ARE HUNDREDS OF CASES

Dr. Hurty, State Health Offi-
cer, Returns From Clay City

Nine Children in One Family with
Smallpox-The Disease Has Spread
to Several Counties.

Dr. Hurty, of the State Board of Health, returned from Clay City, the hotbed of the smallpox epidemic, yesterday, and reports a most alarming state of affairs. He said that there were hundreds of cases, and many of them were of the confluent form, which is exceedingly dangerous. Said he: “It is a common sight to see little children walking along the streets of Clay City with their faces broken out with the eruptive sores of smallpox.”

Smallpox is everywhere in Clay City. It one turns to the right he is confronted with a whole row of houses in every one of which there are to be found one or more cases of fully developed smallpox. The same conditions prevail on every side and Dr. Hurty said that in one instance he found nine children in one family who were smitten with the disease at the same time.

The family referred to is that of George Burkhart, a veteran of the civil war. In speaking of these cases Dr. Hurty said that the fact that  Burkhart, who was vaccinated during the war, did not have the disease was very good evidence that the epidemic was really smallpox. Two of the Burkhart children, Blanche and Mona, have the confluent form of smallpox and it is a very grave question as to their recovery.

Under a misapprehension of the nature of the disease the public schools were continued until nearly two-thirds of the children were inoculated, and it was a common sight to see the little ones going daily to their lessons with their faces broken out with smallpox in the pustular stage. The young, however, are not the only ones who are attacked with the dreadful scourge, for even in the churches there were seen scores of adults whose faces were solid masses of oozing poison. The only excuse to be offered for this apparent criminal neglect on the part of the local board of health is the fact that it was advised by physicians diagnosing the disease that it was nothing more than chickenpox and as a consequence its apprehensions were not aroused until informed by Dr. Hurty of the real nature of the disease. When the Town Council awoke to the fact that the epidemic was really smallpox, the members immediately arranged for a called meeting at which they passed resolutions instructing the health officer to do all he could to prevent the further spread of the disease, and authorizing him to appoint as many deputies as he saw fit, necessary to the preservation of the strictest quarantine. Many new cases of the disease are reported from the district schools in the neighborhood of Clay City and the disease is rapidly spreading throughout the county.

Just prior to Dr. Hurty’s return he was summoned to a meeting of the County Council and he urged upon the members the necessity of doing all they could to stamp out the disease, advising them to instruct the county health officer, by deputies, to inspect all the schools, give free vaccination and quarantine every person who had come in contact with the disease. One of the peculiarities of the disease is its rapid spread, and there is some fear that is may become epidemic throughout the State. Smallpox is reported in Clay, Noble, Jackson, Owen, Green and Scott counties, and unless rigid enforcement of the quarantine law is observed the disease is likely to get beyond control. While Dr. Hurty was in Clay City, Dr. C. E. Ferguson, the diagnostician of the city of Indianapolis, was summoned to Brownstown, Jackson county, where he found a well-developed case of smallpox in the eruptive state. When Dr. Ferguson returned from Brownstown he found a telegram awaiting him from Dr. Hurty bidding him hasten to Scottsburg. The local board of health of that place wired the State Board of Health that it was in urgent need of aid. Dr. Hurty said on his arrival yesterday that he was somewhat at a loss to understand the urgency of the request from Scottsburg, but supposed the disease must be raging in that neighborhood.

The first person known to have the disease in Clay City was Herbert Wiltse, who two weeks after returning home from a street fair in Washington, Daviess county, was taken very sick and afterward went through all the stages of smallpox. His neighbors, believing that he had chickenpox, did not hesitate to visit him and in their manner the disease has been spread all over the country.

“Are Hundreds of Cases,” The Indianapolis Journal (Indianapolis, Indiana), 17 January 1900, p. 8, col. 6; digitial image, Chronicling America (http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/ : accessed 6 December 2014).