Journal Mobile

Author(s): 
J Cohen, J Cohen
Journal Issue: 
Volume 37: Issue 3: 2007

Format

Abstract

 

George  Augustus  Clough  was  a  young  Englishman  who  died  in Charleston, South  Carolina, in  1843.  The  cause  of  death, which  unusually  was given on his gravestone, was Stranger’s fever, which is now known to be yellow fever.  Stranger’s  fever  first  appeared  in  North  America  in  Florida  in  1649, and continued to cause both sporadic cases as well as serious epidemics, mainly in the South  and  along  the  Eastern  seaboard  of  the  US  until  the  beginning  of  the twentieth century. It gained its name from its propensity to mainly afflict recent arrivals, and Clough had only been in Charleston for two years before his death. However, a re-examination of the evidence suggests that he may not in fact have died of yellow fever.

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