Someone told mae dat fat pork is good when yer bound up like a barrel wit’ der bung in der hole, so I took some pork. I went in and sot on der little bucket in der back room, and ’twas good. Der runs took mae.
– Jacob Petten
“The Devil’s own cure” was anything that made things worse
(e.g., putting butter on a burn). Some of the following home,
remedies were seen as a panacea; others were favourably
regarded and used to good effect. Some are still in use.
When my son, Michael, was a teenager he and two friends rode their bikes from Pasadena to Steady Brook. A portion of the highway was under construction at the time and Michael had the misfortune of hitting a construction block. He went head over heels, scraping and burning his elbow and knee on fresh pavement. His friends rode back to Pasadena, leaving him behind with his twisted bicycle, to limp the nearly 20 kilometres home. I took one look at the skin torn on his arm and knee, dirtied and bleeding, and sent him to see our family doctor. Michael’s wounds were cleaned and bandaged, and he was given a prescription for antibacterial ointment. The next day was a holiday and it was impossible to get the prescription filled.
When I took the bandage off Michael’s knee I cringed at the messy sight. The knee was full of pus. I cleaned it with peroxide and then I filled the wound with burnt cornstarch and covered the knee. I repeated this treatment later in the day. In a couple of days the knee had a scab so thick it resembled the bark of a tree.
My children, Janalee and Michael, know that cornstarch is “Mom’s home cure” for just about everything. What Michael didn’t know was that he had been wearing pieces of a cut-up sanitary napkin on his knee, a napkin designed to allow air flow. The home-bandage aided the cornstarch in healing a bleeding and infected knee.
abscesses ∼ White paint and herbs were mixed into a poultice and applied.
afterbirth pains ∼ A drink of hot crowberry juice was given to a new mother.
appetite ∼ Red clover buds were eaten.
arthritis ∼ Seven raisins were soaked in gin and eaten.
athlete’s foot ∼ Red clover was applied. Clover was also used for an itchy scalp, dry flaky skin, and as a hair conditioner.
back pain and strain ∼ 1. A mustard plaster in red flannel was applied to the area. 2. Salt, heated in a frying pan, was placed in a sock and held to the back as the magic bag of the 1900s.
barren ∼ Women ingested the valerian root to help them conceive.
bee sting ∼ Hartshorn drops (prepared from the horns of a deer) were rubbed on bitten skin.
beriberi ∼ A deficiency of vitamin B, causing inflammation of the nerves, was combatted with servings of whole wheat flour, codliver oil, and berries.
bladder cleaning ∼ Mixture of bread soda and milk was taken.
blood cleaning ∼ 1. Turpentine (myrrh) from tree bladders was swallowed. 2. The juniper root was chewed.
blood poison ∼ Tarry oakum (rope picked apart) was tied around a person’s arm to stop the red streak associated with blood poison.
blood spitting ∼ Boiling down of the pitcher plant root was used to cure the spitting up of blood.
blood stoppers ∼ 1. Smoky Jacks (spongy puffballs found in marshes) were used to seal wounds, keeping out infections. 2. Cobwebs were applied to the bleeding area.
boils ∼ A poultice of soap, flour, and molasses soaked in boiling water and drained, was placed on a boil overnight. To extract the core of a boil, a bottle was filled with hot water, and emptied. The mouth of the hot bottle was placed on the boil; as the bottle cooled the core came out.
breast milk weaning ∼ Oakum was wrapped around a mother’s breasts to dry up her milk.
bronchitis ∼ Warm goose grease was rubbed on the patient’s chest.
bruises ∼ Calendula lotion extracted from marigolds was used to treat bruises.
burns ∼ 1. A cloth was sterilized by burning it on the stove. It was greased with castor oil and placed on the burns. 2. The juice of the aloe vera plant rubbed on a burn minimized the damage and helped heal the burn.
canker sores (ulcers) ∼ l. Canker root (snakeroot) was boiled and gargled. 2. Blood from a dicky-bird’s (rooster’s) comb was applied with a rag to canker sores. 3. Salt helped clean and heal sores.
carbuncles (abscesses, boils) ∼ Bogbeans were steeped and applied.
chest cold ∼ 1. The inner bark of the juniper tree was steeped and used as a tonic. 2. A drink of liniment was considered to be efficacious for chest diseases. 3. The vinegar plant was used as a cold compress on the chest.
childbirth ∼ 1. Senna was used to induce labour. 2. Tea steeped from large quantities of raspberry leaves was used to hurry childbirth.
