New Orleans and the Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1853

Hear about one of the deadliest yellow fever epidemics in United States history

On the first Saturday in February at 2:30 PM, the National Museum of Civil War Medicine’s Director of Programming Katie Reichard will present on her extensive research into the Yellow Fever epidemic that swept through New Orleans in 1853.

By 1853, the people of New Orleans thought the threat of yellow fever had passed forever. The last major incident occurred over a decade prior, and the citizens thought the summers of widespread disease were safely in the past. In May one newspaper went as far as to claim the city was cured entirely of yellow fever. That same week, the first confirmed death of the 1853 epidemic was recorded.

When the Yellow Fever epidemic of 1853 began, the citizens faced a perfect storm of incompetent and absent City Council officials, port businesses invested in preventing a citywide quarantine, and newspapers more interested in covering a scandalous murder than the mounting death toll. But, from these dire circumstances rose a relief organization unlike anything the United States had ever seen – The Howard Association. Mostly forgotten in the modern era, it helped to create the modern idea of humanitarian aid as we know it today.

The program is included with admission and FREE for NMCWM members.