October 7, 2025 • 62 mins
In this episode of Math! Science! History!, Gabrielle Birchak speaks with Dr. Kanisorn Wongsrichanalai of the Massachusetts Historical Society about the hidden epidemic that shaped the American Revolution. While battles raged, smallpox quietly threatened to destroy the Continental Army and colonial communities. From George Washington’s controversial order to inoculate his soldiers to Abigail Adams’s letters describing her family’s ordeal, this conversation reveals how trust in science, courage, and collective action helped secure America’s future.
Three Things Listeners Will Learn:
- How smallpox ravaged North America during the Revolutionary War and why it was considered more dangerous than the battlefield.
- Why George Washington’s decision to inoculate the Continental Army may have saved the Revolution.
- How Abigail and John Adams’s letters reveal the fears, risks, and resilience of ordinary families facing inoculation.
Resources & Further Reading:
- Massachusetts Historical Society
- Massachusetts Historical Society – Adams Family Papers
- Mount Vernon – George Washington and Smallpox Inoculation
- Centers for Disease Control (CDC) – History of Smallpox
- WHO – Eradication of Smallpox
🔗 Explore more on our website: mathsciencehistory.com
📚 To buy my book Hypatia: The Sum of Her Life on Amazon, visit https://a.co/d/g3OuP9h
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
I believe in the United States.
I believe in our resilience and I believe that this experiment that is known as America can do so much better if we trust science.
And after today, I hope you have the same revelation.
Today's very special episode includes an interview with the Director of Research at the Massachusetts Historical Society, Dr. Kanisorn Wongsrichanalai.
(00:27):
Stick around.
During the preparation and the interview, I had the opportunity to learn so much more about the Revolutionary War as well as the greater battle that our forefathers endured.
It was a battle that was written in the margins of our history books that many do not know about.
(00:50):
Though many talk about the Revolutionary War and how 250 years ago we banned it together and fought for our independence, a bigger picture was written in the margins that many of us never knew about.
While the forefathers were struggling with developing a country that we could have hope and faith in, the continent was struggling with the deadly disease of smallpox.
(01:13):
From the indigenous people of the northern continent to Canada to the Continental Army, it is approximated that around 130,000 people died between 1775 and 1782.
The heaviest losses fell on indigenous peoples and the communities in Spanish America.
It was during this time that our forefathers had the wherewithal to consider trying inoculation.
(01:39):
And that battle was not an easy one.
It was not like walking into a CVS and getting a shot and then binge-watching for a day.
It was a procedure that required weeks of gathering supplies, blocking out several weeks of recovery time, and hoping that one survived the inoculation process.
And our brave leaders, including their wives, Martha Washington and Abigail Adams, took it upon themselves to inoculate.
(02:07):
For George Washington, Martha's actions to inoculate validated Washington to inoculate the Continental Army.
I have to believe that the foundations of this country was built on trust in the unknown.
And that includes science.
By trusting science, they were able to save the townspeople and save our military and help us become who we are today.
(02:32):
And who we are today may not be perfect, but I would like to believe that the spirit of our forefathers still has a foothold on its legacy.
And it's up to us to remember the courage and the strength that they endured as they came together and rallied around science.
That being said, please enjoy this interview that I had with Dr. Kanisorn Wongsrichanalai.
(02:58):
And I hope that you enjoy the information and the insight that he shares.
And I hope that you enjoy listening to the letters exchanged between Abigail Adams and John Adams, as well as the stories of correspondence between John Adams and George Washington.
Dr. Kanisorn Wongsrichanalai is Director of Research at the Massachusetts Historical Society.
(03:20):
He is the author of Northern Character, College Educated New Englanders, Honor, Nationalism and Leadership in the Civil War Era.
He is the co-editor of So Conceived and So Dedicated, Northern Intellectuals in the Civil War Era.
And he is the co-editor of Wars, Civil and Great, the American Experience in the Civil War and World War One.
(03:45):
He co-directed the National Endowment for the Humanities Sponsored Project, West Texans and the Experience of War, World War One to the Present, while working as an Associate Professor of History at Angelo State University.
He is a graduate of Bowdoin College and earned his PhD in American History at the University of Virginia.
(04:07):
Dr. Kanisorn Wongsrichanalai, thank you so much for joining me here at Math Science History.
It is a pleasure to join you.
And I'm looking forward to our conversation.
I am too.
There's so much to consider right now with all that's going on with vaccines.
And I love the story that is behind George Washington and the inoculations and smallpox.
(04:31):
I know some of my listeners are not familiar with what smallpox is.
Could you briefly describe what it is and how it evolved to becoming literally a danger to the Continental Army?
I'm happy to do that with the caveat that I'm not a medical professional.
And so what we have here is historical documentation about the ravages of the disease smallpox.
(04:57):
But I should also mention that I work at the Massachusetts Historical Society, which is the home of the Adams family papers of the John Adams, Abigail Adams, John Quincy Adams.
And this being the 250th anniversary of the start of the American Revolution in Massachusetts, we are very happy to highlight some of these collections.
(05:20):
And they relate to smallpox, which is actually something that is generally left out of the histories of the revolution.
So I think we'll talk a little bit about that and then we'll lead up to George Washington.
But to go to your question, smallpox is a contagious, very contagious and very deadly and dangerous disease, which thankfully does not exist with us here in 2025.
(05:47):
It presents with flu like symptoms.
And this then later on leads to the development of red spots, including inside a person's mouth.
These are sores or pox, and they're filled with mucus and it's spread through contact with fluids produced by infected individuals.
Therefore, clothing or sheets or if someone has sores inside their throat and they cough on a person, that's how these germs spread.
(06:15):
So it's a virus.
The strain that is lethal to humans that was the most problematic is viriola major.
And the fatality rate was as high as 30 percent.
It was absolutely devastating.
It was absolutely terrifying for people who had it.
And Abigail Adams calls it a pestilence that walketh in darkness.
(06:40):
Wow.
And when did she write that?
That is 1776.
That is right after she had just undergone the inoculation process with the four of her children.
So this is during the American Revolution.
And she is locked down in the town of Boston, having undergone this treatment.
(07:02):
We have many documents to share with your listeners about this, but we'll get to that shortly.
Wonderful.
So now, from what I understand, George Washington actually got smallpox when he was younger, before he actually started working in the American military.
Is that correct?
Yes.
So George Washington had contracted smallpox when he traveled to the Caribbean with his brother.
(07:28):
His brother was suffering from another illness which required treatment.
Probably getting to a tropical or warmer climate was supposed to help.
I believe it was tuberculosis, but I'm not sure on that.
Yes, it was.
Yes, it was.
Very good.
Well, while there, Washington contracts smallpox in the phrase of the time, the natural way, which is he gets it and he's not inoculated.
(07:52):
He gets sick.
He survives it.
So he does have immunity.
So when he's commander of the Continental Army, he is someone who already has this immunity.
It is unclear when he learns of the difference between inoculation and getting infected in the natural way, because he seems to confuse those two in some of his correspondence.
(08:17):
But we can talk about when we get to that point in 1776 and 77, when he finally gets on board with this, what convinces him and when he learns that there is a real difference between catching it the natural way or inoculating oneself against smallpox.
When did the first inoculations begin in the United States?
(08:40):
Was it effective?
Did it help quell the smallpox or was it experimental?
Right.
So the process in North America, in the English colonies, begins before there was a United States.
So many decades before that, in fact.
And actually, it takes place here in the city of Boston.
(09:01):
At the town was not the city, town, but this is a medical, one of many medical innovations that take place here in Boston.
In 1706, the parishioners of a popular preacher by the name of Cotton Mather, whose papers are also at the Massachusetts Historical Society, I'll point out, present Cotton Mather with an enslaved man named Onesimus.
(09:27):
And Mather asked this individual, Onesimus, whether or not he had ever contracted smallpox.
Onesimus told him that in Africa, where he was free, before he was enslaved, he had been inoculated.
And he showed him evidence of this scar on his arm.
So this is where they made the cut to insert the smallpox pus from the infected person.
(09:51):
Now, Mather confirmed this with other enslaved people from Africa who'd undergone this procedure.
So he knew that this is something that other civilizations had performed.
Fast forward to 1721, and there is a smallpox outbreak in Boston.
Mather attempts to convince the physicians in Boston to try this process of inoculation, saying that he had heard this from Onesimus and had confirmed it by speaking with other enslaved Africans.
(10:22):
Now, the physicians in Boston, many of them did not think that they could trust information from enslaved people.
And they certainly doubted that people who they had enslaved were capable of acquiring medical knowledge that was beyond their own skill and knowledge.
There were also some ministers who claimed that inoculation challenged God's will, and so were against this.
(10:48):
But Mather finally convinced a physician by the name of Zabdiel Boylston.
He's actually John Adams's great uncle.
Yes.
There's a family connection there.
Yeah, I thought that was interesting.
It's a small town, and even today, Boston's a small city, so there are a lot of connections.
But Dr. Boylston attempted this inoculation process.
(11:11):
He tried it on his six-year-old son and several enslaved people as well.
This is controversial, and Mather is threatened.
There's someone who throws an incendiary through his window at his home, but Boylston pushes ahead.
And in the end, the facts and the results speak for themselves.
(11:32):
The smallpox outbreak in Boston went from 1721 to 1722.
And during that time, about 5,700 people, 5,759 people, caught smallpox naturally.
842 of them died as a result.
That's a 14.5% mortality rate.
(11:56):
But the people who Boylston inoculated, he inoculated 242 people.
Only six died.
That's a 2.5% mortality rate.
So if you're looking at this, and there are other outbreaks where we can talk about the stats, it is very clear that your chances of surviving inoculation are far higher than surviving catching smallpox through the natural way.
(12:20):
So it was proof that the inoculations worked.
What was the reception like at that time?
Well, Boylston is actually honored in London for his discovery, for his experiments, I should say.
And he publishes his findings, so this knowledge is spread through the English medical community.
(12:41):
He credits Cotton Mather with telling him this, but there's no mention of the fact that this knowledge actually came from Onesimus.
The problem is that even though this knowledge of inoculation is out there in the world, it is still very controversial.
And that's because when one is inoculated with smallpox, one is still contagious.
(13:05):
That four to six week window that we talked about earlier is still in play here.
And so it still is a public health threat.
If people are inoculating themselves against smallpox without telling others, they risk spreading that to other individuals who could then die as a result.
And that's a public health issue.
(13:25):
So it's very controversial for a long time.
