1491, or, Was Pre-European "White Man" America Really

[DogOnPorch]

And none of that was accepted or even common knowledge until well after the disease outbreaks killed so many, revisionist history, did the blankets carry the disease, maybe, were they used as a purposeful weapon or war or genocide? There is zero evidence to support that, you would think that we did enough bad things to native populations around the world without this folklore being treated as fact.

Anyone pushing the 'smallpox infected blankets'* story knows nothing about both forms of variola's viability outside the human body. That is to say, the virus doesn't travel well (at all) away from the human carrier and has no other carrier in the animal world including apes and monkeys. Weaponized variola like the Soviets produced is another story, however. It is meant to be viable 'floating in the breeze' not needing moisture to remain highly infectious.

* as per Lord Ahmherst, etc and the Siege of Ft Pitt.

[Saipan]

I am wondering, since the concept of a virus causing diseases wasn't known until the 1700's how did europeans intentionally infect aboriginals 200 years before that?

Retroactively. Like everything else in politically correct (very temporary) world.

[Shwa]

And none of that was accepted or even common knowledge until well after the disease outbreaks killed so many, revisionist history, did the blankets carry the disease, maybe, were they used as a purposeful weapon or war or genocide? There is zero evidence to support that, you would think that we did enough bad things to native populations around the world without this folklore being treated as fact.

So you obviously didn't refer to the links cited, preferring to use your own opinion of "revisionist history" as the guidepost?

Here, this alone crushes your "zero evidence" claim:

An additional source of information on the matter is the Journal of William Trent, commander of the local militia of the townspeople of Pittsburgh during Pontiac's seige of the fort. This Journal has been described as "... the most detailed contemporary account of the anxious days and nights in the beleaguered stronghold." [Pen Pictures of Early Western Pennsylvania, John W. Harpster, ed. (University of Pittsburgh Press, 1938).]

Trent's entry for May 24, 1763, includes the following statement:

... we gave them two Blankets and an Handkerchief out of the Small Pox Hospital. I hope it will have the desired effect.

Now that is one small reference from Pittsburg militia commander William Trent. Do you have some other evidence that he did not write that, the documents are forgeries or misinterpreted, or that the event never actually happened?

No?

I didn't think so.

So it would seem that your mere opinion on the matter is actually the "revisionist" kind of history, since real historians tend to prefer the written records from the past.

[Shwa]

Anyone pushing the 'smallpox infected blankets'* story knows nothing about both forms of variola's viability outside the human body. That is to say, the virus doesn't travel well (at all) away from the human carrier and has no other carrier in the animal world including apes and monkeys. Weaponized variola like the Soviets produced is another story, however. It is meant to be viable 'floating in the breeze' not needing moisture to remain highly infectious.

So are you saying it never happened or that it actually happened, but the effects were not useful?

[DogOnPorch]

So are you saying it never happened or that it actually happened, but the effects were not useful?

Lord Amherst (etc) would no doubt hoped it would work...but knew little about how variola actually worked. Native Americans caught the pox the same way eveybody else did...by close human contact.

Edited July 8, 2011 by DogOnPorch

[Saipan]

Now that is one small reference from Pittsburg militia commander William Trent. Do you have some other evidence that he did not write that

Do you have evidence he did?

Trent's entry for May 24, 1763, includes the following statement:

... we gave them two Blankets and an Handkerchief out of the Small Pox Hospital. I hope it will have the desired effect.

Blankets, Handkerchief, and Small Pox Hospital were names in those days?

[Shwa]

Lord Amherst (etc) would no doubt hoped it would work...but knew little about how variola actually worked. Native Americans caught the pox the same way eveybody else did...by close human contact.

Yeah I read somewhere that they were particularly interested in 'scabby' blankets and clothe. At any rate, even though they didn't have the technical details of smallpox transmission, they likely were acting on some sort of observation or common knowledge of the times.

WHO - Smallpox:

Smallpox is transmitted from person to person by infected aerosols and air droplets spread in face-to-face contact with an infected person after fever has begun, especially if symptoms include coughing. The disease can also be transmitted by contaminated clothes and bedding, though the risk of infection from this source is much lower.

I would imagine that the affects of smallpox on the native populations were well known and the hope was that even if one person got it, once it spread, it would have had the desired affect.

[Moonlight Graham]

From the article quoted in the OP:

''Throughout eastern North America the open landscape seen by the first Europeans quickly filled in with forest. According to William Cronon, of the University of Wisconsin, later colonists began complaining about how hard it was to get around. (Eventually, of course, they stripped New England almost bare of trees.) When Europeans moved west, they were preceded by two waves: one of disease, the other of ecological disturbance. The former crested with fearsome rapidity; the latter sometimes took more than a century to quiet down. Far from destroying pristine wilderness, European settlers bloodily created it. By 1800 the hemisphere was chockablock with new wilderness. If "forest primeval" means a woodland unsullied by the human presence, William Denevan has written, there was much more of it in the late eighteenth century than in the early sixteenth.''

