Diphtheria

In 1735, a young child in Kingston, New Hampshire, came down with a cold and all of New England would get sick. The Great Throat Distemper of 1735-1740 was one of the greatest epidemics ever to terrify New England.

The disease, which modern physicians recognise as diphtheria, first showed up in the spring of 1735. The symptoms started out looking like a cold that produced a very sore throat. But they then escalated to lost appetite and fever. The bacteria then attacked the throat, nose and lungs – poisoning the tissue and killing it off. The coating of dead tissue eventually interfered with breathing and killed the sufferer.

THE THROAT DISTEMPER

Travel patterns in New England made it relatively simple for epidemiologists to track the spread of the throat distemper. Ernest Caulfield described its path in his The “Throat Distemper” of 1735-1740.

Most of the old towns between Casco Bay and Boston were connected by a road which ran roughly parallel to the coast and far enough inland to avoid the many small inlets, marsh lands, and sandy dunes. A few weeks after the Kingston outbreak the disease invaded Kittery and Hampton Falls, two important trading centers along this road. From Kittery the infection was carried northward into Maine and from Hampton Falls southward across disputed territory into the Province of Massachusetts Bay. Amesbury and Salisbury were soon involved, and by September the epidemic had crossed the Merrimac River and like an invading army concentrated its forces at Newbury before it started down the old Bay Path towards Boston.

The throat distemper – which mostly affected children and killed often within three days – sparked fear as it spread.

In Ipswich, all eight children in the household of Mark and Hephzibah How died during the month of November 1735. A neighbour family also reported losing all eight children. As many as four children were buried in a single grave, a fact that was noted in newspapers as far away as New York.

EARLY BAPTISM

Church records showed parents pressed ministers into performing many early baptisms. They did it “By Reason of Dangerous Sickness” to stay ahead of the undertakers.

Rowley, Mass., would lose one-eighth of its population to the throat distemper. Nearby Byfield would lose one seventh.

In Newbury, Dr. John Fitch actively tried to stop the disease. He contracted it and died. The march of the throat distemper continued through Beverly, Marblehead, Lynn and into Boston as doctors and towns searched for cures.

They also quarantined victims of the throat distemper. The town of Exeter, N.H., seized the house where a young man had died of the disease and quarantined his brother until he, too, died.

NO DIAGNOSIS

Physicians had trouble agreeing on a diagnosis for the disease, calling it cynanche, angina, canker, bladders, rattles or throat distemper. Scarlet fever was also present during 1735, and children were dying of both. More commonly the illness was called “the strangling angel of children.”

In 1735, a vaccine for diphtheria was more than a hundred years in the future. Treatment of the disease was crude and painful. When the throat distemper raged in Boston, a notice in the Boston Gazette offered treatment advice:

First be sure that a vein be opened under the tongue, and if that can’t be done, open a vein in the arm, which must be first done, as all other means will be ineffectual. Then take borax or honey to bathe or annoint the mouth and throat, and lay on the Throat a plaister Vngiuntum Dialthae. To drink a decoction of Devil’s bitt or Robbin’s Plantain, with some Sal Prunelle dissolved therein, as often as the patient will drink. If the body be costive use a clyster agreeable to the nature of the Distemper. … But be sure and let blood, and that under the tongue. We have many times made Blisters under the arms, but that has proved sometimes dangerous.

BOSTON VS. NEW HAMPSHIRE

In Boston, it seemed, patients responded better to treatment. In other towns, treatment rarely succeeded. Whole families of children – six and seven or more at a time – died. Caulfield suggests that Boston, in fact, first experienced a rarely mild epidemic of scarlet fever, which was susceptible to treatment. Other towns, however, were experiencing the diphtheria invading from New Hampshire.

In Newbury, Mass., people theorized that the disease was connected to an explosion in the population of caterpillars in the summer of 1735. The noxious caterpillars covered the roads and houses. They could even float across streams. They crackled when carriage wheels crushed them and caused the wheels to grow slippery.

A prayer and sermon seemed to extinguish the caterpillars, but doubts persisted that they also caused the throat distemper.

In Haverhill, Mass., a pamphlet explained that children’s wailing and coughing showed God or supernatural beings spoke through them. In 1738 the throat distemper epidemic entered its third year and a 17-page poem about it appeared in pamphlet form. AWAKENING CALLS TO EARLY PIETY suggested the disease resulted from impious behavior.

PIETY AND THROAT DISTEMPER

A second pamphlet, Early Piety Encouraged, tried to tamp down fears of catching the disease from sick neighbors or friends: Let me tell you, it is an inordinate and sinful Fear that you have of the Distemper, if it keep you from going nigh your Neighbors, to tend up them, to watch with them, or in any other Respect to be helpful to them.