childbirth recovery ∼ 1. Poly pitchen (polypody), a type of fern or lichen, was scraped off rocks and boiled to help new mothers get their strength back. 2. Juniper tea was also given to new mothers.
chills ∼ Indian tea leaves made a good poultice for chills.
chills and fevers ∼ 1. Gum (frankum) was boiled and a teaspoon of it was given to the patient to swallow. 2. The leaves of Labrador tea were boiled and the patient drew in the steaming vapours. (If Labrador tea is picked between June and August and boiled, it can release harmful toxins.)
colds and flu ∼ Hot ginger and black currant jam were mixed as a drink.
cold sore ∼ 1. Earwax rubbed on the area at the first sign keeps the sore from becoming full-blown. 2. An ice cube held on the spot as soon as a sore is felt keeps the sore from developing.
colour ∼ Leaves and twigs of the black crowberry were steeped and the liquid ingested to bring back one’s colour.
constipation ∼ 1. Senna leaves were steeped as opening medicine (laxative). 2. The seven tops of a maiden fir tree were boiled down and steeped for a drink to clean out a person’s bowels.
coughing blood ∼ A person coughing blood was treated with sticky lumps of gum found on the outside of black spruce trees.
cough remedy ∼ 1. The inner bark of juniper, cherry, and dogwood(mountain ash) trees were boiled and the liquid ingested. 2. Bloodroot, a medicinal plant, was a stimulant expectorant for dry throats due to a cough.
crabs, body ∼ Water and bread soda were mixed and applied to the pubic area.
cramp ∼ A cramp knot (a gnarled lump of wood) was used to ease foot cramps. The cramped foot was rolled over the cramp knot.
cramps, stomach ∼ Maiden fir treetops were boiled down and the liquid given to a person having stomach cramps.
croup ∼ Feverfew (an aromatic plant) was used as a remedy.
cuts ∼ 1. Jam was mixed with mouldy bread and applied. 2. For a gaping cut, gum from a silver pine was steeped, cooled, and the wound filled. 3. Kerosene was boiled to take out its temper, strained, and put on cuts which were sealed with turpentine. 4. For trawl cuts, fisherman put gasoline on their hands.
diaper sores ∼ Burnt flour and burnt cornstarch were in common use.
earache ∼ Warm olive oil was placed in the ear and the ear plugged with wadding (tow).
eyes, tired, weak ∼ 1. Daisy leaves or cow parsnip leaves were boiled in water, let cool, and applied. 2. Beaver more (yellow pond lily) root was boiled in a pot and the steam inhaled, or the water was used to wash tired or weak eyes. 3. The Beothuks used a mother’s milk on sore eyes.
fever ∼ Twinflowers were steeped and used as a drink to bring down a temperature.
fits (convulsions) ∼ A stiff horn of Jamaican rum was seen as a sovereign remedy.
fly bites ∼ Juniper salve cured infections from fly bites. Basil discouraged flies.
freckles ∼ May snow was once gathered and bottled to fade freckles. The snow was applied for each of the first nine days of May.
frostbite ∼ 1. A soft, pulpy layer was scraped from the inner bark of the juniper and boiled, then whipped to make a creamy salve. 2. Frostbitten skin was soaked in human urine. 3. Cod liver was a cure for frost-bitten hands.
gout ∼ 1. Red clover tea was used to soothe the pain of rheumatism and gout. 2. The leaves of bottlebrush were used to cure gout and rheumatism.
hemorrhoids (piles) ∼ Pine tar applied to the affected part produced relief.
headache ∼ 1. Paper was soaked in vinegar and placed on the forehead. 2. The root of the elderberry was made into a poultice and applied.
high blood pressure ∼ The peel from a lemon eaten once a day was believed to keep hypertension away.
infected cut (rising) ∼ 1. A piece of salted pork fat was rubbed against the swelling. 2. A mixture of molasses, flour, ashes, and cobwebs was used as a poultice.
infected sores ∼ Many people of Newfoundland recall some elder in their community who was regarded as remarkable in healing festered sores. It was generally some motherly old lady who did the doctoring. Some ingredients of a good poultice were: scorched linen, burnt cream, white of an egg, powdered dust of seashells, dried and powdered seaweed, goose grease, and mouldy bread.
ingrown nails ∼ For instant relief from ingrown nails, hot tallow was dropped from a lighted candle into the affected part.
itch ∼ Gowithy was boiled with tobacco and applied.
itch (from stinging nettles) ∼ Juice from dockweed was applied to stings. (Dockweed and stinging nettles often grow side by side.)
lice ∼ Hair was dipped in kerosene.