I don't quite understand what this paragraph is saying, ie:

Throughout eastern North America the open landscape seen by the first Europeans quickly filled in with forest.

Why? Did the natives plant trees? The euros? And for what reason?

Edited July 9, 2011 by Moonlight Graham

[DogOnPorch]

Yeah I read somewhere that they were particularly interested in 'scabby' blankets and clothe. At any rate, even though they didn't have the technical details of smallpox transmission, they likely were acting on some sort of observation or common knowledge of the times.

WHO - Smallpox:

I would imagine that the effects of smallpox on the native populations were well known and the hope was that even if one person got it, once it spread, it would have had the desired affect.

The scabs are infectious until dry. The main thing is that variola cannot exist beyond humans for any significant length of time and there isn't a non-human host. Weaponized variola is another matter where cases were reported in the Aral sea area some 40 km away from Vozrozhdeniya island (no longer an island) with regards to the India-1967 strain (the deadliest known) being produced there in mass quantites. The international community is still assisting in the clean-up of that horrible place.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vozrozhdeniya

As for the effects of variola on the native populations...sure...but again they didn't fully understand how it spread or why natives had a higher mortality rate. It was a continous curse to Europeans, Africans and Asians since history has been recorded, but, the death rate was much lower than with natives due to some measure of built-up immunity...now there's a subject for betsy and her "evolution is a lie" threads.

Edited July 8, 2011 by DogOnPorch

[jbg]

From the article quoted in the OP:

I don't quite understand what this paragraph is saying, ie:

Why? Did the natives plant trees? The euros? And for what reason?

The gist of the article and full-length book is that the First Nations used forest fires as a way of maintaining an open and huntable landscape. The eradication of the FN's caused the forests to to thicken. It also caused, at first, a drastic increase in numbers of deer and buffalo, and the wolves that fed upon them. Prior to the white man's arrival, the FN's kept the forests thinner and frequently burned, the number of prey species and their predators down. The flocks of passenger pigeons also experienced a population explosion at first.

[Moonlight Graham]

The gist of the article and full-length book is that the First Nations used forest fires as a way of maintaining an open and huntable landscape. The eradication of the FN's caused the forests to to thicken. It also caused, at first, a drastic increase in numbers of deer and buffalo, and the wolves that fed upon them. Prior to the white man's arrival, the FN's kept the forests thinner and frequently burned, the number of prey species and their predators down. The flocks of passenger pigeons also experienced a population explosion at first.

Thanks for that explanation. Do you still have the full article you can send me? Such a fascinating subject!

[bloodyminded]

It was a continous curse to Europeans, Africans and Asians since history has been recorded, but, the death rate was much lower than with natives due to some measure of built-up immunity...now there's a subject for betsy and her "evolution is a lie" threads.

She'll find the requisite Bible quote to refute it; perhaps somehting about "the Earth's foundation," or "Dawkins is afraid to debate," or other similarly germane arguments.

[CANADIEN]

And none of that was accepted or even common knowledge until well after the disease outbreaks killed so many, revisionist history, did the blankets carry the disease, maybe, were they used as a purposeful weapon or war or genocide? There is zero evidence to support that, you would think that we did enough bad things to native populations around the world without this folklore being treated as fact.

There is zero evidence of attempts at spreading smallpox thorugh the use of infected blankets during the siege of fort Pitt (1763), except the own words of people who took part in it.

Edited July 30, 2011 by CANADIEN

[wyly]

I'm thinking that De Soto's pigs did more damage than a few urban legend "smallpox" blankets.

not a myth, there are historical correspondence that verify it... biological warfare was established for centuries in the old world it's naive to believe that the same methods wouldn't be used in the new...

[wyly]

There is zero evidence of attempts at spreading smallpox thorugh the use of infected blankets during the siege of fort Pitt (1763), except the own words of people who took part in it.

here those words...

Bouquet to Amherst, dated 13 July 1763:

P.S. I will try to inocculate the the Indians by means of Blankets that may fall in their hands, taking care however not to get the disease myself. As it is pity to oppose good men against them, I wish we could make use of the Spaniard's Method, and hunt them with english dogs, supported by Rangers, and some Light Horse, who would I think effectively extirpate or remove that Vermine.

Amherst's response to Bouquet, dated 16 July 1763:

P.S. You will do well to try to Innoculate the Indians by means of Blanketts, as well as to try Every other method that can serve to Extirpate this Execrable Race. I should be very glad your Scheme for Hunting them Down by Dogs could take Effect effect, but England is at too great a Distance to think of that at present.

Bouquet to Amherst, dated 26 July 1763:

Sir, I received yesterday your Excellency's letters of 16th with their Inclosures. The signal for Indian Messengers, and all your directions will be observed.