Gradually the disease progressed into Connecticut and sporadically to Western Massachusetts. Death counts were not as well documented, but throat distemper is noted in some towns. Coventry, Conn., then with 800 people, lost 54 to the disease in 1737. East Haven, Conn., lost 26 from a population of 200.

The outbreak of 1735, which lasted until 1740, was probably not the first case of diphtheria in the New England colonies. But it was the most contagious. Residents of Massachusetts and Connecticut, where the throat distemper was known to exist earlier, suffered lower mortality rates as they had some resistance to the disease.

Maine and New Hampshire, on the other hand, were easier targets. The outbreak coincided with outbreaks of diphtheria across the world.

Across New England some 5,000 people died of diphtheria between 1735 and 1740. More than 75 percent were children. Overall, it killed 22 of every 1,000 people. In New Hampshire, where it struck first and worst, 75 out of every 1,000 people died of it.

Elisha Smith and William Benson

About the year 1735 a book was published intituled "The Cure of Deism". The Author, Mr. Elisha Smith,* had the misfortune to be confined in the Fleet-prison for a debt of £200. Mr. Benson** was highly pleased with this work; enquired who the author was, and, having received the foregoing account, not only sent him a very handsome letter, but discharged the whole debt, fees, &c. and set him at liberty. This deserves to be recorded, as an uncommon instance of generosity and good nature; though Mr. Benson, having been thrust into the Dunciad, will probably be known to posterity only as a bad critic and architect. The following anecdote was received from a person well acquainted with him. Though a man who had spent the greater part of his life among books, yet a short time before his death he acquired an aversion to them which was unconquerable. He could not even bear the sight of any, and remained stedfast in his abhorrence of them as long as he lived.

* Elisha Smith c 1683-1740

**William Benson (1682-1754) a talented amateur architect and Whig politician who sat in the House of Commons 1715-1719

Bible in Lithuanian

The first known translations of the Bible into the Lithuanian language appeared in the middle of the 16th century following the spread of the Protestant Reformation. The full Protestant Bible was first published in 1735 in Königsberg (Kaliningrad). This translation was sponsored by Lutheran Johann Jakob Quandt (1686-1772) and was prepared by joint Lutheran and Calvinist efforts. This translation was later edited by Ludwig Rhesa (1816), Frydrichas Kuršaitis (1853), and Adomas Einoras (1897).

Three Deaths

Deaths

August 17. Died, George James, one of the common councilmen for the ward of Aldersgate-without, and printer to the city of London. His widow carried on the business for some time, when the office of city printer was conferred on Henry Kent, printer, deputy of the ward of Broad-street.

November 10. Died, Thomas Dean, of Malden, in Kent, aged 102 years. When king Charles I. was beheaded, he was then twenty years of age, and was a fellow of University college, Oxford; but being a Catholic, was deprived at the revolution. He wrote some pieces of his religion, which were privately printed in the master's lodgings, and December 18, 1691, he stood in the pillory for concealing a libel: from that time he subsisted mostly on charity.

November 25. Died, Jacob Tonson, the second. He was the eldest son of Richard Tonson, and nephew to the first Jacob Tonson; and it appears from his will, which was made August 16, and proved December 6, 1735, that he was a bookseller, bookbinder, and stationer, all which businesses were carried on in his own house; and that he was also a printer, in partnership with John Watts. The elder Jacob probably also carried on all these several occupations. His will, which filled twenty-seven pages, written by himself, shows him not only to have abounded in wealth, but to have been a just and worthy man - according to the printed accounts of that period he was at the time of his death worth £100,000. After having devised his estates in Herefordshire, Gloucestershire, and Worcestershire, and bequeathed no less a sum than £34,000 to his three daughters and his younger son, Samuel, and disposed of his patent between his eldest sons Jacob and Richard, he mentions his uncle old Jacob Tonson, to whom he leaves fifty guineas for mourning; but, knowing his love of quiet and retirement, he says he would not burden him with the office of executor of his will. He, however, recommends his family to his uncle's care, and exhorts all his children to remember their duty to their superiors and their inferiors, tenderly adding - “And so God bless you all!” It appears by the grant and assignment of his uncle, that he was entitled to the collection of the kit-cat portraits, and that he had not long before his death erected a new room at Barn-elms, in which the pictures were then hung. Seventeen days after his death old Jacob Tonson made his will, in which he confirmed a settlement that he had made on him, (probably at the time of his marriage) and appointed his great nephew, Jacob Tonson, the eldest son of the former Jacob, his executor and residuary legatee.