liver disease ∼ Dandelion (also known as faceclock, dumbledor, piss-abed) root was eaten.
lung disorders ∼ The patient drew in the steamed vapours of the boiled leaves of Labrador tea (a tea rich in vitamin C).
male potency ∼ Beaver testicles were steeped as a drink.
measles and yellow jaundice ∼ A drink of saffron: the juice of sheep droppings was drained through a cloth bag and steeped in milk.
meningitis ∼ Onions were placed in a person’s socks and the socks worn.
milk fever on cows ∼ A half pint of whisky was mixed with some of the cow’s own bee sting venom and given to the sick animal.
night blindness ∼ The gall of a fish was applied to the eyes.
placenta ∼ New mothers sometimes blew into a bottle to help expel the placenta (afterbirth).
pneumonia ∼ A linseed meal poultice or a mustard poultice was applied.
rashes and eczema ∼ Goose grease was rendered into oil. It was cooled and then rubbed on the affected area. The residue of rotten wood, having the consistency of brown flour, was used as baby powder.
rheumatism ∼ The brown jellyfish was bottled. It dissolved into a fluid that was rubbed on the affected parts and acted as a counterirritant.
rickets ∼ The person affected bathed in sea water warmed by a hot stone or iron.
scalded flesh ∼ A grated raw potato was applied.
scurvy ∼ 1. Tea made from boiled bluish-green needles of the black spruce tree. 2. Rose hip tea, high in vitamin C. 3. Spruce beer.
seasickness ∼ 1. Pork fat and hardbread were boiled together and eaten. 2. Wormwood wine (green fairy) was used to settle a seasick stomach.
seizures ∼ Wild garlic was used.
sinusitis ∼ The buds of the yellow pond lily were collected before they flowered and boiled in a pot. The steam was drawn into the nostrils.
skin disorder ∼ Washing the flesh in alder leaves toughened the skin.
smallpox ∼ The root of the pitcher plant was eaten as a cure.
snow blindness ∼ 1. Sliced potatoes and steeped tea leaves were applied to eyelids. 2. A tansy and sugar poultice was applied.
sore bottom ∼ Loggers used dry ass (dried grass) to sit on.
sore eyes ∼ 1. May snow was gathered and bottled for a remedy. 2. Wet tea leaves soothe tired eyelids. 3. Indian Pipe was soaked in rosewater. A cloth saturated with its mixture was applied to eyes.
sore hands ∼ Cod liver inside cotton gloves was a cure for sore or frostbitten hands. An Inuit treatment for seal finger was to wrap the inflamed finger in sea lice.
sore mouth ∼ Snakeroot was used as an astringent.
sores, running, infected wounds ∼ 1. Sphagnum moss was used as a dressing for wounds and sores. 2. Eltrot root (cow parsnip) was boiled, steeped, and applied. 3. Fish-fly maggots clean sores on skin.
sore throat ∼ 1. Bladders of turpentine were cut and let run into bottles to be used for a sore throat. 2. The boiled dried and ground leaves of the sumac were used as a mouthwash. 3. A mixture of kerosene and molasses was heated on the stove and eaten.
splinter infection ∼ Bread poultice was applied.
sprains ∼ A poultice from shepherd’s purse (pink lady’s slipper) was wrapped in linen soaked in comfrey (a healing herb) oil.
squid finger ∼ An inflammation on a fisherman’s hand caused by handling squid was cured with a mixture of urine and salt water.
stomach trouble/cramps ∼ 1. Bakeapples were eaten whole. 2. Juniper or alder buds were boiled and ingested.
stomach, upset ∼ 1. Boy’s love was steeped in hot water with a teaspoon of rum. 2. A drink was made from boiled bogbeans. 3. A drink was made from squashberries.
stoppage of water ∼ 1. Beaver castor (the sweat gland of a beaver) was soaked in warm water. The water was taken a spoonful at a time. 2. Sweet Spirits of Nitre (saltpetre).
strength ∼ Wild rose hips (containing vitamin C) was taken as a tea to build a person’s strength.
swelling ∼ Tansy (yarrow) dressings were used to reduce swelling.
teething ∼ The Innu preserved red berries in tree bark. They squashed them and rubbed the paste on their babies’ gums.
throttles (diphtheria) ∼ 1. A clay pipe filled with brimstone-soaked oakum was smoked. 2. A pint of black rum was swallowed straight from the keg.
thrush (white mouth) ∼ The midwife’s cure was a dose of blackstrap molasses on the patient’s tongue.
tonic ∼ 1. A bladder of turpentine from a fir tree was drained into hot water. 2. Juniper berries mixed with blueberries made a vitaminrich tonic.
