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One of the most feared diseases in the eighteenth century was smallpox. A high percentage of those infected died; many who survived were blinded or badly disfigured. Inoculation against the disease had been introduced into Europe from the Middle East early in the century and subsequently conveyed to the American colonies. Inoculation, however, was not without risks. There were deaths associated with the inoculation process, as it initiated the disease, though in a milder form. There was also the not-unfounded concern that smallpox could be spread through an inoculated person not properly quarantined. Consequently, inoculation often encountered fear and opposition.[1]

It may seem surprising, then, that Thomas Jefferson, who boldly opined in 1799 that the "state of medecine is worse than that of total ignorance,"[2] would be an early advocate of smallpox inoculation and later as president would openly support the introduction of the less virulent but still controversial cowpox vaccine into the United States.

Smallpox inoculation was discouraged in many of the colonies, including Virginia, when Jefferson traveled to Philadelphia at age 23 to undergo inoculation.[3] When the procedure was brought to Norfolk County, Virginia, in 1768 and again in 1769, it provoked riots on both occasions. Jefferson, then practicing law, became involved when he agreed to defend victims of the Norfolk riots, including Dr. Archibald Campbell, whose house had been burned as a result of the inoculations carried out there. Jefferson would give up his law practice before the case was resolved, but he later served on a committee that placed a bill before the Virginia General Assembly to reduce the 1769 restrictions on smallpox inoculation.[4]

The spread of smallpox became an issue in the American Revolution, as the British were accused of conducting biological warfare. During the French and Indian Wars, the Ottawa Indians threatening the British at Fort Pitt were deliberately given blankets used by smallpox victims.[5] It was feared a similar action had taken place during the failed American campaign in Canada. In 1776, Jefferson was appointed to a congressional investigating committee and, according to his notes, one witness before the panel claimed, "The small pox was sent out of Quebeck by Carleton, inoculating the poor people at government expence for the purpose of giving it to our army."[6] This issue arose again during the British invasion of Virginia, as an indeterminate number of slaves who had fled to the British army had contracted smallpox. Virginians feared that the sick slaves were being deliberately used by the British to spread the disease.[7]

This increased presence of the disease in Virginia may have prompted Jefferson to encourage his wife, Martha, to accompany him to Philadelphia in 1776 with one objective being smallpox inoculation. His friend Thomas Nelson encouraged him, "You must certainly bring Mrs. Jefferson with you. Mrs. Nelson shall nurse her in the small pox and take all possible care of her."[8] Mrs. Jefferson did not make the trip to Philadelphia, and it is uncertain whether she ever received inoculation before her death in September 1782. But it is a testament to Jefferson's confidence in smallpox inoculation that just two months after the devastating loss of his wife, he had their daughters inoculated.[9]

After becoming president in 1801, Jefferson expanded his commitment to smallpox inoculation. His library catalog indicates that he followed the work of the British physicians Edward Jenner and John Lettsom in their experiments with the use of the milder cowpox as an effective immunization against smallpox.[10] He worked with American doctors, especially Benjamin Waterhouse, to establish this new vaccine, also known as kinepox, in the United States and allowed his name to be used as an endorsement.

Jefferson brought his involvement to a new level during the summer of 1801, when he directed the inoculation of Monticello slaves, his sons-in-law, and some of his neighbors — about 200 people in all, according to his estimate. He began with vaccine received from Dr. Waterhouse but then was able to collect his own vaccine from those inoculated, and from this was able to send vaccine to other parts of Virginia and to Washington, D.C.[11] Some of his notes and statistics were published in Dr. John Coxe's "Practical Observations on Vaccination: or Inoculation for the Cow-Pock," and Jefferson received a letter from the Royal Jennerian Society in London recognizing his promotion of the vaccine in the United States.[12]

Jefferson also espoused the value of inoculation in his June 1803 instructions to Meriwether Lewis, who was preparing for what would become the Lewis and Clark Expedition: "[C]arry with you some matter of the kine-pox; inform those of them with whom you may be, of it's efficacy as a preservative from the small pox; and instruct & encourage them in the use of it."[13]

