Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1793 - Carey's Accusations

Carey's Accusations

In his 1793 account of the epidemic, Mathew Carey contrasted the sacrifices of men like Joseph Inskeep, a Quaker who served on the Mayor's Committee and also visited the sick, with the selfishness of others. When Inskeep contracted the fever, he asked for the assistance of a family whom he had attended when several of its members were sick. They refused; he died, which might have happened even with their aid. Carey reported their refusal.

He published rumors of greed, especially by landlords who threw convalescing tenants into the street to gain control of their flats. While he praised Richard Allen and Absalom Jones for their work, he suggested that blacks had caused the epidemic, and that some black nurses had charged high fees and even stolen from those for whom they cared.

Allen and Jones quickly wrote a pamphlet to defend the people of color in the crisis. The historian Julie Winch believes they wanted to defend their community, knowing how powerful Carey was, and wanting to maintain the reputation of their people in the aftermath of the epidemic. The men noted that the first nurses from the Free African Society had worked without any pay. As the mortality rate increased, they had to hire men to get anyone to deal with the sick and dying. They recounted that

"the great prices paid did not escape the observation of that worthy and vigilant magistrate, Matthew Clarkson, mayor of the city, and president of the committee. He sent for us, and requested we would use our influence to lessen the wages of the nurses. But on informing him of the cause, i.e. that of the people over-bidding one another, it was concluded unnecessary to attempt any thing on that head; therefore it was left to the people concerned."

Allen and Jones noted that white nurses also profited and stole from their patients. "We know that six pounds was demanded by and paid to a white woman, for putting a corpse into a coffin; and forty dollars was demanded and paid to four white men, for bringing it down the stairs." Many black nurses served without compensation:

"A poor black man, named Sampson, went constantly from house to house where distress was, and no assistance, without fee or reward. He was smitten with the disorder, and died. After his death his family were neglected by those he had served. Sarah Bass, a poor black widow, gave all the assistance she could, in several families, for which she did not receive any thing; and when any thing was offered her, she left it to the option of those she served."