So then the other innovation that takes place in Massachusetts is really about public health law.
And in the 1730s, the Massachusetts General Court, along with the leaders of Boston, the select men, created a structure to deal, a policy rather, to deal with smallpox outbreaks.
(13:48):
They knew that they had the ability to quarantine the sick.
They could put up flags outside of a home.
They could fence off an area of a home and keep people quarantined in that area.
In 1731, they passed a law that forbade people from hiding the effects of smallpox.
The head of a household was supposed to notify officials, select men in Boston, if someone in their home came down with smallpox, they would then go through the process of warning other people to stay away from this particular home.
(14:21):
There's also a caveat to that rule, which is that once 20 families had to be quarantined, that is, smallpox had spread to 20 households, then the quarantine rule was off because then the select men, the town leaders, knew that they could not contain this outbreak, that that it was too far gone for these attempts to just close off certain homes or certain areas to be effective.
(14:46):
Once 20 households had been infected, the town had reached this mark to begin inoculation.
And at this point, people from outside of the town where the infection was was spreading could also come in and get inoculated as well.
And they would, of course, close down the town.
This is very disruptive to trade, especially for a port town like Boston, right?
(15:11):
Or Salem or any other of these places that rely on this trade from the Atlantic world.
But it's a public health issue.
They know they cannot contain it.
And they know that the only way to reduce deaths is to inoculate.
And this is what we see happen later on in in the 18th century when there are outbreaks, that they would shut down the town, that they would have inoculations.
(15:33):
People would come in because people believed in inoculations and they would get their own natural immunity as a result.
In 1752, there was a smallpox epidemic that struck Boston again.
And during this particular outbreak, about 5,567 people caught smallpox naturally.
(15:54):
About 514 of them perished as a result.
That's a 9 percent mortality rate.
The town did go through the process of inoculation.
Two thousand one hundred and nine people received inoculations.
And of those, 31 people died.
That's one point five percent.
So once again, this is showing that inoculations are much safer.
(16:21):
They're still a risk, of course, but they are certainly safer than contracting smallpox in the natural way.
Doctors who were here in 1752 also learned that perhaps some individuals were not suitable for inoculations.
Pregnant women, infants or those who were elderly risked getting a severe illness from the inoculation.
(16:44):
So they recommended that these individuals actually leave the area while this process was being undertaken.
We can go to some letters whenever you're ready in 1764 with John Adams.
And if people are interested in seeing them, are they on the website?
So some of them have been scanned or available on the website.
They have been transcribed and people can search through the Adams papers collections by name of recipient, of author, of subject, by date.
(17:14):
It's really quite an operation.
And one gets a sense of the life of people living in the 18th century to see the originals.
They'll have to come to the Massachusetts Historical Society.
We are free and open to the public.
And we love showing these wonderful artifacts from the past.
See, now I'm coming.
(17:34):
I got to come to Boston.
I got to come to Massachusetts, not just to see these letters.
Yes, please do.
We see ourselves as the caretakers of these items.
They belong to the people.
And so we really invite the public to come and take a look at these letters, which are not just a testament to life during the American Revolution in the early days of the republic, but also of a love between two individuals who were just deeply engaged with each other for much of their adult lives.
(18:03):
That's beautiful.
Well, let's hear the letters.
All right.
So this first letter is from John Adams from 1764.
Saturday evening, eight o'clock, 7 April 1764.
So this is John Adams writing to Abigail Smith.
This is before they're married.
You'll note that they use nicknames for each other.
(18:26):
He called her Diana, and she referred to him as Lysander.
So that's who these people are references to when we get to those portions of the letters between the two of them.
For many years past, John writes, I have not felt more serenely than I do this evening.
My head is clear and my heart is at ease.
(18:47):
Business of every kind I have banished from my thoughts.
My room is prepared for a seven days retirement and my plan is digested for four or five weeks.
My brother retreats with me to our preparatory hospital and is determined to keep me company through the smallpox.
(19:07):
Your uncle, by his agreeable account of the doctor and your brother, their strength, their spirits and their happy prospects, but especially by the favor he left me from you, has contributed very much to the felicity of my present frame of mind.
For I assure you that as nothing which I before expected from the distemper gave me more concern than the thought of a six weeks separation from my Diana.
(19:38):
My departure from your house this morning made an impression upon me that was severely painful.
I thought I left you in tears and anxiety and was very glad to hear by your letter that your fears were abated.
For my own part, I believe no man ever undertook to prepare himself for the smallpox with fewer than I have at present.
(20:01):
I have considered thoroughly the diet and medicine prescribed me and am fully satisfied that no durable evil can result from either and any other fear from the smallpox or its appurtenances in the modern way of inoculation I never had in my life.
Thanks for my ball next Friday for certain with suitable submission.
(20:25):
We take our departure for Boston to Captain Cunningham's.
We go and I have not the least doubt of a pleasant three weeks, notwithstanding the distemper.
Good night, my dear.
I am going to bed.
So you'll note from that real quick that they sometimes refer to smallpox as distemper.
OK, I think it's really important for the listeners to realize just the human toll and the fear that these people are going through.
(20:53):
There is a chance that he's not going to come back.
There is still a chance that one could have a complication from inoculation and pass away as a result.
This is a long separation.
This is not as we have today with vaccines, which is you walk into your local pharmacy or doctor's office and get a shot and you might not feel good for a short period of time, but you're not contagious and you're free to go about your daily life.
(21:18):
This is something that requires weeks and weeks of preparation and weeks of weeks of being isolated.
That's true.
I didn't think about that as he's writing her is it could possibly be his last letter to her.
Yes, that's really it is.
It's very heartbreaking.
And I can't imagine what she was going through receiving these and wondering when she might get the next letter and hoping she gets the next letter.
(21:45):
Exactly.
We'll be right back after a quick word from my advertisers.
So he then writes an update on the 13th of April, a few days later, and he talks about the process that he undergoes to receive this inoculation.
Okay, so this is John Adams.
Dr. Perkins demanded my left arm and Dr. Warren, my brothers, they took their lancets and with their points divided the skin for about a quarter of an inch and just suffering the blood to appear, buried a thread about half a quarter of an inch long in the channel.
(22:22):
A little lint was then laid over the scratch and a piece of a rag pressed on and then a bandage bound over all my coat and waistcoat put on and I was big to go where and do what I pleased.
The doctors have left us pills red and black to take night and morning, but they looked very sagaciously and importantly at us and ordered my brother larger doses than me on account of the difference in our constitutions.
(22:53):
The doctors having finished the operation and left us, their directions medicines took their departure in infinite haste.
I have one request to make, which is that you would be very careful in making Tom smoke all the letters from me very faithfully before you or any of the family reads them.
For although I shall never fail to smoke them myself before sealing, yet I fear the air of this house will be too much infected soon to be absolutely without danger and I would not you should take the distemper by letter from me for millions.
(23:30):
I write at a desk far removed from any sick room and shall use all the care I can, but too much cannot be used.
My love to all, my hearty thanks to Mama for her kind wishes.
My regards is due to Papa and should request his prayers which are always becoming and especially at such times when we are undertaking anything of consequence as the smallpox.
(23:56):
Undoubtedly though, I have not the least apprehension at all of what is called danger.
This letter is so heavy, it just shows the weight of himself and what the community was going through.
Yes.
Dealing with not just the smallpox but also the inoculation process.
(24:17):
Wow.
Yes, it's a lot and of course they're not able to eat and go anywhere they please.
They're not able to eat normally.
There is a letter he writes, talks about in a little bit.
Please continue.
So four days later, John writes again to tell Abigail of the process of living through this inoculation while he's waiting for the infection to run its course.
(24:45):
So this is John on April 17, 1764.
Yours of April 15th, this moment received.
I thank you for it and for your offer of milk, but we have milk in vast abundance and everything else we want except company.
You can't imagine how finely my brother and I live.
We have as much bread and as much new pure milk, as much pudding and rice as we please.
(25:10):
And the medicine we take is not all that nauseous or painful and our felicity is the greater as five persons in the same room under the care of Lord and Church, those are some doctors, caregivers, are starved and medicimated with the utmost severity.
No bread, no pudding, no milk is permitted them, i.e. no pure and simple milk.
(25:34):
They are allowed a mixture of half milk and half water.
And every other day they are tortured with powders that make them as sick as death and as weak as water.
All this may be necessary for them for what I know, as Lord is professively against any preparation previous to inoculation, in which opinion I own I was fully agreed with him till lately.
(25:56):
But experience has convinced me of my mistake and I have felt and now feel every hour the advantage and the wisdom of the contrary doctrine."
He goes on to talk about how other people are surviving, are going through the process.
Let me fast forward to this portion where John talks about someone who has caught the distemper, smallpox, through the natural way.
(26:21):
Those who have it in the natural way are objects of as much horror as ever.
There is a poor man in this neighborhood, one bass, now laboring with it in the natural way.
He is in a good way of recovery but is the most shocking sight that can be seen.
They say he is no more like a man than he is like a hog or a horse, swelled to three times his size, black as bacon, blind as a stone.
(26:47):
And how was Abigail's reception to his letters?
Well, she of course is very concerned, as you could tell from the previous letter, she was offering to send anything she could.
She is also someone who believes in inoculation and would have gone with him to undergo the process, but her father forbade it.
(27:07):
And it's not until 1776, at the start of the American Revolution, that she is able to get inoculated with, at that point, their four children.
And so John and Abigail are very convinced that inoculation works.
And I think this is probably one of the moments in their relationship where they wish they could have been together to go through this process.
(27:33):
But perhaps they reasoned that at least one of them would, if they survived, if John survived inoculation, be safe from it for the rest of his life.
Well, John has a lot of time, of course, to think about the procedure.
He's quarantined for many weeks after all.
And in this letter where he describes what he's eating, how people are going through the process, he contrasts that very clearly with someone who's caught smallpox through the natural way, as he says.
(28:03):
And for him, based on this observation, as well as the evidence of other inoculation campaigns, inoculation is the way to go.
It is much safer.
And so here's a quotation that I think is really striking and really gets to what he thinks about the process of inoculation.
This is John again, quote, I would think myself a deliberate self-murderer.
(29:07):
I mean that I incurred all the guilt of deliberate self-murder.
If I should only stay in this town and run the chance of having it in the natural way.
There's just so much to unravel here with that statement.
Questioning, are men rational?
Those that would go through it the natural way versus those that would choose inoculation.
(29:31):
And it's interesting how we're still asking that same question today.
