Suzanne Delage:Quilts & smallpox

Michael Doolittle · 13 May 1998, 19:26 · from urth-v0011.mbox · original

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From: "Michael Doolittle" <mdoolittle at metlife.com>
Subject: (urth) Suzanne Delage:Quilts & smallpox
Date: Wed, 13 May 1998 19:26:33
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>>William:  the smallpox bit won't wash, not in a quilt from
>>American Revolution times.  While the idea of leprosy coming
>>through infected items might have occurred to some colonists
>>(via the Biblical precepts thereon), it's unlikely that
>>anyone would have tried to pass smallpox on through germ
>>warfare in those pre-van-Leewenhoek days.

Actually the smallpox is possible.  I've read several accounts of European
colonists and/or soldiers giving clothes/bedclothes from smallpox victims
to Native Americans *specifically* in the hope that they would catch the
disease.

Mike



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