Duke d'Aiguillon

In this year the Duke d'Aiguillon erected a printing press at Vérets, his country seat, in the province of Touraine, at which was printed a collection of French pieces, bearing the imprint of Ancona, in this year; it is said that only seven or twelve copies of this work were struck off.

Christopher Saur

In this year Christopher Saur, a German, established a press at Germantown, Pennsylvania, and the establishment was carried to considerable extent and eminence by his son. Thomas, in his History of Printing, reports of him, that “his was by far the most extensive book manufactory then, and for many years afterwards, in the British American colonies. It occasioned the establishment of several binderies, a paper-mill, and a foundry for English and German types.” At this foundry, which was one of the earliest erected throughout the whole of British America, Saur cast types, not only for himself, but for other German printers. He also manufactured his own ink. Among other works, three editions of the German Bible issued from his press; viz. in the years 1743, 1762 and 1776. The greater part of this last impression, consisting of 3000 copies, was most singularly and unfortunately disposed of “The property of Saur was much injured by the revolutionary war, particularly by the battle of Germantown, in 1777. To preserve the residue of it from being destroyed by the British, he went to Philadelphia; his estate was confiscated before the close of the war, and his books, bound and unbound, were sold: among these was the principal part of the last edition of the Bible in sheets; some copies of them had been before, and others of them were now, converted into cartridges, and thus used, not for the salvation of men's souls, but for the destruction of their bodies.” In the summer of 1739, Saur commenced a newspaper in German.

Death of Thomas Lewis Welsh Baptist Minister

Born c. 1671, son and heir of John Lewis, landed gentleman and Baptist of Glascwm, Radnorshire. who experienced persecution in the Restoration. The son, like his father, became a member of the Baptist church at Leominster c. 1692 or at least before 1694 and is believed to have started to preach soon afterwards. He had left Leominster before 1707 and had incorporated the Baptists of east Radnorshire into a church at Glascwm and New Radnor. He was very active among them and is said (Dr John Evans ‘Return’ (1715)) to have had a congregation of 400. In 1728, in company with Thomas Evans, brother of Caleb Evans, minister at Pentre, Radnorshire, he was appointed distributor for Wales of the Baptist Fund. He was buried in a burial-ground at Glascwm which his father had given to the church.

The Cause of God and Truth

It was in 1735 that the first part of The cause of God and Truth by Dr John Gill (1597-1671) appeared. There were to be four parts in all. The final preface of the massive work begins

It should be known by the reader, that the following work was undertaken and begun about the year 1733 or 1734, at which time Dr. Whitby's Discourse on the Five Points was reprinted, judged to be a masterpiece on the subject, in the English tongue, and accounted an unanswerable one; and it was almost in the mouth of everyone, as an objection to the Calvinists, Why do not ye answer Dr. Whitby?

Induced hereby, I determined to give it another reading, and found myself inclined to answer it, and thought this was a very proper and seasonable time to engage in such a work.

In the year 1735, the First Part of this work was published, in which are considered the several passages of Scripture made us of by Dr. Whitby and others in favour of the Universal Scheme, and against the Calvinistic Scheme, in which their arguments and objections are answered, and the several passages set in a just and proper light. These, and what are contained in the following Part in favour of the Particular Scheme, are extracted from Sermons delivered in a Wednesday evening's lecture.

Fashion by Carrington Bowels

Taste A-La-Mode as in the year 1735 being the contrast to the year 1745 is an etchig

that belongs to the British Musem from the late 1740s. It is by Carington Bowels (1724-1793)

Sermons Against Popery: Preached at Salters-Hall in the Year 1735

This two volume work of sermons preached by various ministers appeared in the year 1735. There are seventeen sermons and contributors include: John Barker, Samuel Chandler, George Smith, Samuel Wright, William Harris, Obadiah Hughes, Jeremiah Hunt, Joshua Bayes, John Newman, Jabez Earle, Moses Lowman, Benjamin Grosvenor, Thomas Leavesly, Joseph Burrough and Daniel Neal.

First Moravians arrive in Georgia

The Moravian mission in Georgia has been described as “a failed prelude to building bigger and better things to come.” The Moravians arrived in Savannah on April 6, 1735

How did Moravians end up in Georgia? Zinzendorf originally brokered land in Georgia for the Schwenkfelder (not Moravian) refugees living on his land near Berthelsdorf. When the Schwenkfelders were banished from Saxony in 1733, they asked Zinzendorf to help them relocate. They had heard of Governor James Oglethorpe’s plans to admit those fleeing religious persecution to the new colony of Georgia in America. Protestants were desired to form a buffer between the English colonies and Spanish Catholics from Florida and French-Catholics from Louisiana. With Zinzendorf’s help the Schwenkfelders travelled as far as Holland, but then accepted an offer for passage to Pennsylvania instead after hearing rumours of poor land and being turned into slaves by the English in Georgia. The Trustees of Georgia then allowed Moravians to take the land themselves, granting them 500 acres on the Ogeechee River, plus two 50-acre tracts in Savannah.