Yes.
Thank you for sharing that.
And so was this letter shared or was it just directed to Abigail?
It's directed to Abigail, but I suspect that it is something that other people would have talked about.
(29:53):
This is a very big debate.
It was a big debate at that particular time in the 18th century, and as it is a big debate for us today.
This is always going to be a matter of life and death.
It's always a matter that people find of great interest to talk about choices and public health and whatnot.
But once again, I'll point out that while John has gone through this process, he's fine.
(30:18):
He emerges and with his immunity, that outbreak in 1764 ultimately has a similar outcome, which is that about 699 people contracted smallpox naturally.
24 of them died.
That's a 17.5% mortality rate.
(30:40):
4,977 received inoculations.
That's almost 5,000 people received inoculations with only 46 deaths.
That's 0.9%. So you can compare the numbers and those who believe in this process can point to these irrefutable facts that it saves lives.
(31:02):
And at this time, he was still engaged to Abigail, correct?
Okay.
So at what point did she decide to do it?
Did she inoculate herself or did she have someone inoculate her as well as her children?
She had someone inoculate her and her children.
And it is a whole process.
(31:25):
This is, from what I've read to you so far, as we've talked about, inoculation is a trying process under normal peacetime circumstances.
But imagine that Abigail Adams has to go through this process in the middle of the start of the American Revolution.
And that adds several factors of anxiety, but also a great deal of a threat from other sources as well.
(31:51):
So if we fast forward to 1776, the summer of 1776, this is when Abigail Adams has the opportunity to inoculate both herself and her children.
And that's because there's another smallpox outbreak in Boston at that time.
So the town shuts down again, there's a smallpox inoculation process, and Abigail and her children come in.
(32:16):
They're not living in Boston at the time, but they come in from where they are, and they go through the process.
And I'm happy to share some of her experiences with that.
Please do.
So this is Abigail writing to John, and John Adams at this time is in Philadelphia to debate the pros and cons of independence and what to do with regards to the colony's relationship with the mother country.
(32:42):
In fact, this letter is after independence has been declared.
This is the 13th of July in 1776.
And she's already undergone the process.
So she writes, she starts with an apology to John, quote, I must begin with apologizing to you for not writing since the 17th of June.
I've really had so many cares upon my hands and mind, with a bad inflammation in my eyes, that I have not been able to write.
(33:10):
I now date from Boston, where I yesterday arrived and was with all four of our little ones inoculated for the smallpox.
We had our bedding, etc.
to bring.
A cow we have driven down from Braintree and some hay I have had put into the stable, wood, etc.
And we have really commenced housekeepers here.
(33:34):
The house was furnished with almost every article except beds, which we have free use of and think ourselves much obliged by the fine accommodations and kind offer of our friends.
All our necessary stores we purchased jointly.
Our little ones stood the operation manfully.
Dr. Bullfinch is our physician.
(33:56):
Such a spirit of inoculation never before took place.
The town and every house in it are as full as they can hold.
I believe there are not less than 304 persons from Braintree, this is the town they're living in for people unfamiliar with the area.
304 persons from Braintree, she means having come to Boston for the inoculation.
(34:19):
God grant that we may all go comfortably through the distemper.
So that's the start of it.
Now, the next day she writes again, I had many disagreeable sensations at the thoughts of coming myself.
But to see my children through it, I thought my duty and all those feelings vanished as soon as I was inoculated.
(34:40):
And I trust a kind Providence will carry me safely through.
I have enough upon our hands in the morning.
The little folks are very sick then and puke every morning.
But after that they are comfortable.
I shall write you very often.
Pray inform me constantly of every important transaction.
(35:01):
Every expression of tenderness is cordial to my heart, unimportant as they are to the rest of the world.
To me, they are everything.
So there's a lot to unpack there too.
Of course, she's talking about how she had fears about going through this process herself, but she did this for her children.
And she's also hinting at the isolation they feel being quarantined here, and how she wants to hear about what's going on where he is, which is where this great debate about independence is taking place.
(35:32):
So now she's wrestling with the same emotions that he struggled with in the fear of not just losing herself, but also her kids.
And so and then the letter starts with an apology.
I'm sure it has had to be a shock for him receiving it, as well as a comfort knowing that they're taking actions.
(35:53):
And what did that mean for ordinary Americans watching her example?
Did this influence the desire to be inoculated in other individuals?
People, by and large, wanted, of course, to be free from this horrible disease.
They knew that being inoculated or surviving smallpox meant that they would never have to worry about it again.
(36:17):
That much they knew.
They also understood that inoculations lowered the risk of dying as a result.
But the problem is sometimes in many cases during the colonial period and the revolutionary period, one of economics.
What kind of people have the means of not working for one month or six weeks?
(36:40):
What kind of people have the means of finding supplies for themselves and their loved ones who are isolated, undergoing this treatment, suffering through this?
This is something that points to a class divide.
There is a class element here that's sometimes the wealthy, the well to do, the middle class are able to go through this process.
(37:03):
And the danger, of course, is that if any of those people who are being inoculated break that quarantine, they risk spreading that illness to everyone else who does not have the ability to get inoculated.
So there are serious issues that many Americans had to contend with this particular time.
And are there any letters from Abigail where she talks about the relief she felt after being inoculated?
(37:30):
Abigail and the children have different reactions to the inoculation process.
It is possible that someone undergoing inoculation will actually not catch smallpox.
And that means the inoculation has not worked.
So as it turns out with Abigail, Abigail's works.
But for some of her children, they have to undergo the process several times.
(37:54):
There are no symptoms.
They don't show any symptoms.
And that's how they know that they've not contracted it after a certain amount of time.
And so their quarantine actually has to be extended for much longer because they have to make sure that all of the children have gone through this distemper, have contracted it and then have survived.
And ultimately they do.
(38:16):
And there's enormous relief in Abigail's tone when she writes to John saying that all the children have survived the process.
What was the timeline between their first inoculation and her kids finally being receptive to the smallpox inoculation?
So this is Abigail Adams to John Adams on the 30th of July in 1776.
(38:40):
Quote, I am comfortable.
Johnny is cleverly.
Nabby, I hope, has gone through the distemper.
The eruption was so trifling that to be certain I have had inoculation repeated.
Charles and Tommy have neither had symptoms nor eruptions.
Charles was inoculated last Sabbath evening a second time.
(39:04):
Tommy today, the three times from some fresh matter taken from Becky Peck, who has enough for all the house beside.
This suspense is painful.
I know not what to do with them.
It lengthens out the time which I can but ill afford.
And if they can have it, I know not how to quit till I can get them through.
(39:27):
Youth.
Youth is the time they have no pains but bodily, no anxiety of mind, no fears for themselves or others.
And then the disease is much lighter.
The poor doctor is as anxious as we are, but begs us to make it certain if repeated inoculations will do it.
There are now several patients who were inoculated last winter and thought they passed through the distemper but have now taken it in the natural way.
(39:57):
So this is a real anxiety, right?
Because if someone goes through it, does not actually have the immunity because they were not infected through inoculation.
They are still susceptible to it.
And then the next day, the very next day, the 31st of July, she writes again.
I have the pleasure to tell you this morning that I think Tommy's second inoculation has taken as he was very ill last night and the eruptive fever seems coming on his 10 days since the second.
(40:26):
So you want to see a reaction.
You want to see the body respond to this as a sign that the infection has taken place and the inoculation process has gone through.
I can't imagine when myself and my kids were going through the first COVID shots, you're watching your kids struggle and you're not only feeling a sense of relief that, okay, great, they've taken it, they're responding to the inoculation, but now will they survive this?
(40:52):
And on top of it, she's dealing with timelines and she's pressed for a structure of time because she's a busy mom and her husband just happens to be John Adams.
There's just so much there in that letter that I think every mom can associate with and go, oh my goodness, I get this.
That is really just brings back the humanity of history.
(41:14):
It makes us realize how, you know, you were saying it's not written in history.
In a lot of our histories, they don't bring up the smallpox epidemic.
So it really highlights everything that they were dealing with, not just a war, but also smallpox.
Well, I think disease is the great leveler and it shows people as people, they're human, all of them, all of us are, whether you're rich or poor, you're human and you're affected by all of these awful diseases.
(41:46):
And so when you read the letters of people who we revere as great Americans and see the everyday pain and the anxiety and the concern they have for their children, that they suffered, you see them as human beings.
And that gets us, I think, to really understand that history is not foreordained.
(42:10):
It's not made by people who knew all the answers.
History is made by people like you and me, everyday people who are trying to navigate events that they face, life and death, how to take care of your children and how to get to a better life.
And so I think studying this, bringing this element of health care to the public at this moment, the 250th anniversary of the start of the American Revolution, may help us better understand these individuals and perhaps give us a better understanding and appreciation for history.
(42:43):
Very well stated.
I agree with you a hundred percent, especially in light of the anniversary of the revolution.
Right.
We'll be right back after a quick word from my advertisers.
And so in light of all of this, was John Adams also communicating with George Washington?
(43:06):
And you were talking about how Washington's wife was like the catalyst in him agreeing to inoculate his army.
Yes.
So there's a great line from John Adams where he writes later on about his experience having undergone the inoculation process.
And he talks about how when he was recovering, they fed him this concoction.
(43:30):
He does not mention it in the letters I quoted to you, but he talks about how they're also feeding them mercury.
And as a result of this, the teeth in his mouth, his gums were wobbling.
And that gave him something in common with George Washington, who as your listeners may know, had horrible teeth.
That by the end of his life, he only had a single tooth remaining in his mouth.
(43:54):
But Washington himself, there are many pressures on Washington on the matter of smallpox, and he has physicians and generals who are advocating it.
He knows that the men in the ranks are inoculating themselves against orders.
And then he has this opportunity to see the inoculation process work with his own wife, Martha Washington, who's inoculated in Philadelphia.
(44:22):
And it seems as if right after she emerges from this, having survived it, he has this change of heart.
And it's as if in the winter of 1776 and 77, when the army is encamped, so
this is actually a quiet time, there's not much one can do militarily in the
(44:44):
winter in the 18th century, in 18th century warfare, having this evidence
of smallpox raging across the country, having this evidence of his wife having
survived the process and having these demands from the men, he orders
that the army be inoculated.
So this is a letter that Washington writes to William Shippen Jr. from his headquarters in Morristown in winter camp, quote, finding the smallpox to be spreading much and fearing that no precaution can prevent it from running through the whole of our army, I have determined that the troops shall be inoculated.
