Chapter 38
May–July 1832
Townsend Street Cholera Hospital
Dublin, Ireland
Ever since the news broke about the cholera epidemic, the streets had been eerily quiet. All public events, including Lord Montague’s trial, were canceled or postponed in order to keep the residents of Dublin safe. Only those who had to be away from their homes ventured out.
Townsend Street held an eerie pall as we approached the cholera clinic where we would minister to the sick and dying. Instead of a constant din of voices, seagull screams dominated the atmosphere and the clop of hooves and rattle of wheels echoed through the alleyways long before the rare carriage came into sight. Not even Catherine, who hated the idea of illness and bodily fluids and was loathe to take on the duties of a nurse, or Frances, who usually had advice or wisdom for any situation, spoke. It was as though the weight of our upcoming duties rendered us all mute.
My ears had adjusted to the lack of sound as walked, so the wall of noise when we opened the hospital doors was an aural assault. Hundreds of people formed a queue reaching from one end of the hall to the other. Their voices were punctuated by hacking coughs and crying babies and children.
“Ah, you are here,” an eager young man rushed up to us and introduced himself as Dr. Michael Blake, the attending physician. “Just in time. We are about to admit our first patients.”
He led us to a large room with dozens of pallet beds arranged in neat rows on the floor. They were separated by a curtain to give each patient a measure of privacy and formed a kind of “room” within the open space. Each room contained only a lamp, a wash basin, and a pitcher. Anything else we might need, the doctor said, was available in a locked room across the hall to keep desperate patients from getting their hands on items they might steal or use to harm themselves.
“You have agreed to work in three eight-hour shifts, is that correct?” Dr. Blake asked.
“Yes,” Catherine answered. “When each is over, a new set of volunteers or Sisters will arrive by carriage and the replace those traveling back to Baggot Street.”
The doctor wrote something down in book he carried. “When you end your shift, we ask that you change your habit before you leave so that we may launder the old one. You don’t want arrive at the convent covered in unpleasant substances. Also be sure to disinfect any items you use in vinegar, and scrub your hands with it before leaving.”
Kate sniffed the air. “What is that smell? It’s like woodsmoke but with a sweetness to it.”
“We are burning all the patients’ clothing when they enter to avoid further contagion. An intake nurse will then give them a plain gown to wear that will make it easier to examine them.”
Less than an hour passed before the once pristine room stank of excrement and vomit. The four of us divided up the room into quadrants and each of us cared for a block of patients in various states of illness. We held basins for those in the early stages of the illness, whose bodies were rebelling by purging them of all fluids; massaged the muscles of those suffering cramps; gave laudanum and brandy to those in pain; and prayed for and consoled those who were beyond our ability to heal.
Cholera was not an easy death. In addition to the loss of dignity that came with the early symptoms of the disease, as it progressed, patients eventually became trapped their own bodies, able to see and feel, but do little else as their eyes became sunken, their skin withered, and their tongue dried up, making it nearly impossible to swallow. Those who were lucky lost consciousness toward the end, but some suffered severe shock, in full awareness of their death as it happened.
At the end of every shift, as instructed, we changed our habits, disinfected our hands, and stumbled into the carriage. Oftentimes we slept during the ride home and didn’t bother getting undressed before falling into bed. One night, I was so exhausted I didn’t make it to my room; I fell asleep standing up on the stairs. Catherine eventually discovered me and helped me to bed, only so that we could rise in a few hours to do it all over again.
*****
By July, our spirits were flagging. The nonstop pace had taken its toll on everyone. More than one woman who was paid to help us had taken to drinking the alcoholic tinctures meant for the patients and were dismissed when they were caught. This left us even more shorthanded just as the number of people we were seeing was on the rise. Yesterday, Dr. Frances Barker, secretary of the Central Board of Health for Ireland, announced that more than five thousand cases had been seen in Dublin, and about six hundred people were dying every day.
On top of that, the cost of clothes for the patients who survived, the burial expenses for those who didn’t, and the necessities of bedding, medicine, coal, soap, and candles far outpaced the stipend allotted to us by the government, as businesses found a way to make a profit off of people’s pain. These added expenses depleted the Baggot Street coffers at a time when our income was at an all-time low, and volunteers dwindled to a core group who lived at the House of Mercy.
But still we showed up every day, despite those who believed we were doing more harm than good. I wasn’t aware of this attitude until one of my patients, who was near to recovery, said to me, “I’m so glad I didn’t let those silly rumors keep me from coming here.”
“What rumors?”
“Oh, you haven’t heard? People are saying the government is having people poisoned and then buried alive in order to stop the spread of the disease.” She chewed a bit bread thoughtfully. “It’s not true though. There’s no poison here and I see how carefully that Catherine examines everybody before declaring them officially dead. She wouldn’t miss anyone.”
I told her I would be back to check on her in about thirty minutes and crawled over the next bed. I had given up walking from bed to bed weeks ago because my joints ached from the constant up and down as I knelt to tend to my wards. Instead. I shuffled on my knees from one beside to another. Unfortunately, that wasn’t much better. My knees swelled to the size of tea saucers and were red and sore to the touch, which meant I could barely walk.
That morning, I had found a piece of paper slipped under my door. It was one of Catherine’s silly poems, designed to make me laugh. In it, she named my knees cholera and cholerine and begged me to take some time off.
In November, I took her advice and elected to stay behind at Baggot Street to give my knees a rest and help out there. The number of cases was going down, so I didn’t feel guilty. One month later, the secretary of the Central Board of Health for Ireland declared that the epidemic was over and awarded us a medal for having fewer deaths than anywhere else in the country. Catherine immediately placed it on the altar and led us in a prayer of thanksgiving for deliverance from this trial.