Existing comment:
The Flu Pandemic:
"Influenza conditions here have been desperate and its seems to be on the increase."
-- on Chenaw (?), SC in Charleston News and Courier, October 19, 1918
Epidemics of measles and meningitis hit the state in 1917 and 1918. The flu epidemic proved far more dangerous. Theories of how it developed abound but by August 1918, the first phases of it were felt at Camp Devon outside Boston. It reached South Carolina in September, some reports saying the Charleston Navy Yard had the first cases in the state. Others claimed it originated at Camp Jackson. By the time the flu had waned more than 200,000 South Carolinians had contracted it and the death toll reached between 4,000 and 10,000 people.
It spread quickly. By October, so many people were sick that most towns and cities shut down all public facilities, including schools, parks, churches, and libraries. Although this was lifted in early November, the flu continued to plague the state, to a lesser degree, into the early months of 1919.
In October, Lake City reported that, "Influenza is very prevalent here, so much so that one can hardly hear of a home that has not been visited with the disease... [in many] cases the entire family has been stricken at the same time."
In Charleston, during the same month, physicians were working non-stop in most communities around the nation. In one day, October 20, twelve deaths were reported and 421 cases treated. Two days later a single physician claimed he made 147 house calls.
Decades later, a Charleston resident recalled that during 1918 coffins were stacked down Columbia Street to be transferred by caissons to Union Station for transport home.
Elsewhere in the state, more than 600 cases were reported at Camp Wadsworth while Camp Jackson reported even more at the height of the crisis.
Why did the flu kill so many?
It was probably a new strain which few young adults had natural immunity against. But older adults, those above the age of 45, rarely seemed to contract the disease. This suggested that older people had developed a natural resistance to flu over time. Since the war required the movement of so many young people who did not realize they were carriers, the virus quickly spread from one community to another via rail systems and overseas travel. By the time the flu had dissipated an estimated 650,000 Americans had died and more than 20 million across the globe had perished. American losses alone were nearly six times that of U.S. troops killed in combat or training (120,144). For South Carolina, the total losses in the armed forces were 2,085. |