(45:22):
This expedient may be attended with some inconveniences and some disadvantages, but yet I trust in its consequences will have the most happy effects.
Necessity not only authorizes, but seems to require the measure for should the disorder infect the army in the natural way and rage with its usual virulence, we should have more to dread from it than from the sword of the enemy.
(45:52):
Under these circumstances, I have directed Dr. Bond to prepare immediately for inoculating in this quarter, keeping the matter as secret as possible and request that you will without delay inoculate all the continental troops that are in Philadelphia and those that shall come in as fast as they arrive.
(46:15):
You will spare no pains to carry them through the disorder with the utmost expedition and to have them cleansed from the infection when recovered, that they may proceed to camp with as little injury as possible to the country through which they pass.
If the business is immediately begun and favored with the common success, I would feign hope they will be soon fit for duty and that in a short space of time, we shall have an army not subject to this, the greatest of all calamities that can befall it when taken in the natural way.
(46:51):
That is a bold statement.
And it was a letter that he wrote to William Shipper, correct?
It's a letter to William Shippen, who's in charge of the troops in Philadelphia.
Yes.
Okay.
So was this kept a secret?
Like for fear of moles, maybe information being shared with the opposing military?
(47:14):
I think they certainly tried to keep it a secret.
But of course, if you're inoculating thousands and thousands of people, word will spread.
Of course, the good news is this is, as I mentioned, in the middle of winter and it's very difficult for any troops in the 18th century to mobilize to fight during this time.
So it's actually a safe time to do this.
(47:36):
I just am always struck by what Washington calls this at the end of his thesis, the greatest of all calamities that can befall it when taken in the natural way.
Yes.
This is a this is a sea change in how people view inoculation, that when the Continental Army inoculates its troops wherever they are, it changes how people, civilians in the colonies, regard it as well.
(48:02):
Connecticut, for example, had had very strict laws banning inoculation and it ultimately had to repeal these because soldiers were being inoculated in Connecticut during the war itself.
And people understood that this was a really important innovation.
And if the commander of the Continental Army is ordering it and sees its effectiveness, then that carries a lot of weight with individuals, too.
(48:29):
It's still a damaging disease.
Historians estimate that about 100,000 people died during the smallpox epidemic during the American Revolution.
But I think that Washington's actions not only saved a lot of lives, but may have saved the army and therefore saved the revolution as well.
(48:50):
No doubt.
And it was, I'm sure, incredibly influential on the community at large.
What was the opposition, like those who are anti-inoculators, who felt like it was God's will, what did that look like?
Was there any discussion between possibly Adams or Washington or others discussing those who opposed it?
(49:15):
To my knowledge, there is none of that.
I think that the religious objections to this, which we saw early in the 18th century, had really been muted by the time we get to the late 18th century and closer to the revolution.
I mean, the facts are, well, to take John Adams quotation from a different context, facts are stubborn things and you cannot deny the success of this.
(49:46):
So, for example, in 1776 in Boston, this outbreak where Abigail Adams has herself
and her family inoculated, there are, once again, if you look at the math, if you look
at the statistics, 304 people in Boston contract smallpox the natural way, 29 of
them die, that's nine and a half percent mortality, 4,988 are inoculated, that's
(50:11):
almost 5,000 people inoculated, 28 people die, that's 0.6 percent mortality.
There is just no question that this reduces your chances of death from smallpox.
And there it is, the facts that are very stubborn things, they tend to be the ultimate influence in the ultimate decision.
(50:37):
And I have a line for you and your listeners, this is a podcast, math, science, history, so I'm going to say do the math, believe the science, learn your history.
Oh my goodness, I'm going to have that printed out and put in a frame.
Well, right, do the math, look at the stats, believe the science, believe what the inoculation does and learn your history.
(51:05):
Yes, and learn history.
It's like I always say, history, they're the ultimate in showing us where the red flags of danger lie.
Yes, history is the ultimate in showing us what we can learn from it.
This is, it's a wonderful tool to have and hopefully that will never be destroyed under our watch or anybody else's watch for that matter.
(51:28):
Well, if the MHS can help it, that's not going to happen.
And that's why I love the MHS.
I love the work that you provide for the community and for the country and for the world at large to see this wonderful experiment that is the United States and how it came to be and where it could possibly go.
(51:50):
So I want to, I want to ask, so when we look at George Washington's decision to
inoculate the army and Abigail Adams' choice to inoculate her family, her
children, and the way Americans embraced the inoculation after the revolution, and
this goes back to where we are today, what does that tell us about how the
(52:13):
revolutionary generation balanced their personal risk, their public health, and
their survival of a new nation?
And what does that tell us about how we can do the same?
That is a very good question.
People say that history repeats itself, but that's not entirely true.
(52:35):
There's no way to replicate the conditions of the past that brought American society together.
And I would argue that there was a greater consensus in the colonies that would become the United States about the efficacy, the success of inoculation than there perhaps was over the issue of whether or not we should be an independent nation from Great Britain.
(53:04):
These were issues of health, of public health, issues of politics are always divisive.
But unlike politics, whether domestic or international, as I said, going back to what we discussed earlier, public health, the health of the society is something that one cannot escape.
(53:24):
And I think that at that particular time, there was a real understanding that we all are in this together.
For example, if you live in a town where a smallpox has broken out, you are worried about yourself, you are worried about your loved ones, and you understand that the only way that you're going to survive, that the community is going to survive, is that everyone gets involved.
(53:49):
Everyone gets inoculated or everyone adheres to the quarantine.
This is something that's very difficult for us to understand now because, of course, we do not live under the threat of as awful a plague as smallpox.
We do not live under the threat of numerous diseases that have been, if not defeated, as smallpox has been, but certainly limited in what they do, their effects on humankind.
(54:22):
Yellow fever, for example.
And I think that we are at a point in our history where our luxury, our blessings of science have gotten us to a place where we can, to the detriment, perhaps, of the greater good, where we can't ignore or challenge or say that we're not going to get involved in something that is beneficial to all.
(54:50):
And so this is why it's really important to understand history and the context of history and the full story of history.
It's not just about the revolution.
This is also about Americans fighting off and coming together and finding consensus and rallying around the idea of inoculation to fight this horrible scourge.
(55:10):
It gives us a sense of the importance of that and a threat that big requires a unified response.
Perhaps that's something that we shall see again.
I certainly hope so.
But it certainly brings a community together in a way that very few other events do.
(55:31):
And that was beautiful.
I think what you've highlighted so powerfully is that politics has always been divisive, but health leaves no room to stand apart.
And the part that really resonates today is that the revolution wasn't only one on the battlefield.
It was held together by communities who trusted science and cared for one another.
(55:57):
Yes.
Well, I will let you wrap up.
Sure.
So just a few years after the American Revolution, actually after the period of confederation, after the Constitutional Convention, this is actually 1796, which is the year that John Adams is elected president.
Edward Jenner, on the other side of the Atlantic, noticed that dairymaids who had been affected by cowpox were immune from smallpox.
(56:26):
I'll point out also that smallpox is something that only humans get.
No other animal species get smallpox.
They have their own forms.
But humans can get cowpox.
And it's a very mild response from the human body, this reaction, but it builds up immunity to smallpox.
(56:47):
And so Jenner and other physicians come up with the idea of vaccination.
And the word vaccine is from this time period.
So it's cowpox, cow vaccine.
So to give someone cowpox is a way to prevent them from getting smallpox.
It builds up the same immunity one needs.
(57:09):
And one is not infectious during that time.
So one cannot spread it because one does not have smallpox.
And so this is much safer.
You do not need to quarantine.
You do not need to shut down trade.
You do not need to shut down a town.
And it is safe.
And this is the start of this understanding of how to ultimately combat smallpox, which is eradicated, as we know it, as a threat.
(57:36):
In the 20th century, in 1980, the World Health Organization declared that it had seen the last of smallpox.
And the last outbreak in the United States took place in 1949.
But there was a real concerted effort in the 1960s to do this, and they were successful by the 1970s.
So there are several generations of humans that have now lived in a world where there is no smallpox.
(58:02):
I did not know that.
So it's almost as if they aren't even aware of potential threats.
Yes.
And I should specify that although no one that we know of has smallpox and there have not been any outbreaks, the United States has a small sample of it.
And Russia has a small sample of it.
(58:24):
Both of these superpowers are keeping this for potential research.
And this is a huge debate in the scientific community about whether or not to just completely eradicate this, just destroy the sample, lest it get out again.
In fact, I think the last person to actually have contracted smallpox and died of smallpox was in the United Kingdom.
(58:46):
And it was from a lab leak of some sort.
But this was decades ago.
So there are still samples that exist, but this is beyond my field of expertise.
I'll leave this to medical professionals, scientists and ethical experts, philosophers to talk about what to do with these samples.
But no one has been infected with smallpox that we know of for several decades.
(59:11):
That is the perfect question to end the podcast on.
It makes us reflect back on our ethics.
And what does the science say?
Do we observe these samples or do we destroy them?
And would that be an act of ignorance or would that be an act of curiosity and scientific study?
(59:32):
That's wonderful.
I love this.
I love leaving out a question.
Well, thank you very much for your time, Dr. Wongsrichanalai.
If my listeners want more information, where can they go to either see some of these letters, read them or learn more about the Massachusetts Historical Society?
We invite people to visit our website at www.masshist.org online so you can learn about our collections.
(01:00:05):
You can see the Adams Papers, links to the Adams Papers project.
And you can also, if you are in the city of Boston, come visit us in the Back Bay.
We are very close to Fenway Park and we are free and open to the public.
Come see the treasures that belong to the American people that we hold in trust for them, for future generations and for posterity.
(01:00:28):
Yes, please visit.
It was a pleasure speaking with you.
This was a lot of fun.
It was.
And thank you so much for your time.
I believe that history doesn't just live in our textbooks.
It lives in the choices we make today.
Two hundred and fifty years ago, George Washington, Martha Washington, John Adams and Abigail Adams chose to risk the unknown to place their trust in science.
(01:00:57):
And in doing so, they safeguarded a fragile nation's future.
Their courage reminds us that progress has always required faith, not blind faith, but faith grounded in evidence, in resilience and in the shared hope of building something greater than ourselves as we face the challenges of our own country.
(01:01:20):
Now, may we remember that legacy.
May we remember that courage is not just found on battlefields, but in the quiet, determined choice to trust knowledge, to protect one another and to look forward toward the future and toward science with resolve.