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Primary Source References

1801 August 20. (A. Bainbridge to Jefferson). "... at the request of my old intimate friend, Doctor Edward Gantt—the inclosed letter to him contains some of the Vaccine matter—he says the most certain conveyance will be to inclose it to you, and you would send it to him."[14]

1802 January 17. (Jefferson to Martha Jefferson Randolph). "Dr. Gantt has inoculated six of his Cow pox patients with the small pox, not one of which took it. many have been tried in Philadelphia, & with the same issue. as the matter here came from Monticello, and that at Philadelphia from this place, they establish the genuineness of our inoculations & may place our families & neighbors in perfect security."[15]

1809 January 1. (Martha Jefferson Randolph to Jefferson). "[W]e recieved the vaccine safe and will innoculate our children immediatly as well as our neighbours. Jefferson was innoculated with the small pox in Richmond With Virginia & Ann."[16]

- Gaye Wilson, 2004. Originally published as "Jefferson: Advocate of Inoculation," Monticello Newsletter 15 (Spring 2004).

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Further Sources

References

  1. ^ For a discussion of smallpox inoculation and its introduction into Europe and America, see Elizabeth A. Fenn, Pox Americana: The Great Smallpox Epidemic of 1775-82 (New York: Hill and Wang, 2001), 1-43, and Genevieve Miller, "Smallpox Inoculation in England and America: A Reappraisal," The William and Mary Quarterly, 3d ser., vol. 13, no. 4 (October 1956): 476-92.
  2. ^ Jefferson to William G. Munford, June 18, 1799, in PTJ, 31:127. Transcription available at Founders Online.
  3. ^ Jefferson to John Page, May 25, 1766, in PTJ, 1:20. Transcription available at Founders Online. See also Malone, Jefferson, 1:99-100.
  4. ^ Frank L. Dewey, "Thomas Jefferson's Law Practice: The Norfolk Anti-Inoculation Riots," The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography 91 (January 1983): 39-53; Robert H. Halsey, How the President, Thomas Jefferson, and Doctor Benjamin Waterhouse Established Vaccination as a Public Health Procedure (New York: Published by the Author, 1936), 33-34. See also William Waller Hening, The Statutes at Large: Being a Collection of all the Laws of Virginia (Richmond: Printed for the Editor, George Cochran, Printers, 1822), VIII:371-73IX:371-73.
  5. ^ Fenn, Pox Americana, 88-89.
  6. ^ Notes of Witnesses' Testimony concerning the Canadian Compaign, [July 1-27, 1776], in PTJ, 1:435. Transcription available at Founders Online.
  7. ^ Philip Ranlet, "The British, Slaves, and Smallpox in Revolutionary Virginia," The Journal of Negro History 84 (Summer 1999): 217-26; Fenn, Pox Americana, 130-33.
  8. ^ Nelson to Jefferson, February 4, 1776, in PTJ, 1:286. Transcription available at Founders Online.
  9. ^ Jefferson to James Madison, November 26, 1782, in PTJ, 6:207. Transcription available at Founders Online.
  10. ^ Sowerby, 1:429-32.
  11. ^ Jefferson to John Vaughan, November 5, 1801, in PTJ, 35:572-73. Transcription available at Founders Online. See also Jefferson to Dr. John Shore, September 12, 1801, in PTJ, 35:277-78 (transcription available at Founders Online); Jefferson to Waterhouse, September 17, 1801, in PTJ, 35:311-12 (transcription available at Founders Online).
  12. ^ Sowerby, 1:429, 1:432; Charles Murray to Jefferson, July 4, 1803, in PTJ, 40:656 (transcription available at Founders Online).
  13. ^ Jefferson to Lewis, June 20, 1803, in PTJ, 40:179. Transcription available at Founders Online.
  14. ^ Coolidge Collection of Thomas Jefferson Manuscripts, Massachusetts Historical Society. See also the note at Edward Gantt to Jefferson, August 17, 1801, in PTJ, 35:103. Editorial note available at Founders Online.
  15. ^ PTJ, 36:387-88. Transcription available at Founders Online.
  16. ^ Family Letters, 375. Transcription available at Founders Online.