toothache ∼ 1. Vinegar was left in the mouth to give relief. 2. Frankum was rubbed on an affected tooth. 3. A pinch of tobacco was pressed against the tooth.
tuberculosis ∼ Molasses and myrrh (turpentine bladders) were mixed, wrapped in a white cloth, and applied to a patient’s chest. 2. Snails were cooked in salt water and eaten.
urinary problems ∼ Cranberries were eaten whole or mixed in a drink.
water pups (wrist blisters: skin chafed from twine in sea water) ∼ A poultice of molasses, flour, laundry soap, and sugar was applied to the area. Red flannel wrapped around the wrist lessened a fisherman’s sea boils.
water trouble ∼ A drink was made from soaked and boiled juniper bushes.
worms ∼ 1. Boiled roots of dogberry trees were steeped into a tea. 2. Steeped snakeroot made a drink for a cure.
wounds ∼ 1. Myrrh off a fir or spruce tree was used to seal wounds while they healed. 2. Chewed Indian leaves soothe a wound.
wrist strain ∼ A salt- and urine-soaked rag was wrapped around a sprained wrist.
ampery ∼ inflamed.
anguish ∼ inflammation.
anxiety ∼ infection.
apse (abscess) ∼ boil on body.
black measles ∼ chicken pox.
blood turned ∼ When someone got a fright and became epileptic (had fits), it was said that his blood was turned.
chin cough ∼ whooping cough.
creeping paralysis ∼ multiple sclerosis.
double pneumonia ∼ pneumonia in both lungs (kill or cure: a dose of kerosene and molasses).
galloping consumption ∼ tuberculosis that spreads fast.
grippe ∼ flu.
inflammation ∼ pneumonia.
leaky paw ∼ inflammation in hand or wrist from twine chafing and salt water.
milk fever ∼ milk gathered in a mother’s breast.
milk leg ∼ blood clot in a woman’s leg, thought to be a result of childbirth.
rattle on the chest ∼ a bad cough.
rising ∼ an infection from a minor cut.
throttles ∼ diphtheria.
tight in the chest ∼ a chest cold.
water whelps ∼ sores on fishermen’s wrists made from cold bait, wet trawls, and nets.
whitlow ∼ a gathered finger (infected).
wis ∼ an inflamed rising on the eyelid.
Fred Porter was 11 years old when he awoke in the middle of the night with a toothache. He got the pliers and tried to pull the tooth. A piece broke off. He went back to sleep, but he woke with pain again before daylight. His father told him to go see a woman who had a seventh son of a seventh son. It was commonly thought that the seventh son of the seventh son was a healer.
Fred knocked on the stranger’s door which was opened by the woman still in her nightclothes. The boy looked at her and, in an uncertain voice, asked if she had a seventh son of a seventh son.
“Just a minute,” she said, going back through the hallway. She came back holding a baby. Fred explained about his tooth. The woman placed the baby’s finger on the tooth. Fred thanked her and left. When he got home, his tooth started to crack as if frost was coming out of it. It was easy to get the pieces out, and get clear of a nasty toothache.
1. A skinned rat boiled. 2. Mouse soup. 3. A hearty meal of snails for breakfast.
• Tie a cramp ring (knot of wood) around the neck to cure fits, or throw cold water in the victim’s face to scare away the Devil who caused them.
• To cure muscle cramps, wrap a warm herring in a sock around the neck.
• To cure cramping limbs, tie an eel skin around the area.
• For leg cramps, the contracted muscles are rubbed with hot kerosene. This is done seven times alone or with the Sign of the Cross.
• Distract the attention of the sufferer momentarily.
• Turn a saucer upside down in the cupboard and hiccups will disappear.
• Taking nine glutches of water will cure hiccups.
• Walk backward going in a circle.
• Tie a man’s tie around one’s head.
• Charm it away by writing words on a scrap of paper; have the afflicted one carry the script on his person, without reading it. If he reads it, the headache will return.
• Drink from a skull.
• To cure a migraine, walk backward going clockwise, or stand on your head until you are dizzy.
• An eel skin (taken from a live eel) is tied around the affected area.
• Copper wire bracelets are made for ankles and wrists.
• A fish doctor (a red beetle that clings to wounded fish) is suspended around the patient’s neck.
• A haddock bone is kept in a pocket or on a string around the neck.
• Turds from a barn are sewn inside a cloth and kept around the neck on a toothache string for three or four days.
• A pratie rock (a small rock) is put in the pot and boiled with potatoes.
