In Victorian America, sexually transmitted disease, especially syphilis, was of medical, moral, and social concern. In part because of the association of the disease with prostitution, women were thought to be responsible for spreading the disease and were urged to keep themselves clean. A medical treatise on the treatment of syphilis from 1842 notes, “If, in general, women were more cleanly and careful of themselves, the venereal disease would be far less common.”27 Both women and men were encouraged by their physicians not to marry if they had syphilis, to prevent spreading the disease.
Female Patient 277, a new bride twenty years of age, had contracted syphilis while visiting Wheeling, West Virginia, when she was nineteen.28 She visited a doctor in Mount Vernon, Ohio, and he treated her, though he urged her not to follow through with plans to marry. Despite this advice, marry she did. Following the wedding, she and her husband visited another physician regarded as a “quack” by her Mount Vernon physician. The “quack,” without examining her, told her she was pregnant and infected with syphilis and sent her back to her father’s home. Here unfolded a drama involving suicide attempts, which led to her commitment to the asylum at Athens on June 5, 1874.29 Her Mount Vernon physician prepared her commitment papers with no mention of syphilis, saving that for a private letter to the asylum superintendent.
Statement of Medical Witness to the Probate Court:
I hereby certify that I have examined Mrs. ______, State of Ohio and find her insane. I believe her now to be free from any infectious disease or vermin.
She is twenty years of age. On Wednesday May 28th 1874 I was called upon to see the aforesaid lady found her at the Commercial House in Mt. Vernon, Ohio in bed[.] [H]er voice was husky, pupils contracted, she acknowledged to having taken morphine with a view of destroying her life[:] under a threat from me that her trunk should be examined she gave me a bottle containing 10 1/2 grains of Sulphate of Morphine. Strong Coffee was ordered and a close watch kept. On Thursday evening following upon hearing her Father’s voice, she shot herself in the thorax, the ball entered at the middle and near the left side of the Sternum, and passed in an outward direction and now lies in the soft parts covering the left side of the Thorax. None of the parties were ever in an Asylum. Mrs. ______ has never had Epilepsy. This person has made two attempts to take her life, and of which I have knowledge. The treatment has been good nutritious diet and a sedative. She now says that she does not want to recover, has attempted to probe the wound with her fingers.
Her physician attached a letter describing the year-long unfolding of the situation, which included the diagnosis of syphilis and follow-up treatment by the “quack,” details that he wished to spare the patient’s parents. His notes, down to the blue silk dress purchased by the bride, give an unusually vivid picture of the difficulties of this young woman.
June 1st, 1874
To the Superintendent of the Lunatic Asylum at Athens, Ohio
Dear doctor,
I take this opportunity to give you some more information in regard to ______ than I felt called upon to make in the Certificate. I write you expecting that what I now reveal will be kept a secret for the sake of the father and mother of this unfortunate woman. She first consulted me for a private disease about the middle of last January. Said she contracted it 2 months prior in Wheeling Va. I made an examination and found a chancre and multiple bubers in both groins. I regarded the case one of true Syphilis and so treated it. In a few weeks she had sore throat & an eruption. Under the use of Hyd. Bichloride & Tinct. Ferri internally and applications of nitrate of silver the chancre healed, eruptions & sore throat disappeared. She remained under my care 2 1/2 months when I regarded her cured. She told me that she was engaged to be married, time had been set—I told her the danger of getting married in that condition and advised her to postpone the day indefinitely[.] [T]his she said [she] could not do and was married since [that] time in April[.] [O]n her way to the home of her husband they stopped in Zanesville and consulted a quack doctor by the name of ______. Without any vaginal examination he pronounced her badly diseased and pregnant—and sent her back to her father. On Wednesday May 20th she started from her father’s with the view of joining her husband. She stopped in Zanesville and consulted the Quack[;] prior to leaving home she tried to poison herself with strychnine. She purchased in Zanesville a beautiful blue silk dress, with kid slippers and other articles of dress to match and returned to this city on Saturday May 23rd. She came to my office (after an absence of some 8 weeks). I made an examination and could not find any evidence of disease. Tried hard to satisfy her . . . and told her to seek the advice of some regular physician. She took that . . . advice and again chose a quack. After this she proceeded at once to the carrying out of her plan. First on Tuesday at 10 and 10 1/2 PM and [again] Wednesday 4 AM she took a dose of morphine in all 45 grains. I saw her on Wednesday 11 AM, found her pupils contracted, voice husky, said she had vomited after each dose. Under threat that her trunk should be examined she gave me up what Morphine she had left & said she would go on with her husband. Her father came before she got started and the moment she heard his voice she shot herself. . . . The cause of her insanity is very plain I think. I expect that under your professional care & skill she will be returned entirely cured both in body and mind.
Yours,
______, MD
The new bride entered the asylum at Athens four days later on June 5 as Female Patient 277.
In 1874, another bride was found to be insane and was hospitalized with witness provided by two female friends. Distraught that she had married the wrong man, Female Patient 242 was suicidal and had to be watched constantly by friends. The physician explained, “The exciting cause is as I learn Matrimonial disappointment. She is sane on some subjects and has perfect lucid intervals in which she is sane on all. She has attempted violence upon herself. I am of [the] opinion that if confined for a few weeks under kind treatment, that she will entirely recover as suicide is her only Mania.” The probate judge added a separate letter explaining the situation to the superintendent:
Dr. Gundry
Dear Sir:
Inclosed please find papers in case of ______[,] a married lady[;] it appears that she is sensible of having disappointed someone else by Marrying her present husband and for that reason she ought to put herself out of the way of all. She finds no fault with her husband[.] She has repeatedly attempted Suicide by different means. Her friends are compelled to guard her continually, she seems to be reasonable in other matters. Please reply at your earliest convenience, as she is being kept here to wait the reply.
Respectfully etc.
J. C. Evans
PJ [Probate Judge]
The sights, sounds, and injuries of the battlefields of the American Civil War induced trauma and illness that, for some, resulted in commitment to the asylum. Male Patient 216, from a farm along the Ohio River, was hospitalized because of a mental illness dating from 1865. His physician wrote that the cause of his illness was “Typhoid fever, from which he suffered while in the Army during the year of 1864. [He] has made attempts of violence upon his family and others.” This veteran had been a private in the 91st Regiment of the Ohio Infantry. Before his illness, he participated in the West Virginia war theater, including a raid up the Kanawha River and pursuit of Morgan’s Raiders.
Male Patient 231, a private in the 188th Ohio Infantry, was admitted to the Athens asylum in 1874 following ten years of mental illness attributed to the trauma of the sounds of battle. His physician describes his case, which dated from 1864, as a “case of chronic mania, he was in an asylum about five years ago. The cause is nervous derangement, probably acquired while in the Army. He received a sudden shock from cannonading.”
Male Patient 3 enlisted in the Ohio 77th Infantry Regiment at the age of fifteen and endured near-constant battle conditions until the war’s end, when he had his first “attack” of mental illness. The medical report committing him in 1874 noted, “About seven years ago [he] had an attack lasting two or three months, has had three or four attacks since. He has made threats of violence upon himself and also upon others.” The teenager fought with his regiment