(01:01:42):
Thank you for joining me today.
And thank you again to Dr. Canisauran Wongsrijanilai for his invaluable insight.
Until next time, stay curious, stay courageous and never forget the power of science that will carry us forward.
Until next time, Carpe Diem.
(01:02:03):
Thank you for tuning in to Math Science History.
If you enjoyed today's episode, please leave a quick rating and review.
They really help the podcast.
You can find our transcripts at mathsciencehistory.com.
And while you're there, remember to click on that coffee button because every dollar you donate supports a portion of our production costs and keeps our educational website free.
(01:02:25):
Again, thank you for tuning in.
And until next time, Carpe Diem.
I believe in the United States.
I believe in our resilience and I believe that this experiment that is known as America can do so much better if we trust science.
And after today, I hope you have the same revelation.
Today's very special episode includes an interview with the Director of Research at the Massachusetts Historical Society, Dr. Kanisorn Wongsrichanalai.
(00:27):
Stick around.
During the preparation and the interview, I had the opportunity to learn so much more about the Revolutionary War as well as the greater battle that our forefathers endured.
It was a battle that was written in the margins of our history books that many do not know about.
(00:50):
Though many talk about the Revolutionary War and how 250 years ago we banned it together and fought for our independence, a bigger picture was written in the margins that many of us never knew about.
While the forefathers were struggling with developing a country that we could have hope and faith in, the continent was struggling with the deadly disease of smallpox.
(01:13):
From the indigenous people of the northern continent to Canada to the Continental Army, it is approximated that around 130,000 people died between 1775 and 1782.
The heaviest losses fell on indigenous peoples and the communities in Spanish America.
It was during this time that our forefathers had the wherewithal to consider trying inoculation.
(01:39):
And that battle was not an easy one.
It was not like walking into a CVS and getting a shot and then binge-watching for a day.
It was a procedure that required weeks of gathering supplies, blocking out several weeks of recovery time, and hoping that one survived the inoculation process.
And our brave leaders, including their wives, Martha Washington and Abigail Adams, took it upon themselves to inoculate.
(02:07):
For George Washington, Martha's actions to inoculate validated Washington to inoculate the Continental Army.
I have to believe that the foundations of this country was built on trust in the unknown.
And that includes science.
By trusting science, they were able to save the townspeople and save our military and help us become who we are today.
(02:32):
And who we are today may not be perfect, but I would like to believe that the spirit of our forefathers still has a foothold on its legacy.
And it's up to us to remember the courage and the strength that they endured as they came together and rallied around science.
That being said, please enjoy this interview that I had with Dr. Kanisorn Wongsrichanalai.
(02:58):
And I hope that you enjoy the information and the insight that he shares.
And I hope that you enjoy listening to the letters exchanged between Abigail Adams and John Adams, as well as the stories of correspondence between John Adams and George Washington.
Dr. Kanisorn Wongsrichanalai is Director of Research at the Massachusetts Historical Society.
(03:20):
He is the author of Northern Character, College Educated New Englanders, Honor, Nationalism and Leadership in the Civil War Era.
He is the co-editor of So Conceived and So Dedicated, Northern Intellectuals in the Civil War Era.
And he is the co-editor of Wars, Civil and Great, the American Experience in the Civil War and World War One.
(03:45):
He co-directed the National Endowment for the Humanities Sponsored Project, West Texans and the Experience of War, World War One to the Present, while working as an Associate Professor of History at Angelo State University.
He is a graduate of Bowdoin College and earned his PhD in American History at the University of Virginia.
(04:07):
Dr. Kanisorn Wongsrichanalai, thank you so much for joining me here at Math Science History.
It is a pleasure to join you.
And I'm looking forward to our conversation.
I am too.
There's so much to consider right now with all that's going on with vaccines.
And I love the story that is behind George Washington and the inoculations and smallpox.
(04:31):
I know some of my listeners are not familiar with what smallpox is.
Could you briefly describe what it is and how it evolved to becoming literally a danger to the Continental Army?
I'm happy to do that with the caveat that I'm not a medical professional.
And so what we have here is historical documentation about the ravages of the disease smallpox.
(04:57):
But I should also mention that I work at the Massachusetts Historical Society, which is the home of the Adams family papers of the John Adams, Abigail Adams, John Quincy Adams.
And this being the 250th anniversary of the start of the American Revolution in Massachusetts, we are very happy to highlight some of these collections.
(05:20):
And they relate to smallpox, which is actually something that is generally left out of the histories of the revolution.
So I think we'll talk a little bit about that and then we'll lead up to George Washington.
But to go to your question, smallpox is a contagious, very contagious and very deadly and dangerous disease, which thankfully does not exist with us here in 2025.
(05:47):
It presents with flu like symptoms.
And this then later on leads to the development of red spots, including inside a person's mouth.
These are sores or pox, and they're filled with mucus and it's spread through contact with fluids produced by infected individuals.
Therefore, clothing or sheets or if someone has sores inside their throat and they cough on a person, that's how these germs spread.
(06:15):
So it's a virus.
The strain that is lethal to humans that was the most problematic is viriola major.
And the fatality rate was as high as 30 percent.
It was absolutely devastating.
It was absolutely terrifying for people who had it.
And Abigail Adams calls it a pestilence that walketh in darkness.
(06:40):
Wow.
And when did she write that?
That is 1776.
That is right after she had just undergone the inoculation process with the four of her children.
So this is during the American Revolution.
And she is locked down in the town of Boston, having undergone this treatment.
(07:02):
We have many documents to share with your listeners about this, but we'll get to that shortly.
Wonderful.
So now, from what I understand, George Washington actually got smallpox when he was younger, before he actually started working in the American military.
Is that correct?
Yes.
So George Washington had contracted smallpox when he traveled to the Caribbean with his brother.
(07:28):
His brother was suffering from another illness which required treatment.
Probably getting to a tropical or warmer climate was supposed to help.
I believe it was tuberculosis, but I'm not sure on that.
Yes, it was.
Yes, it was.
Very good.
Well, while there, Washington contracts smallpox in the phrase of the time, the natural way, which is he gets it and he's not inoculated.
(07:52):
He gets sick.
He survives it.
So he does have immunity.
So when he's commander of the Continental Army, he is someone who already has this immunity.
It is unclear when he learns of the difference between inoculation and getting infected in the natural way, because he seems to confuse those two in some of his correspondence.
(08:17):
But we can talk about when we get to that point in 1776 and 77, when he finally gets on board with this, what convinces him and when he learns that there is a real difference between catching it the natural way or inoculating oneself against smallpox.
When did the first inoculations begin in the United States?
(08:40):
Was it effective?
Did it help quell the smallpox or was it experimental?
Right.
So the process in North America, in the English colonies, begins before there was a United States.
So many decades before that, in fact.
And actually, it takes place here in the city of Boston.
(09:01):
At the town was not the city, town, but this is a medical, one of many medical innovations that take place here in Boston.
In 1706, the parishioners of a popular preacher by the name of Cotton Mather, whose papers are also at the Massachusetts Historical Society, I'll point out, present Cotton Mather with an enslaved man named Onesimus.
(09:27):
And Mather asked this individual, Onesimus, whether or not he had ever contracted smallpox.
Onesimus told him that in Africa, where he was free, before he was enslaved, he had been inoculated.
And he showed him evidence of this scar on his arm.
So this is where they made the cut to insert the smallpox pus from the infected person.
(09:51):
Now, Mather confirmed this with other enslaved people from Africa who'd undergone this procedure.
So he knew that this is something that other civilizations had performed.
Fast forward to 1721, and there is a smallpox outbreak in Boston.
Mather attempts to convince the physicians in Boston to try this process of inoculation, saying that he had heard this from Onesimus and had confirmed it by speaking with other enslaved Africans.
(10:22):
Now, the physicians in Boston, many of them did not think that they could trust information from enslaved people.
And they certainly doubted that people who they had enslaved were capable of acquiring medical knowledge that was beyond their own skill and knowledge.
There were also some ministers who claimed that inoculation challenged God's will, and so were against this.
(10:48):
But Mather finally convinced a physician by the name of Zabdiel Boylston.
He's actually John Adams's great uncle.
Yes.
There's a family connection there.
Yeah, I thought that was interesting.
It's a small town, and even today, Boston's a small city, so there are a lot of connections.
But Dr. Boylston attempted this inoculation process.
(11:11):
He tried it on his six-year-old son and several enslaved people as well.
This is controversial, and Mather is threatened.
There's someone who throws an incendiary through his window at his home, but Boylston pushes ahead.
And in the end, the facts and the results speak for themselves.
(11:32):
The smallpox outbreak in Boston went from 1721 to 1722.
And during that time, about 5,700 people, 5,759 people, caught smallpox naturally.
842 of them died as a result.
That's a 14.5% mortality rate.
(11:56):
But the people who Boylston inoculated, he inoculated 242 people.
Only six died.
That's a 2.5% mortality rate.
So if you're looking at this, and there are other outbreaks where we can talk about the stats, it is very clear that your chances of surviving inoculation are far higher than surviving catching smallpox through the natural way.
(12:20):
So it was proof that the inoculations worked.
What was the reception like at that time?
Well, Boylston is actually honored in London for his discovery, for his experiments, I should say.
And he publishes his findings, so this knowledge is spread through the English medical community.
(12:41):
He credits Cotton Mather with telling him this, but there's no mention of the fact that this knowledge actually came from Onesimus.
The problem is that even though this knowledge of inoculation is out there in the world, it is still very controversial.
And that's because when one is inoculated with smallpox, one is still contagious.
(13:05):
That four to six week window that we talked about earlier is still in play here.
And so it still is a public health threat.
If people are inoculating themselves against smallpox without telling others, they risk spreading that to other individuals who could then die as a result.
And that's a public health issue.
(13:25):
So it's very controversial for a long time.
So then the other innovation that takes place in Massachusetts is really about public health law.
And in the 1730s, the Massachusetts General Court, along with the leaders of Boston, the select men, created a structure to deal, a policy rather, to deal with smallpox outbreaks.
(13:48):
They knew that they had the ability to quarantine the sick.
They could put up flags outside of a home.
They could fence off an area of a home and keep people quarantined in that area.
In 1731, they passed a law that forbade people from hiding the effects of smallpox.
The head of a household was supposed to notify officials, select men in Boston, if someone in their home came down with smallpox, they would then go through the process of warning other people to stay away from this particular home.