• The ladybug beetle (God’s cow) is put in bag and the bag is placed around the neck.
• A flat rock is spat on and thrown over the left shoulder. The sufferer walks away without looking back.
• Spill expressed milk on a hot stove.
• Have the mother wear a soft, cured weasel skin.
• Oakum in a mother’s brassiere will also bring a cessation to her milk.
WART CURES:
• Wrap as many pebbles as there are warts in a rag; rub the rag on the warts, and then throw away the pebbles. That will transfer the warts to the person who picks up the pebbles.
• Cut as many notches as you have warts in a stick and hide the stick. The warts will disappear.
• Rub a piece of fresh meat on warts. As the meat decays, the warts will disappear.
• Count the warts and make a like number of chalk marks on the back of a stove; the marks will burn off and the warts will go away.
• Rub a piece of salt pork on warts during a full moon.
• Fry pork fat on Shrove Wednesday or Good Friday and rub it on warts.
• Cut bulrushes one and a half inches long and boil for 10 to 15 minutes. Place the mixture in gauze and leave on warts until the mixture dries. Apply this mixture each day for nine days.
• Catch a trout and hold it over the ailing person’s mouth while she is coughing. Then return it alive to the water.
• Tie a lock of red hair in a red cloth around the neck and keep it there until the cough ends.
• A nail bent like a horseshoe, charmed and tied to a necklace string kept around the neck of an ailing person, will cure him or her.
• A horseshoe on the door will drive away spirits or fairies.
• Tie two large one-cent pieces in a newborn baby’s belly button to avert a navel hernia.
• To cure a child of a hernia, split a green witch hazel tree or a balsam tree and pass the child through it, or pass a child through the limbs of a dogberry tree.
• Having intercourse with a servant girl or a young virgin was/is (erroneously) considered to be a cure for syphilis.
• To remedy a dropped palate, midwives once tied the hair straight up on the crown of a newborn’s head (the soft spot) for a week.
• Cross hives with the Sign of the Cross using a thumb nail.
• If you step on a nail, take it out and file the tip. Drive it into a piece of pine so you won’t get blood poisoning, or become jawlocked.
• Bury a nail that has caused a wound in the foot.
• A birthmark will disappear if it is rubbed with the hand of a dead person of the opposite sex.
• A nosebleed can be stopped by certain persons reciting a secret prayer to achieve the desired effect. Some people tie a green ribbon around the bleeder’s neck.
• Pull a needle of homespun wool through a gall on a fisherman’s hand to heal it. Tie ends near gall, leaving ends in.
• A cloth, holding pebbles from the grave of a pious person, worn around the neck provides a faith cure for an ailment.
• For a bad stomach, put a pebble under the tongue.
• Take the broodiness out of a hen by placing it in a brin (burlap) bag and putting it under salt water.
• When a woman takes with labour, run for an axe. Place it under her bed to cut the pain.
• Hold a saucer of milk over your open mouth to coax up a tapeworm.
• The Old Hag is a nightmare in which people feel pinned to their beds and hag-ridden. If a person lying beside the person being hagged calls his name backward, he will come out of it. An alternative is for the person to sit on the victim and recite the Lord’s Prayer backward.
• If a person prone to having the Old Hag will drive a nail in a shingle and lash the shingle to her chest she won’t have the Old Hag.
• To cure a wrist sprain, wrap red wool nine times around the wrist; keep it on for nine days.
• Shake a white cloth over a cow as a cure for worms.
• To cure a stitch in the side, wear a small pebble in a pocket, on and under the tongue or around the neck.
• For grippe (flu) swallow nine lice every third day for nine days.
• For a wis or sty (inflammation on an eye) rub the site with a gold ring seven times or make the Sign of the Cross on the eye with a gold ring nine times. Rub the area with May snow.
• Turn the hands of a grandfather clock back until its spring breaks to cure someone of a fright.
• A small piece of lit candle on a penny under the mouth of a dry tumbler is placed on the stomach of a person suffering dyspepsia (indigestion). He is to lie flat on his back, repeating: “In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit” until the candle goes out.
• A waxed thread (tacker) used by cobblers is tied in nine knots and hung around the neck to treat boils.
• To cure a person’s fits, have her wear the tooth of a dying deer on a string around her neck.
• For an eczema cure, bathe in the foam of a brook before the sun rises. Do this each day for three mornings. Stop for three, then repeat until cured.
• Cut your nails on Monday and you won’t have sea boils.
• The seventh son of the seventh son is a healer. He can put a worm on one hand and have it turn white and die. He can take the dead worm and put it on the other hand where it will regain its life.