Nels E. Johnson, Bethene Blanche Johnson, Alice Margaret (Gregg) Johnson, Helen Kjerstine Johnson. Personal collection of the author.

Alice Margaret Gregg was one of the members of the older generation. Unlike her nephew, Robert Dudley Atkins (aged 25), and her niece, Charlotte M. Gregg (aged 8), Alice was a parent.

Alice Johnson was born 29 April 1870 in West Nodaway, Nodaway, Adams County, Iowa, to Robert Washington Gregg, a veteran of the 25th Iowa volunteers during the Civil War, and Helen Edwina Arnold. Between 1883 and 1885, the Greggs moved from Iowa to Nebraska. She would have been thirteen to fifteen years old. She was the second eldest. Her sister Lora Elizabeth Gregg had been born in 1868, and so would have been fifteen to seventeen years old. The younger siblings included William Blakeway Gregg (born 1872), Archie G. Gregg (born 1875), Esther Emily Gregg (born 1879), and Blanche Cora Gregg (born 1883).

According to family lore, Robert Washington Gregg was called “Gypsy Gregg” because he kept moving. By 1888, he had moved the family to a homestead near Alliance, Box Butte County, Nebraska. In addition to farming, he ran the Post Office at the eponymous Gregg, Box Butte County, Nebraska from 1890–1893.

Alice married Nels Johnson on 26 September 1888 at her father’s homestead in Alliance, Box Butte County, Nebraska. Alice was 18; her husband Nels was 24. Nels lived in Nance County, where Alice had grown up. He was a Swedish immigrant, having come to America in 1868 at the age of four with his parents and three older siblings.

He bought a [160 acre] farm a mile west of his father’s place, farming there some years. He sold it and moved to Ord, Nebraska, in December, 1901, where he bought a farm of five hundred ten acres four miles north of Ord, in Valley County. — Schlichtemeier, 13

They ran one farm, sold it, and bought another, three times larger. And they raised their family. They had three children: Bethene Blanche Johnson was born in 1892, Helen Kjerstine Johnson in 1894, and, finally, Wallace Gregg Johnson in 1903. The family prospered, and Alice Johnson was active in local women’s groups, including the P. E. O. Sisterhood and the Laurel Kensington Club.

In the last months of her life, Alice was dealing with a number of health issues in the family. She had been ill. Then, her son-in-law Ralph was injured on the farm. While he was recuperating, many of the members of the family became ill with the flu.

Then, Alice herself became ill with the Spanish flu and died.

Bethene Blanche (Johnson) Harris (1892–1919)

Bethene Blanche Johnson was the eldest of the children of Nels and Alice Johnson. After graduating from Ord High School in 1912, she received a teacher’s certificate and taught second grade. She married Frederick Ralph Harris — who went by Ralph — on 28 September 1913, and they moved to Lincoln. Ralph was a cashier and later a book keeper. At the time of his registration for the draft, the family was living at 2758 Franklin St., Lincoln. On 3 March 1917, they had a boy, Frederick Ralph Harris Jr.

In early 1919, Ralph and Bethene moved their young family to Bethene’s father’s farm near Ord. They took over running the farm and Bethene’s parents moved into the town of Ord to enjoy a less strenuous life.

But it was not to be:

It was but a few months ago that Mrs. Johnson had a terrible sickness and Ralph Harris got kicked [by a horse and had brain surgery] and for weeks his life was almost despaired of and he has barely recovered his normal health. Mr. [Nels] Johnson has been far from well since having the flu a few weeks ago and both Mr. Harris and the son Wallace Johnson have been critically ill in recent days. — “Mother and Daughter Die,” Ord Quiz

When her mother fell ill, Bethene attended to her. Bethene herself then became ill. Helen Johnson, Bethene’s sister, and my grandmother was sent for. She had been teaching in Blue Hill, Nebraska. She dropped everything and came down to nurse her mother and sister.

Alice died on 29 March 1919; her daughter Bethene died on 1 April 1919. The minister had been told to come to conduct a funeral. Between his being notified and his arriving there was another death. Mother and daughter were buried in the Ord Cemetery on 2 April 1919. Ralph Harris was barely well enough to attend the funeral of his wife and mother-in-law. Ralph Jr. was picked up at the funeral and taken to his new home with the Youngs. He grew up as Fred Young, and became a professor of English language and literature.

Family Overview

Robert Washington Gregg and his wife Helen Edwina (Arnold) Gregg had six children, from Lora Elizabeth the eldest (born 1868) to Blanche Cora the youngest (born 1883). All of their children — with the exception of Archie — had children. Twenty-two grandchildren in all.