(14:21):
There's also a caveat to that rule, which is that once 20 families had to be quarantined, that is, smallpox had spread to 20 households, then the quarantine rule was off because then the select men, the town leaders, knew that they could not contain this outbreak, that that it was too far gone for these attempts to just close off certain homes or certain areas to be effective.
(14:46):
Once 20 households had been infected, the town had reached this mark to begin inoculation.
And at this point, people from outside of the town where the infection was was spreading could also come in and get inoculated as well.
And they would, of course, close down the town.
This is very disruptive to trade, especially for a port town like Boston, right?
(15:11):
Or Salem or any other of these places that rely on this trade from the Atlantic world.
But it's a public health issue.
They know they cannot contain it.
And they know that the only way to reduce deaths is to inoculate.
And this is what we see happen later on in in the 18th century when there are outbreaks, that they would shut down the town, that they would have inoculations.
(15:33):
People would come in because people believed in inoculations and they would get their own natural immunity as a result.
In 1752, there was a smallpox epidemic that struck Boston again.
And during this particular outbreak, about 5,567 people caught smallpox naturally.
(15:54):
About 514 of them perished as a result.
That's a 9 percent mortality rate.
The town did go through the process of inoculation.
Two thousand one hundred and nine people received inoculations.
And of those, 31 people died.
That's one point five percent.
So once again, this is showing that inoculations are much safer.
(16:21):
They're still a risk, of course, but they are certainly safer than contracting smallpox in the natural way.
Doctors who were here in 1752 also learned that perhaps some individuals were not suitable for inoculations.
Pregnant women, infants or those who were elderly risked getting a severe illness from the inoculation.
(16:44):
So they recommended that these individuals actually leave the area while this process was being undertaken.
We can go to some letters whenever you're ready in 1764 with John Adams.
And if people are interested in seeing them, are they on the website?
So some of them have been scanned or available on the website.
They have been transcribed and people can search through the Adams papers collections by name of recipient, of author, of subject, by date.
(17:14):
It's really quite an operation.
And one gets a sense of the life of people living in the 18th century to see the originals.
They'll have to come to the Massachusetts Historical Society.
We are free and open to the public.
And we love showing these wonderful artifacts from the past.
See, now I'm coming.
(17:34):
I got to come to Boston.
I got to come to Massachusetts, not just to see these letters.
Yes, please do.
We see ourselves as the caretakers of these items.
They belong to the people.
And so we really invite the public to come and take a look at these letters, which are not just a testament to life during the American Revolution in the early days of the republic, but also of a love between two individuals who were just deeply engaged with each other for much of their adult lives.
(18:03):
That's beautiful.
Well, let's hear the letters.
All right.
So this first letter is from John Adams from 1764.
Saturday evening, eight o'clock, 7 April 1764.
So this is John Adams writing to Abigail Smith.
This is before they're married.
You'll note that they use nicknames for each other.
(18:26):
He called her Diana, and she referred to him as Lysander.
So that's who these people are references to when we get to those portions of the letters between the two of them.
For many years past, John writes, I have not felt more serenely than I do this evening.
My head is clear and my heart is at ease.
(18:47):
Business of every kind I have banished from my thoughts.
My room is prepared for a seven days retirement and my plan is digested for four or five weeks.
My brother retreats with me to our preparatory hospital and is determined to keep me company through the smallpox.
(19:07):
Your uncle, by his agreeable account of the doctor and your brother, their strength, their spirits and their happy prospects, but especially by the favor he left me from you, has contributed very much to the felicity of my present frame of mind.
For I assure you that as nothing which I before expected from the distemper gave me more concern than the thought of a six weeks separation from my Diana.
(19:38):
My departure from your house this morning made an impression upon me that was severely painful.
I thought I left you in tears and anxiety and was very glad to hear by your letter that your fears were abated.
For my own part, I believe no man ever undertook to prepare himself for the smallpox with fewer than I have at present.
(20:01):
I have considered thoroughly the diet and medicine prescribed me and am fully satisfied that no durable evil can result from either and any other fear from the smallpox or its appurtenances in the modern way of inoculation I never had in my life.
Thanks for my ball next Friday for certain with suitable submission.
(20:25):
We take our departure for Boston to Captain Cunningham's.
We go and I have not the least doubt of a pleasant three weeks, notwithstanding the distemper.
Good night, my dear.
I am going to bed.
So you'll note from that real quick that they sometimes refer to smallpox as distemper.
OK, I think it's really important for the listeners to realize just the human toll and the fear that these people are going through.
(20:53):
There is a chance that he's not going to come back.
There is still a chance that one could have a complication from inoculation and pass away as a result.
This is a long separation.
This is not as we have today with vaccines, which is you walk into your local pharmacy or doctor's office and get a shot and you might not feel good for a short period of time, but you're not contagious and you're free to go about your daily life.
(21:18):
This is something that requires weeks and weeks of preparation and weeks of weeks of being isolated.
That's true.
I didn't think about that as he's writing her is it could possibly be his last letter to her.
Yes, that's really it is.
It's very heartbreaking.
And I can't imagine what she was going through receiving these and wondering when she might get the next letter and hoping she gets the next letter.
(21:45):
Exactly.
We'll be right back after a quick word from my advertisers.
So he then writes an update on the 13th of April, a few days later, and he talks about the process that he undergoes to receive this inoculation.
Okay, so this is John Adams.
Dr. Perkins demanded my left arm and Dr. Warren, my brothers, they took their lancets and with their points divided the skin for about a quarter of an inch and just suffering the blood to appear, buried a thread about half a quarter of an inch long in the channel.
(22:22):
A little lint was then laid over the scratch and a piece of a rag pressed on and then a bandage bound over all my coat and waistcoat put on and I was big to go where and do what I pleased.
The doctors have left us pills red and black to take night and morning, but they looked very sagaciously and importantly at us and ordered my brother larger doses than me on account of the difference in our constitutions.
(22:53):
The doctors having finished the operation and left us, their directions medicines took their departure in infinite haste.
I have one request to make, which is that you would be very careful in making Tom smoke all the letters from me very faithfully before you or any of the family reads them.
For although I shall never fail to smoke them myself before sealing, yet I fear the air of this house will be too much infected soon to be absolutely without danger and I would not you should take the distemper by letter from me for millions.
(23:30):
I write at a desk far removed from any sick room and shall use all the care I can, but too much cannot be used.
My love to all, my hearty thanks to Mama for her kind wishes.
My regards is due to Papa and should request his prayers which are always becoming and especially at such times when we are undertaking anything of consequence as the smallpox.
(23:56):
Undoubtedly though, I have not the least apprehension at all of what is called danger.
This letter is so heavy, it just shows the weight of himself and what the community was going through.
Yes.
Dealing with not just the smallpox but also the inoculation process.
(24:17):
Wow.
Yes, it's a lot and of course they're not able to eat and go anywhere they please.
They're not able to eat normally.
There is a letter he writes, talks about in a little bit.
Please continue.
So four days later, John writes again to tell Abigail of the process of living through this inoculation while he's waiting for the infection to run its course.
(24:45):
So this is John on April 17, 1764.
Yours of April 15th, this moment received.
I thank you for it and for your offer of milk, but we have milk in vast abundance and everything else we want except company.
You can't imagine how finely my brother and I live.
We have as much bread and as much new pure milk, as much pudding and rice as we please.
(25:10):
And the medicine we take is not all that nauseous or painful and our felicity is the greater as five persons in the same room under the care of Lord and Church, those are some doctors, caregivers, are starved and medicimated with the utmost severity.
No bread, no pudding, no milk is permitted them, i.e. no pure and simple milk.
(25:34):
They are allowed a mixture of half milk and half water.
And every other day they are tortured with powders that make them as sick as death and as weak as water.
All this may be necessary for them for what I know, as Lord is professively against any preparation previous to inoculation, in which opinion I own I was fully agreed with him till lately.
(25:56):
But experience has convinced me of my mistake and I have felt and now feel every hour the advantage and the wisdom of the contrary doctrine."
He goes on to talk about how other people are surviving, are going through the process.
Let me fast forward to this portion where John talks about someone who has caught the distemper, smallpox, through the natural way.
(26:21):
Those who have it in the natural way are objects of as much horror as ever.
There is a poor man in this neighborhood, one bass, now laboring with it in the natural way.
He is in a good way of recovery but is the most shocking sight that can be seen.
They say he is no more like a man than he is like a hog or a horse, swelled to three times his size, black as bacon, blind as a stone.
(26:47):
And how was Abigail's reception to his letters?
Well, she of course is very concerned, as you could tell from the previous letter, she was offering to send anything she could.
She is also someone who believes in inoculation and would have gone with him to undergo the process, but her father forbade it.
(27:07):
And it's not until 1776, at the start of the American Revolution, that she is able to get inoculated with, at that point, their four children.
And so John and Abigail are very convinced that inoculation works.
And I think this is probably one of the moments in their relationship where they wish they could have been together to go through this process.
(27:33):
But perhaps they reasoned that at least one of them would, if they survived, if John survived inoculation, be safe from it for the rest of his life.
Well, John has a lot of time, of course, to think about the procedure.
He's quarantined for many weeks after all.
And in this letter where he describes what he's eating, how people are going through the process, he contrasts that very clearly with someone who's caught smallpox through the natural way, as he says.
(28:03):
And for him, based on this observation, as well as the evidence of other inoculation campaigns, inoculation is the way to go.
It is much safer.
And so here's a quotation that I think is really striking and really gets to what he thinks about the process of inoculation.
This is John again, quote, I would think myself a deliberate self-murderer.
(29:07):
I mean that I incurred all the guilt of deliberate self-murder.
If I should only stay in this town and run the chance of having it in the natural way.
There's just so much to unravel here with that statement.
Questioning, are men rational?
Those that would go through it the natural way versus those that would choose inoculation.
(29:31):
And it's interesting how we're still asking that same question today.
Yes.
Thank you for sharing that.
And so was this letter shared or was it just directed to Abigail?
It's directed to Abigail, but I suspect that it is something that other people would have talked about.
(29:53):
This is a very big debate.
It was a big debate at that particular time in the 18th century, and as it is a big debate for us today.
This is always going to be a matter of life and death.
It's always a matter that people find of great interest to talk about choices and public health and whatnot.
But once again, I'll point out that while John has gone through this process, he's fine.
(30:18):
He emerges and with his immunity, that outbreak in 1764 ultimately has a similar outcome, which is that about 699 people contracted smallpox naturally.
24 of them died.
