A Short Account of the Malignant Fever
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A Short Account of the Malignant Fever was published by Mathew Carey (January 28, 1760 – September 16, 1839) in 1793. The city of Philadelphia suffered a severe Yellow Fever epidemic. During that time, Carey, along with many others, fled the city in order to escape the disease. Left behind in the city were members of the Black community as well as the sick and dying. In this pamphlet, Carey accused the blacks directly of not only causing and spreading the disease but also invading the houses of the sick and dying. This seventeen-chapter pamphlet was widely distributed and consisted of four editions, each one developed one step further from the previous one.[1]
The Yellow Fever epidemic in Philadelphia took place itself in July of 1793. This was the first major American Yellow Fever epidemic. The bulk of the effects were shown throughout the city in July however it started spreading in October. Over 2000 free black peoples lived in the nation's capital. In addition to this, there were also many white French-speaking from Santo Domingo as well as Revolutionary political figure heads to make up part of the community.
Thomas Jefferson wrote a letter to James Madison in the beginning of September informing him of the extreme disaster that this sickness would cause throughout the city. At the time, the population of Philadelphia was about 45,000. From these numbers, 17,000 were said to spread and 5,000 died.[2]
According to numerous scholars, such as Gould, from Brown University, Benjamin Rush composed a letter to Richard Allen who was the Black Minister in Philadelphia. He was incredibly embarrassed to the lack of "white" help in the cities time of need. Therefore, he turned to Allen in hopes of finding help from other community members. [3]