Smallpox

I know I am suppose to be moving on to researching my Torrey ancestors in Weymouth, MA; but I have been interested in writing about one more aspect of the John Adams miniseries I am watching. One of the more interesting scenes for me so far as I watch this miniseries is when Abigail Adams inoculates herself and her children to the smallpox virus so that they may have a higher probability of surviving the disease.

I wanted to look into the history of the smallpox for that time period. Obviously; at that time, the vaccine had not been discovered (not until about 1796), but it was found to be less dangerous to have part of the live smallpox virus ground up and inserted through a cut of the person being inoculated (a process called variolation) than getting smallpox from another sick person. A smaller percentage of these inoculated people died compared to those that developed the smallpox through exposure. These inoculated people did develop symptoms however, and it was still considered dangerous.

I thought next I would look into the letters that Abigail wrote to John to see if she did mention the smallpox and their exposure to the disease. In the miniseries, she had a doctor come to the house with an infected patient (who is outside lying very ill in a wagon). The doctor is the one who seems most concerned about the procedure and with Abigail for not having spoken to her husband about the decision. The movie also shows the eldest girl getting the most sick.

In the letters (Letter from Abigail Adams to John Adams, 13 - 14 July 1776 and Letter from Abigail Adams to John Adams, 21 - 22 July 1776 ) to her husband, Abigail does speak of these inoculations. The family goes to Boston to an Uncle's house to receive the doctor. Abigail states she did not bother to write John earlier about the decision to inoculate, as she knows his opinion on the matter. I would imagine; though, that it was a difficult decision to make, and a worry that was always on their minds. Abigail states in her letter, "I had many dissagreable Sensations at the Thoughts of comeing myself, but to see my children thro it I thought my duty, and all those feelings vanished as soon as I was innoculated and I trust a kind providence will carry me safely thro." (I often wonder what parents thought about these illnesses in that time period as I go through many death records of children who die from diseases that we no longer have to worry about. I have anxiety over less serious illnesses, I cannot imagine their fear!) Another interesting aspect of the letters is she states one of the children, Tommy, did not get many symptoms at all from the virus, so the doctor decides to inoculate him again. Everyone else in the family; however, does get the other symptoms associated with the disease, such as vomiting, fever, and postules. Abigail also writes about going to hear the Declaration of Independence read during this time that she has been "carrying" the virus. I was surprised by this as she would be risking exposure to other people by being in the crowd. It seems unlikely that she would not know she could pass the virus on to others.

To Do
1. Search for families in my ancestry living around 1770s to identify those that lived during the times of these letters, as they would have faced similar decisions as Abigail and John Adams.

Links on Topic
1. Encarta Encyclopedia article on smallpox
2. Boston 1775 : blog on the "history, analysis, and unabashed gossip about the start of the American Revolution in Massachusetts" - searched for entries on smallpox - link here

John Adams

I have started watching the John Adams miniseries on HBO and was inspired to look at the Adams family tree. Since John Adams had connections to Weymouth, MA; where many of my ancestors are from, I thought it would be fun to see if our families were connected, even if only distantly. From my memory of doing research some years ago, there is at least one connection of my family to Abigail Adam's family in Weymouth. The Reverend Samuel Torrey (who's relationship to my family I will look into in my next entry - but I believe he is some sort of great grand uncle - generations back!) built Abigail Adam's family's house. Samuel was the Reverend of the First Church of Weymouth preceding Abigail Adams' father Reverend William Smith.

Getting back to John Adam's family though, I found a family tree for John Quincy Adams online (click on view tree), and looked for names that were similar in my tree. (I also found another Adams family tree from the Massachusetts Historical Society.) There was really only one surname, White, that may connect our families, so I went to ancestry and tried out their "find famous relatives" link under the One World Tree database. I first had to find one of my White ancestors in One World Tree, so I searched for Jeremiah White (my 6th great grandfather) who married Hannah Canterbury. I found him, clicked on the famous relatives link, and hoped for something interesting to come up. (side note - "find famous relatives" is a search function that links your family with famous people, but uses data that has been entered by other users, so further research would be involved to verify the accuracy of data.) I browsed quickly and did not see a John Adams link come up, but did see his cousin, Samuel Adams, on my famous relatives page. According to this data, Samuel Adams is my 6th great grandfathers (Jeremiah's) 4th cousin, 2 times removed. Kind of neat. Of course this led me to do some other research on my White family - so I started looking into Jeremiah White's parents. I have found in many family trees online that Jeremiah is the son of Samuel White, a deacon in Weymouth; I guess I was looking for more verification - such as a reference to a probate record or something. The closest I came to such a reference was on google books website; page 373 in the book: The Vinton Memorial : Comprising A Genealogy of the Descendents of John Vinton of Lynn, 1648, which states Samuel White died intestate and insolvent, August 18, 1760, age 84 - so if this source is accurate, there is no will to find. Perhaps land records will lead me to prove that Samuel White is Jeremiah's father. If this is Jeremiah's line of descent - the immigrant ancestor is Thomas White of Weymouth who came to Massachusetts around 1635. I did a quick look at the Great Migration project to see if a sketch had been done on Thomas. At this time the Great Migration series is only up to The Great Migration: Immigrants to New England: 1634-1635, Volume V, M-P; so I will have to wait to read about Thomas White.

To Do
1. Look into the Torrey line again - find the link to Rev. Samuel Torrey in Weymouth
2. Find out what county Weymouth was in for early 1700s - I think it was Suffolk County.
3. Find any deeds on Samuel White which ties him with Jeremiah White (at probate court - or indexed in this book Suffolk County, MA deeds, 1639-1885 [microform] at NEHGS library and FHL. Also the Massachusetts State Archives has this book Record books, 1629-1800.

Links On Topic
1. John Adams timeline from the Massachusetts Historical Society
2. John Adams manuscripts from the Massachusetts Historical Society