Welsh Journals

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The disease first appeared in Sunderland in September 1848, and then subsided and died away as the colder weather set in. The visitation had been slight and confined mainly to the North of England and Scotland. However, with the arrival of warmer weather, cholera re-appeared. This time it struck like a tempest lashing at every nook and cranny on the island." By mid-June, the disease had appeared in Merthyr, Cardiff Aberavon and Neath. The actual date at which it appeared in Swansea is unknown. The Cambrian in early July claimed that Swansea was never more free from sickness than at present but the threat of an epidemic had not escaped notice. The police were engaged in extensive ablutionary activities in the upper part of the town, and sanitary Visiting Committees were appointed to inspect various districts in the borough and its neighbourhood. Despite the light-hearted tone of the local press which continued to report the steady arrival of summer visitors, the epidemic mounted in severity. By autumn it was virulent. The Mayor, Michael John Michael, approved the Vicar's plan to hold services to supplicate Almighty God to remove the prevailing epidemic." A Day of Humiliation was fixed for 10 October, shops, buisness premises and works were closed. A Sabbath-like stillness prevailed throughout the town as churchmen and dissenters attended their respective places of worship." Gradually, the epidemic subsided and 15 November was observed in Swansea as a day of thanksgiving for the cessation of the pestilence." Authoritative opinion differed as to the total number of deaths there were from cholera in Swansea in 1849. William Henry Michael, the first Medical Officer of Health, put the figure at 139. His successor, Ebenezer Davies, put it as high as 241 or 7.7 per 1,000 of the population. It was agreed, however, that the upper part of the town was particularly badly hit by the epidemic no less than 17 per cent of the total number of deaths were reported to have occurred in this area, in the vicinity of several grossly over- crowded burial grounds. No account of the cholera epidemic in Swansea in 1849 would be complete without reference to the exertions of Dr. George Gwyn Bird, the Mayor, Michael J. Michael, and the Reverend Charles Kavanagh, the Roman Catholic priest in Greenhill. Between them, in their various capacities, these men devised innumerable measures to mitigate the severity of the epidemic. Their efforts were appreciated by their fellow townspeople and publicly rewarded in the following year. Michael was presented with a silver-gilt loving cup and silver salver Kavanagh with a public donation of 50 sovereigns and an inscription testifying to the useful services he had rendered to the poor. These were direct and of an intimate nature. In the words of his successor, he washed them, combed their hair, made their beds and laid them in their coffins."