SHIP CAPTAIN COOK.

Lyttelton Times, Volume XX, Issue 1130, 9 September 1863, Page 3

SHIP CAPTAIN COOK.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE LYTTELTON TIMES. Sir,—ln your issue of this day it is stated "we learn from official sources that since the Captain Cook arrived two deaths have occurred among the passengers. The complaint is the common typhoid fever. It is preposterous for any man to state from what cause a person has died unless he has attentively examined and marked the history of the disease, and as Dr. Rouse paid a " flying " visit to the sick, surely he is incompetent to judge what was the nature of the diseases present, but in each instance I told him. The deaths to which you have alluded originated, the one in "a child named Lucas from long-continued diarrhaa, the other was in the case of George Lewis, who died from compression of the brain, coupled with disease of the bladder; he was suffering from neither a contagious nor infectious disease. None of the emigrants have yet been " under canvas " as stated in your paper; nor has the Health Officer considered it expedient to visit the ship or make any inquiry as to its sanitory condition or otherwise since the day on which it cast anchor. I am, Sir, yours obediently, J. B. CLUTTERBUCK. September 5,1863. P.S.—I think it right to send for publication in your journal a copy of a letter I have this day transmitted to the Health Officer. Sir,—l take leave once more to draw your attention to the fact, that there is no disease of a contagious nor infectious nature on board this ship, nor, with the exception of the case of small-pox a few days after leaving England, has one occurred. 1. Martha Frumpton, married, is one amongst the most important cases now under treatment. She is in a state of great depression and imminent danger, the inflammatory condition of the pharyageal membrane and adjacent parts not having yet subsided. Her disease, diptheria, a fashionable name' given to an old complaint. 2. Hannah Blower, married, who having had slight inflammation of the brain—fever, as some might term it—a few days since, is now affected with inflamation of the mucous membrane of the bronchical tubes, coupled with diarrhoea, is in a most critical state.

3. Mary Shirratt, married, recently miscarried, now labors under obscure disease within the chest; intellect greatly impaired; in a most critical state. *4. Jane Florence, age 14, great debility from late febrile auction and diarrhoea, issue still problematical. *5. Simmons, a seaman, whose toes and half of both feet will, I fear, slough. This case I drew your attention to on my arrival, hoping ere this he would have been removed into your hospital. *6. Pearcy's wife, monomania. 7. Jane Longman, age 30, slight bronchical affection. 8. Eliza Pepperall, 2 years, slight diarrhoea. 9. Anna Burnett, 16 years, diarrhoea. 10. Emma Burnett, 14 years, diarrhoea. *11. Henry Pearcy, married, profuse diarrhoea. 12. Samuel Davis, married, diarrhoea. The above are the only cases at present under my care; and I would observe that the three first on the list require constant attention, and are in a state totally unfitted for removal. Should you insist upon their being deported to quarantine ground, I can only offer a strong protest against such a proceeding. Those persons to whose names an asterisk (*) has been affixed require immediate removal into warm, dry barracks; the others need no comment beyond a recommendation that all ought, without further loss of time to have change of air. It is my duty now to inform you that the remaining persons on board are in perfect health—a total of upwards 470 souls; and that should they be subjected to further detention by that which appears to

me to be an egregious mistake and blunder, namely, compulsory imprisonment on board or on quarantine ground in canvas tents, disease of a formidable nature will, I predict, supervene. Further, I would add that as you are the chief of the health department, I regret that, on conveying my wishes to you to come on board and judge for yourself whether a so-called " contagious, infectious, or pestilential disease " existed, you should have descended to curt and ungentlemanly language in your refusal. Had you personally inspected the sick, neither vague conjecture nor hypothesis would, I think, have guided you in forming the opinion now held that the rigid enforcement of the quarantine laws was imperative. I would further state, Bennison and Jones, two married women, have had disease of the lungs. By . admission into the hospital, and by treatment to which I need not advert, they are comparatively convalescent. Charlotte Saunders and Eliza Doyle, single young women, came on board similarly affected, and are both benefited by the voyage. Should the abovenamed four persons be submitted to the influence of damp or moist air necessarily inhaled by living and sleeping under canvas tents at this season, I have little doubt consumption will follow. It is the earnest desire of persons, especially of those in health and who have paid their own passage on board this ship, to be immediately allowed to leave for Lyttelton, and I trust no barrier will be opposed to their wishes, or the consequences, I dread, will be more appalling than would be desirable. For my own part, although at great personal inconvenience and loss of time, most precious to me, I shall unflinchingly and to the best of my ability do my duty, and my services are at the disposal of the Government so long as they may be deemed useful. I am, sir, yours, &e., J. B. Clutterbuck. Dr. Donald, Health Officer. P.S. I would add I shall forward a copy of this letter to Mr. Maude, the Provincial Secretary. Sept. 5. —It was too late yesterday to have this communication sent on shore. To-day I have to report Frampton, Blower, and Sherratt's wife are decidedly worse, so is little Florence. A panic pervades all classes. They imagine that as even letters are subjected to a process of fumigation, the plague must have broken out—a process which I really must designate as absurd and puerile, the custom having long since become obsolete, except under most pressing and alarming circumstances; and as a professional man surely you ought to know that in our public hospitals at home, in which fever of a most malignant form occurs, no letters, notes, or parcels are prohibited from the sick wards to friends, nor are the nurses restricted from going into and out of such hospitals to visit their relatives in their own abode. I would also observe patients in England would have the right and benefit of consultation of as many medical men as they chose; but through the strange doctrine you have promulgated, my patients are to have no such benefit—in cases too which are full of danger.

On re-consideration, I shall send copies of this to the local press, as both you sir, and I, must naturally wish publicity should be given to the strange rumours now afloat concerning the ship, its officers, and sick; and I cannot help noting an observation made by Dr. Rouse on his taking a rapid survey of some of the patients, " I do not like the appearance of some of their tongues, 'tis a case of quarantine, I fear; at all events, I don't like to take upon myself the responsibility; a survey must be held"—as if the merest tyro in the profession does not know that an altered State of the lingual membrane (varying in color &c.) necessarily accompanies all febrile action—hence the term " malignant" is applied to disease if the tongue present a dark or blackish hue. No regular medical survey has yet been made.