Zinzendorf capitalised on this change of events: “I therefore look into every opportunity which presents itself [to make Jesus known among the “heathen”]. The first group of ten men left London on February 3, 1735, and after nine weeks at sea arrived in the Savannah harbor on April 6. The company, led by Spangenberg, included masons, carpenters, weavers, a gardener and a game-keeper - all pious workmen skilled to establish an independent mission community in Georgia.
Zinzendorf instructed them: “You must live alone, establishing your own little corner, where your customs will irritate no one...Your one aim will be to establish a little place near the heathen where you may gather together the dispersed in Israel, patiently win back the wayward, and instruct the heathen tribes.”
Upon arriving in Savannah, the group was immediately visited by friendly Native Americans and introduced to the Yamacraw chief, Tomochichi, who would prove to be a peaceful ally. The Moravians quickly went to work, finishing their cabin in six days and laying out ten acres of garden on plots outside of town in less than two weeks. Some of their neighbours remarked “that the Moravians had done more in a week than their people in two years.”
The first year found the group preoccupied with survival rather than any true mission work. They spent much of their time surveying and cultivating their land and building shelter for themselves and the next expected company. Adjusting to the new climate and a poor diet was hard on the group and most fell ill, although only one, Friedrich Riedel, a mason, died that first year.
Although a second group of 25 men and women arrived on February 23, 1736, “internal disputes” and political pressure to bear arms doomed the work to failure before much could be accomplished. Peter Böhler later said, “the good children lost sight of their Plan.” Through death and abandonment the group dwindled to six by 1740, and impending war with the Spanish finally drove them to Pennsylvania, where mission work resumed - this time with much more success.

John Cennick 1718-1755 under conviction

William McKeown tells us that

About Easter 1735 John Cennick experienced a period of deep conviction of sin. It was a time of great misery for him:

‘I felt at once an uncommon fear and dejection … through the strength of convictions and the fear of going to hell … I knew not any weight before like this.’ No amusement could lift the load. Getting away from the town for a walk in the country did no good, for even there ‘the terrors of the Lord came upon me, and the pains of hell took hold of me’.

A light-hearted companion eased the burden, but only for a time, for when they separated, the burden returned.

‘Whoever I met I envied their happiness. Whatever I heard grieved me; whatever I said or did so troubled me, that I repented that I stirred or broke silence. If I laughed at any thing my heart smote me immediately; and if the occasion was a foolish jest or lie, I thought, alas! I helped not only to ruin my own soul, but the souls of others too.’

He gave up worldly amusements, he even considered going into a monastery to get peace of mind, but it was all to no avail. Often he would be haunted in bed at night by confused thoughts. He tried exercise, eating and medicine, but all proved useless. He confesses that although he was convicted of sin he had no power over sin: ‘I committed it continually, though not in the eyes of the world. My chief sins were pride, murmuring against God, blasphemy, disobedience, and evil concupiscence; sometimes I strove against them, but finding myself always conquered I concluded there was no help.’ In church his mind wandered. It seemed to him that his worship was a mockery of God. At one point he left off praying for he considered the prayers of the wicked an abomination. The devil suggested to him that there was no God. He cried out, ‘Have I sinned more than all the sons of Adam? O that I had never been born.’

He was convinced that heaven was closed to him. He described these times: ‘I stood still and fixed my heavy eyes on the trees, walls or on the ground, amazed above measure, and often crying with a bitter cry, “What must I do to be saved?”‘ He thought of going to the country to be a plough-boy, of even starving himself to death, but he could not get any peace. ‘I could not be thankful for any temporal blessings, because I thought myself so unsettled, and because no blessing satisfied my craving soul or made me wish to stay behind on earth a day … nor could meat, drink, or raiment give me any comfort; I only wanted to know if I had any part in Jesus.’

He tried mortification, eating only once a day and fasting from Friday breakfast until Sunday noon, when he had Communion, but it was no good: ‘No alms, or fasting, or prayers, or watchings could cover my naked soul from almighty wrath.’ This period of conviction lasted for about two years during which even Scripture brought him no comfort: ‘To me all beside the law and the judgements and their terrors were like a book sealed so that I could not read it (as I thought) to profit by it at all.’

He was eventually converted in 1737