That's a 17.5% mortality rate.
(30:40):
4,977 received inoculations.
That's almost 5,000 people received inoculations with only 46 deaths.
That's 0.9%. So you can compare the numbers and those who believe in this process can point to these irrefutable facts that it saves lives.
(31:02):
And at this time, he was still engaged to Abigail, correct?
Okay.
So at what point did she decide to do it?
Did she inoculate herself or did she have someone inoculate her as well as her children?
She had someone inoculate her and her children.
And it is a whole process.
(31:25):
This is, from what I've read to you so far, as we've talked about, inoculation is a trying process under normal peacetime circumstances.
But imagine that Abigail Adams has to go through this process in the middle of the start of the American Revolution.
And that adds several factors of anxiety, but also a great deal of a threat from other sources as well.
(31:51):
So if we fast forward to 1776, the summer of 1776, this is when Abigail Adams has the opportunity to inoculate both herself and her children.
And that's because there's another smallpox outbreak in Boston at that time.
So the town shuts down again, there's a smallpox inoculation process, and Abigail and her children come in.
(32:16):
They're not living in Boston at the time, but they come in from where they are, and they go through the process.
And I'm happy to share some of her experiences with that.
Please do.
So this is Abigail writing to John, and John Adams at this time is in Philadelphia to debate the pros and cons of independence and what to do with regards to the colony's relationship with the mother country.
(32:42):
In fact, this letter is after independence has been declared.
This is the 13th of July in 1776.
And she's already undergone the process.
So she writes, she starts with an apology to John, quote, I must begin with apologizing to you for not writing since the 17th of June.
I've really had so many cares upon my hands and mind, with a bad inflammation in my eyes, that I have not been able to write.
(33:10):
I now date from Boston, where I yesterday arrived and was with all four of our little ones inoculated for the smallpox.
We had our bedding, etc.
to bring.
A cow we have driven down from Braintree and some hay I have had put into the stable, wood, etc.
And we have really commenced housekeepers here.
(33:34):
The house was furnished with almost every article except beds, which we have free use of and think ourselves much obliged by the fine accommodations and kind offer of our friends.
All our necessary stores we purchased jointly.
Our little ones stood the operation manfully.
Dr. Bullfinch is our physician.
(33:56):
Such a spirit of inoculation never before took place.
The town and every house in it are as full as they can hold.
I believe there are not less than 304 persons from Braintree, this is the town they're living in for people unfamiliar with the area.
304 persons from Braintree, she means having come to Boston for the inoculation.
(34:19):
God grant that we may all go comfortably through the distemper.
So that's the start of it.
Now, the next day she writes again, I had many disagreeable sensations at the thoughts of coming myself.
But to see my children through it, I thought my duty and all those feelings vanished as soon as I was inoculated.
(34:40):
And I trust a kind Providence will carry me safely through.
I have enough upon our hands in the morning.
The little folks are very sick then and puke every morning.
But after that they are comfortable.
I shall write you very often.
Pray inform me constantly of every important transaction.
(35:01):
Every expression of tenderness is cordial to my heart, unimportant as they are to the rest of the world.
To me, they are everything.
So there's a lot to unpack there too.
Of course, she's talking about how she had fears about going through this process herself, but she did this for her children.
And she's also hinting at the isolation they feel being quarantined here, and how she wants to hear about what's going on where he is, which is where this great debate about independence is taking place.
(35:32):
So now she's wrestling with the same emotions that he struggled with in the fear of not just losing herself, but also her kids.
And so and then the letter starts with an apology.
I'm sure it has had to be a shock for him receiving it, as well as a comfort knowing that they're taking actions.
(35:53):
And what did that mean for ordinary Americans watching her example?
Did this influence the desire to be inoculated in other individuals?
People, by and large, wanted, of course, to be free from this horrible disease.
They knew that being inoculated or surviving smallpox meant that they would never have to worry about it again.
(36:17):
That much they knew.
They also understood that inoculations lowered the risk of dying as a result.
But the problem is sometimes in many cases during the colonial period and the revolutionary period, one of economics.
What kind of people have the means of not working for one month or six weeks?
(36:40):
What kind of people have the means of finding supplies for themselves and their loved ones who are isolated, undergoing this treatment, suffering through this?
This is something that points to a class divide.
There is a class element here that's sometimes the wealthy, the well to do, the middle class are able to go through this process.
(37:03):
And the danger, of course, is that if any of those people who are being inoculated break that quarantine, they risk spreading that illness to everyone else who does not have the ability to get inoculated.
So there are serious issues that many Americans had to contend with this particular time.
And are there any letters from Abigail where she talks about the relief she felt after being inoculated?
(37:30):
Abigail and the children have different reactions to the inoculation process.
It is possible that someone undergoing inoculation will actually not catch smallpox.
And that means the inoculation has not worked.
So as it turns out with Abigail, Abigail's works.
But for some of her children, they have to undergo the process several times.
(37:54):
There are no symptoms.
They don't show any symptoms.
And that's how they know that they've not contracted it after a certain amount of time.
And so their quarantine actually has to be extended for much longer because they have to make sure that all of the children have gone through this distemper, have contracted it and then have survived.
And ultimately they do.
(38:16):
And there's enormous relief in Abigail's tone when she writes to John saying that all the children have survived the process.
What was the timeline between their first inoculation and her kids finally being receptive to the smallpox inoculation?
So this is Abigail Adams to John Adams on the 30th of July in 1776.
(38:40):
Quote, I am comfortable.
Johnny is cleverly.
Nabby, I hope, has gone through the distemper.
The eruption was so trifling that to be certain I have had inoculation repeated.
Charles and Tommy have neither had symptoms nor eruptions.
Charles was inoculated last Sabbath evening a second time.
(39:04):
Tommy today, the three times from some fresh matter taken from Becky Peck, who has enough for all the house beside.
This suspense is painful.
I know not what to do with them.
It lengthens out the time which I can but ill afford.
And if they can have it, I know not how to quit till I can get them through.
(39:27):
Youth.
Youth is the time they have no pains but bodily, no anxiety of mind, no fears for themselves or others.
And then the disease is much lighter.
The poor doctor is as anxious as we are, but begs us to make it certain if repeated inoculations will do it.
There are now several patients who were inoculated last winter and thought they passed through the distemper but have now taken it in the natural way.
(39:57):
So this is a real anxiety, right?
Because if someone goes through it, does not actually have the immunity because they were not infected through inoculation.
They are still susceptible to it.
And then the next day, the very next day, the 31st of July, she writes again.
I have the pleasure to tell you this morning that I think Tommy's second inoculation has taken as he was very ill last night and the eruptive fever seems coming on his 10 days since the second.
(40:26):
So you want to see a reaction.
You want to see the body respond to this as a sign that the infection has taken place and the inoculation process has gone through.
I can't imagine when myself and my kids were going through the first COVID shots, you're watching your kids struggle and you're not only feeling a sense of relief that, okay, great, they've taken it, they're responding to the inoculation, but now will they survive this?
(40:52):
And on top of it, she's dealing with timelines and she's pressed for a structure of time because she's a busy mom and her husband just happens to be John Adams.
There's just so much there in that letter that I think every mom can associate with and go, oh my goodness, I get this.
That is really just brings back the humanity of history.
(41:14):
It makes us realize how, you know, you were saying it's not written in history.
In a lot of our histories, they don't bring up the smallpox epidemic.
So it really highlights everything that they were dealing with, not just a war, but also smallpox.
Well, I think disease is the great leveler and it shows people as people, they're human, all of them, all of us are, whether you're rich or poor, you're human and you're affected by all of these awful diseases.
(41:46):
And so when you read the letters of people who we revere as great Americans and see the everyday pain and the anxiety and the concern they have for their children, that they suffered, you see them as human beings.
And that gets us, I think, to really understand that history is not foreordained.
(42:10):
It's not made by people who knew all the answers.
History is made by people like you and me, everyday people who are trying to navigate events that they face, life and death, how to take care of your children and how to get to a better life.
And so I think studying this, bringing this element of health care to the public at this moment, the 250th anniversary of the start of the American Revolution, may help us better understand these individuals and perhaps give us a better understanding and appreciation for history.
(42:43):
Very well stated.
I agree with you a hundred percent, especially in light of the anniversary of the revolution.
Right.
We'll be right back after a quick word from my advertisers.
And so in light of all of this, was John Adams also communicating with George Washington?
(43:06):
And you were talking about how Washington's wife was like the catalyst in him agreeing to inoculate his army.
Yes.
So there's a great line from John Adams where he writes later on about his experience having undergone the inoculation process.
And he talks about how when he was recovering, they fed him this concoction.
(43:30):
He does not mention it in the letters I quoted to you, but he talks about how they're also feeding them mercury.
And as a result of this, the teeth in his mouth, his gums were wobbling.
And that gave him something in common with George Washington, who as your listeners may know, had horrible teeth.
That by the end of his life, he only had a single tooth remaining in his mouth.
(43:54):
But Washington himself, there are many pressures on Washington on the matter of smallpox, and he has physicians and generals who are advocating it.
He knows that the men in the ranks are inoculating themselves against orders.
And then he has this opportunity to see the inoculation process work with his own wife, Martha Washington, who's inoculated in Philadelphia.
(44:22):
And it seems as if right after she emerges from this, having survived it, he has this change of heart.
And it's as if in the winter of 1776 and 77, when the army is encamped, so
this is actually a quiet time, there's not much one can do militarily in the
(44:44):
winter in the 18th century, in 18th century warfare, having this evidence
of smallpox raging across the country, having this evidence of his wife having
survived the process and having these demands from the men, he orders
that the army be inoculated.
So this is a letter that Washington writes to William Shippen Jr. from his headquarters in Morristown in winter camp, quote, finding the smallpox to be spreading much and fearing that no precaution can prevent it from running through the whole of our army, I have determined that the troops shall be inoculated.
(45:22):
This expedient may be attended with some inconveniences and some disadvantages, but yet I trust in its consequences will have the most happy effects.
Necessity not only authorizes, but seems to require the measure for should the disorder infect the army in the natural way and rage with its usual virulence, we should have more to dread from it than from the sword of the enemy.
(45:52):
Under these circumstances, I have directed Dr. Bond to prepare immediately for inoculating in this quarter, keeping the matter as secret as possible and request that you will without delay inoculate all the continental troops that are in Philadelphia and those that shall come in as fast as they arrive.
