Bring Out Your Dead: The Great Plague of Yellow Fever in Philadelphia in 1793 PDF

Rating: (8 reviews) Author: J. H. Powell ISBN : 9780812214239 New from $9.96 Format: PDF

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In 1793 a disastrous plague of yellow fever paralyzed Philadelphia, killing thousands of residents and bringing the nation's capital city to a standstill. In this psychological portrait of a city in terror, J. H. Powell presents a penetrating study of human nature revealing itself. Bring Out Your Dead is an absorbing account, form the original sources, of an infamous tragedy that left its mark on all it touched.

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• Table of Contents
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• Series: Studies in Health, Illness, and Caregiving
• Paperback: 334 pages
• Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press (June 1, 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0812214234
• ISBN-13: 978-0812214239
• Product Dimensions: 0.9 x 5.5 x 8.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)

Bring Out Your Dead: The Great Plague of Yellow Fever in Philadelphia in 1793 PDF

This is a great story, full of familiar people (George Washington, Thomas Jefferson), life and death situations, bravery, cowardice, avarice, public hysteria, and stupidity. The author chose to focus on the drama of the event and the clash of medical authorities. But it seems to me that an even greater story lies in the mystery of why no serious effort was made to solve the mystery. That is, given that no one knew what caused the sudden and inexplicable death of thousands of America's finest citizen's, why was the scientific method not applied? Instead, the medical profession selected a host of mostly disastrous therapies, mainly lethal doses of mercury and bloodletting. Possibly as many people died from the "cures" as from the disease. What does this event tell us about our society's willingness to accept authority and mysticism, when a small dose of knowledge would go a whole lot further? This is a fascinating if horrifying portrait of our culture, as well as a great read.

By Gordon Rodda

Frequently when we study history we fail to realize how fragile health was in pre technological early American life. Yellow fever worked its manevolence on the average of an outbreak every 10 years back in the 18th century. The plague of 1793 was particularly bad, and here is its chronicle. The writer, John Powell, was a scholar and reasearch director of the Free Library of Philadelphia. With access to the papers of Dr. Benjamin Rush his account is a factual, and thougough study of the great plague. It is fully indexed, illustrated, and annotated; with an interesting editor's preface in addition to the author's preface, and afterwards.

By Gandalf