Swine and other Influenza

The recent outbreak of Swine Flu brought to mind the stories my father told about his experience during the Spanish Influenza of 1918-1919. In today’s world, word of the Swine flu spread faster than the virus, yet it is amazing how quickly the Spanish flu spread around the world in the age of steam travel. Soldiers, returning from the Great War were the main carriers of the sickness but by 1919, the flu had reached the Port Loring area. My Dad recorded his memories of that era in The Steamer Kawigamog as follows:

“The Spanish Influenza epidemic that raced through Europe in the closing year of the Great War reached our area in the fall of 1919. That fall had been particularly cool and wet and these conditions seemed to favour the illness. There were approximately 2,000 men working in the various lumber camps and mills at that time, many of them in remote cutting camps. When illness struck there was no one to attend them, in fact, even the people at Lost Channel and in the Loring area had to rely on the services of one doctor. Dr. Ames looked after as many sick people as he could but the flu struck so many that he was unable to offer much time with any one person.

“My brother Merrill was the first one of the crew to be struck down with the flu. We were away from home (at Lost Channel), so we just placed him in a bunk on the Kawigamog (the Walton’s steamboat that operated on the Pickerel River) where Mother and Daisy could keep him comfortable until we could get back to Port Loring. My mother and sister Daisy were on board at this time, running the canteen and cooking meals for the crew. Four days later, my Dad, already weakened by the influenza, collapsed at the engine. We were just coming in to land at Bruce’s mill. When granddad Captain Arthur signalled to stop engine, Dad was so weak he fell when he reached for the lever. The Kawigamog banged into the dock, which fortunately was just made of slabs and sawdust, so there was no damage to the bow.

“Maurice Maloney of Sundridge had taken over the firing when Merrill became ill, and with his help, we placed Dad in a bunk. I was working as deck hand that trip as all the able-bodied men in the area were either working in the lumber camps or replacing someone else who was ill. The Kwig now had a crew of three men and two women. Captain Arthur, who would be seventy-one at this time, had two youngsters as crew; Maurice, who was a little older than I, was the fireman, and me, a 12 year old, who was appointed Engineer! Granddad used special signals for me and I ran the engine for four days until Uncle Edgar, who was running the steamer Stanley Byers at the time, could take over and operate the engine until Dad recovered.

“For the next four days the three of us ran trips, picking up men and taking them to the temporary hospital at Lost Channel. One day we landed at the Schroeder Mill Warehouse to find 22 men waiting in the cold warehouse. They had been brought out from the bush camps and just left there, knowing that the Kwig would be stopping. These men were so weak that they had to be helped aboard and some could not even walk. The men were too heavy for us to carry so Maurice and I took an old grey blanket from the cabin and rolled the men onto it then dragged them to the deck of the Kwig. We placed them side by side on the deck and made for Lost Channel. One of the men was dead when we arrived.”

With these memories in their minds, it is understandable why my parents subjected us to mustard plasters, steaming vapours of Vicks and that tasty Buckley’s Mixture whenever we kids seemed to be coming down with the ‘flu’.

There have been a number of other pandemics since the Great War with the virus attributed to chickens, birds, monkeys, mad cows and even mosquito-infected crows. One might even be suspicious that the animals were out to get us, infecting us with everything from chicken pox to rabies and the flu. There is even a small group of theorists who think the mushrooms are influencing our thinking. The term ‘influenza’ comes from the ancients who thought that it was the stars that were ‘influencing’ the spread of disease. The Spanish Flu, which likely originated in the United States, got its moniker from Spain because Spain was neutral in the Great War and reported the deaths from the Flu in uncensored news. If that were the case today, the pigs would have been cleared of the blame and this latest pandemic would have been called the Internet Flu. Of course, computers already suffer from any number of viruses so maybe that would not be accurate.

In all the press hullabaloo and precautions over Swine Flu, one has to keep a perspective – The Spanish Flu killed an estimated 50 million people. I hope that we can contain this latest threat to pigs and people, and I wonder what our children or grandchildren will remember about the Swine Flu of 2009.