(46:15):
You will spare no pains to carry them through the disorder with the utmost expedition and to have them cleansed from the infection when recovered, that they may proceed to camp with as little injury as possible to the country through which they pass.
If the business is immediately begun and favored with the common success, I would feign hope they will be soon fit for duty and that in a short space of time, we shall have an army not subject to this, the greatest of all calamities that can befall it when taken in the natural way.
(46:51):
That is a bold statement.
And it was a letter that he wrote to William Shipper, correct?
It's a letter to William Shippen, who's in charge of the troops in Philadelphia.
Yes.
Okay.
So was this kept a secret?
Like for fear of moles, maybe information being shared with the opposing military?
(47:14):
I think they certainly tried to keep it a secret.
But of course, if you're inoculating thousands and thousands of people, word will spread.
Of course, the good news is this is, as I mentioned, in the middle of winter and it's very difficult for any troops in the 18th century to mobilize to fight during this time.
So it's actually a safe time to do this.
(47:36):
I just am always struck by what Washington calls this at the end of his thesis, the greatest of all calamities that can befall it when taken in the natural way.
Yes.
This is a this is a sea change in how people view inoculation, that when the Continental Army inoculates its troops wherever they are, it changes how people, civilians in the colonies, regard it as well.
(48:02):
Connecticut, for example, had had very strict laws banning inoculation and it ultimately had to repeal these because soldiers were being inoculated in Connecticut during the war itself.
And people understood that this was a really important innovation.
And if the commander of the Continental Army is ordering it and sees its effectiveness, then that carries a lot of weight with individuals, too.
(48:29):
It's still a damaging disease.
Historians estimate that about 100,000 people died during the smallpox epidemic during the American Revolution.
But I think that Washington's actions not only saved a lot of lives, but may have saved the army and therefore saved the revolution as well.
(48:50):
No doubt.
And it was, I'm sure, incredibly influential on the community at large.
What was the opposition, like those who are anti-inoculators, who felt like it was God's will, what did that look like?
Was there any discussion between possibly Adams or Washington or others discussing those who opposed it?
(49:15):
To my knowledge, there is none of that.
I think that the religious objections to this, which we saw early in the 18th century, had really been muted by the time we get to the late 18th century and closer to the revolution.
I mean, the facts are, well, to take John Adams quotation from a different context, facts are stubborn things and you cannot deny the success of this.
(49:46):
So, for example, in 1776 in Boston, this outbreak where Abigail Adams has herself
and her family inoculated, there are, once again, if you look at the math, if you look
at the statistics, 304 people in Boston contract smallpox the natural way, 29 of
them die, that's nine and a half percent mortality, 4,988 are inoculated, that's
(50:11):
almost 5,000 people inoculated, 28 people die, that's 0.6 percent mortality.
There is just no question that this reduces your chances of death from smallpox.
And there it is, the facts that are very stubborn things, they tend to be the ultimate influence in the ultimate decision.
(50:37):
And I have a line for you and your listeners, this is a podcast, math, science, history, so I'm going to say do the math, believe the science, learn your history.
Oh my goodness, I'm going to have that printed out and put in a frame.
Well, right, do the math, look at the stats, believe the science, believe what the inoculation does and learn your history.
(51:05):
Yes, and learn history.
It's like I always say, history, they're the ultimate in showing us where the red flags of danger lie.
Yes, history is the ultimate in showing us what we can learn from it.
This is, it's a wonderful tool to have and hopefully that will never be destroyed under our watch or anybody else's watch for that matter.
(51:28):
Well, if the MHS can help it, that's not going to happen.
And that's why I love the MHS.
I love the work that you provide for the community and for the country and for the world at large to see this wonderful experiment that is the United States and how it came to be and where it could possibly go.
(51:50):
So I want to, I want to ask, so when we look at George Washington's decision to
inoculate the army and Abigail Adams' choice to inoculate her family, her
children, and the way Americans embraced the inoculation after the revolution, and
this goes back to where we are today, what does that tell us about how the
(52:13):
revolutionary generation balanced their personal risk, their public health, and
their survival of a new nation?
And what does that tell us about how we can do the same?
That is a very good question.
People say that history repeats itself, but that's not entirely true.
(52:35):
There's no way to replicate the conditions of the past that brought American society together.
And I would argue that there was a greater consensus in the colonies that would become the United States about the efficacy, the success of inoculation than there perhaps was over the issue of whether or not we should be an independent nation from Great Britain.
(53:04):
These were issues of health, of public health, issues of politics are always divisive.
But unlike politics, whether domestic or international, as I said, going back to what we discussed earlier, public health, the health of the society is something that one cannot escape.
(53:24):
And I think that at that particular time, there was a real understanding that we all are in this together.
For example, if you live in a town where a smallpox has broken out, you are worried about yourself, you are worried about your loved ones, and you understand that the only way that you're going to survive, that the community is going to survive, is that everyone gets involved.
(53:49):
Everyone gets inoculated or everyone adheres to the quarantine.
This is something that's very difficult for us to understand now because, of course, we do not live under the threat of as awful a plague as smallpox.
We do not live under the threat of numerous diseases that have been, if not defeated, as smallpox has been, but certainly limited in what they do, their effects on humankind.
(54:22):
Yellow fever, for example.
And I think that we are at a point in our history where our luxury, our blessings of science have gotten us to a place where we can, to the detriment, perhaps, of the greater good, where we can't ignore or challenge or say that we're not going to get involved in something that is beneficial to all.
(54:50):
And so this is why it's really important to understand history and the context of history and the full story of history.
It's not just about the revolution.
This is also about Americans fighting off and coming together and finding consensus and rallying around the idea of inoculation to fight this horrible scourge.
(55:10):
It gives us a sense of the importance of that and a threat that big requires a unified response.
Perhaps that's something that we shall see again.
I certainly hope so.
But it certainly brings a community together in a way that very few other events do.
(55:31):
And that was beautiful.
I think what you've highlighted so powerfully is that politics has always been divisive, but health leaves no room to stand apart.
And the part that really resonates today is that the revolution wasn't only one on the battlefield.
It was held together by communities who trusted science and cared for one another.
(55:57):
Yes.
Well, I will let you wrap up.
Sure.
So just a few years after the American Revolution, actually after the period of confederation, after the Constitutional Convention, this is actually 1796, which is the year that John Adams is elected president.
Edward Jenner, on the other side of the Atlantic, noticed that dairymaids who had been affected by cowpox were immune from smallpox.
(56:26):
I'll point out also that smallpox is something that only humans get.
No other animal species get smallpox.
They have their own forms.
But humans can get cowpox.
And it's a very mild response from the human body, this reaction, but it builds up immunity to smallpox.
(56:47):
And so Jenner and other physicians come up with the idea of vaccination.
And the word vaccine is from this time period.
So it's cowpox, cow vaccine.
So to give someone cowpox is a way to prevent them from getting smallpox.
It builds up the same immunity one needs.
(57:09):
And one is not infectious during that time.
So one cannot spread it because one does not have smallpox.
And so this is much safer.
You do not need to quarantine.
You do not need to shut down trade.
You do not need to shut down a town.
And it is safe.
And this is the start of this understanding of how to ultimately combat smallpox, which is eradicated, as we know it, as a threat.
(57:36):
In the 20th century, in 1980, the World Health Organization declared that it had seen the last of smallpox.
And the last outbreak in the United States took place in 1949.
But there was a real concerted effort in the 1960s to do this, and they were successful by the 1970s.
So there are several generations of humans that have now lived in a world where there is no smallpox.
(58:02):
I did not know that.
So it's almost as if they aren't even aware of potential threats.
Yes.
And I should specify that although no one that we know of has smallpox and there have not been any outbreaks, the United States has a small sample of it.
And Russia has a small sample of it.
(58:24):
Both of these superpowers are keeping this for potential research.
And this is a huge debate in the scientific community about whether or not to just completely eradicate this, just destroy the sample, lest it get out again.
In fact, I think the last person to actually have contracted smallpox and died of smallpox was in the United Kingdom.
(58:46):
And it was from a lab leak of some sort.
But this was decades ago.
So there are still samples that exist, but this is beyond my field of expertise.
I'll leave this to medical professionals, scientists and ethical experts, philosophers to talk about what to do with these samples.
But no one has been infected with smallpox that we know of for several decades.
(59:11):
That is the perfect question to end the podcast on.
It makes us reflect back on our ethics.
And what does the science say?
Do we observe these samples or do we destroy them?
And would that be an act of ignorance or would that be an act of curiosity and scientific study?
(59:32):
That's wonderful.
I love this.
I love leaving out a question.
Well, thank you very much for your time, Dr. Wongsrichanalai.
If my listeners want more information, where can they go to either see some of these letters, read them or learn more about the Massachusetts Historical Society?
We invite people to visit our website at www.masshist.org online so you can learn about our collections.
(01:00:05):
You can see the Adams Papers, links to the Adams Papers project.
And you can also, if you are in the city of Boston, come visit us in the Back Bay.
We are very close to Fenway Park and we are free and open to the public.
Come see the treasures that belong to the American people that we hold in trust for them, for future generations and for posterity.
(01:00:28):
Yes, please visit.
It was a pleasure speaking with you.
This was a lot of fun.
It was.
And thank you so much for your time.
I believe that history doesn't just live in our textbooks.
It lives in the choices we make today.
Two hundred and fifty years ago, George Washington, Martha Washington, John Adams and Abigail Adams chose to risk the unknown to place their trust in science.
(01:00:57):
And in doing so, they safeguarded a fragile nation's future.
Their courage reminds us that progress has always required faith, not blind faith, but faith grounded in evidence, in resilience and in the shared hope of building something greater than ourselves as we face the challenges of our own country.
(01:01:20):
Now, may we remember that legacy.
May we remember that courage is not just found on battlefields, but in the quiet, determined choice to trust knowledge, to protect one another and to look forward toward the future and toward science with resolve.
(01:01:42):
Thank you for joining me today.
And thank you again to Dr. Canisauran Wongsrijanilai for his invaluable insight.
Until next time, stay curious, stay courageous and never forget the power of science that will carry us forward.
Until next time, Carpe Diem.
(01:02:03):
Thank you for tuning in to Math Science History.
If you enjoyed today's episode, please leave a quick rating and review.
They really help the podcast.
You can find our transcripts at mathsciencehistory.com.
And while you're there, remember to click on that coffee button because every dollar you donate supports a portion of our production costs and keeps our educational website free.
(01:02:25):
Again, thank you for tuning in.
And until next time, Carpe Diem.
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