[CANADIEN]

here those words...

Thanks for yet another proof it happened.

PS: I was mocking the claim there's no proof.

[Shwa]

Thanks for yet another proof it happened.

PS: I was mocking the claim there's no proof.

But it isn't "proof" haven't you been reading?

First of all, those are just letters from one insignficant, lost-in-history Brit to another. Second, just because they wrote about it, doesn't mean it actually happened; like where's the video? Thirdly, even if it did happen, it is scientificially impossible for smallpox to be transmitted through blankets, and even if it were, chances are, that any outbreak of smallpox was likely due to human contact anyways from the siegees to the siegers. And that is competely unavoidable, natural and morally acceptable. Even if the carrier was sent out to meet the siegers, it wasn't their fault that the Indians caught smallpox.

Sure, a rudimentary knowledge of the contagious effects of disease in warfare was generally known for centuries prior to the siege at Fort Pitt, but that doesn't mean that they actually used it there.

[CANADIEN]

But it isn't "proof" haven't you been reading?

First of all, those are just letters from one insignficant, lost-in-history Brit to another. Second, just because they wrote about it, doesn't mean it actually happened; like where's the video? Thirdly, even if it did happen, it is scientificially impossible for smallpox to be transmitted through blankets, and even if it were, chances are, that any outbreak of smallpox was likely due to human contact anyways from the siegees to the siegers. And that is competely unavoidable, natural and morally acceptable. Even if the carrier was sent out to meet the siegers, it wasn't their fault that the Indians caught smallpox.

Sure, a rudimentary knowledge of the contagious effects of disease in warfare was generally known for centuries prior to the siege at Fort Pitt, but that doesn't mean that they actually used it there.

You got me at the video. Yes indeed. I want to see the video. I want to see the video!

[wyly]

But it isn't "proof" haven't you been reading?

First of all, those are just letters from one insignficant, lost-in-history Brit to another. Second, just because they wrote about it, doesn't mean it actually happened; like where's the video? Thirdly, even if it did happen, it is scientificially impossible for smallpox to be transmitted through blankets, and even if it were, chances are, that any outbreak of smallpox was likely due to human contact anyways from the siegees to the siegers. And that is competely unavoidable, natural and morally acceptable. Even if the carrier was sent out to meet the siegers, it wasn't their fault that the Indians caught smallpox.

Sure, a rudimentary knowledge of the contagious effects of disease in warfare was generally known for centuries prior to the siege at Fort Pitt, but that doesn't mean that they actually used it there.

scientifically impossible? yes it is, it's highly infectious...

"Contaminated clothing or bed linens also can spread the virus. Those caring for people with smallpox need to use special safety measures to ensure that all bedding and clothing from the infected person are cleaned appropriately with bleach and hot water."

http://www.niaid.nih.gov/topics/smallpox/Pages/transmission.aspx,

Edited July 30, 2011 by wyly

[wyly]

Thanks for yet another proof it happened.

PS: I was mocking the claim there's no proof.

I know...and coincidentally natives starting dying of smallpox after the letters were sent...

as for the book 1941 the author is not a historian or archeologist or anthropologist so it may an interesting read but the accuracy needs to questioned...my daughter is an archeologist/historian and now working on a biology degree and she comes across many inconsistencies...archeologists do not have the same knowledge as historians and neither have the same knowledge as biologists, sometimes they make incorrect assumptions on the others field of studies...

[Remiel]

It appears that the discussion on genocide started on Page 1, and is still going on Page 21. Not sure I can to check if that is what everything in the middle was. Note that a lot of people from the early discussed were at some point Banned.

I think this thread could be improved by finally dropping the genocide argument and discussing the OP, which was what North America was actually like before colonization. There is a Wiki article on the book jpg read at this point:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1491:_New_Revelations_of_the_Americas_Before_Columbus

[jbg]

There is zero evidence of attempts at spreading smallpox thorugh the use of infected blankets during the siege of fort Pitt (1763), except the own words of people who took part in it.

not a myth, there are historical correspondence that verify it... biological warfare was established for centuries in the old world it's naive to believe that the same methods wouldn't be used in the new...

Thanks for yet another proof it happened.

PS: I was mocking the claim there's no proof.

But it isn't "proof" haven't you been reading?

First of all, those are just letters from one insignficant, lost-in-history Brit to another. Second, just because they wrote about it, doesn't mean it actually happened; like where's the video? Thirdly, even if it did happen, it is scientificially impossible for smallpox to be transmitted through blankets, and even if it were, chances are, that any outbreak of smallpox was likely due to human contact anyways from the siegees to the siegers. And that is competely unavoidable, natural and morally acceptable. Even if the carrier was sent out to meet the siegers, it wasn't their fault that the Indians caught smallpox.

Sure, a rudimentary knowledge of the contagious effects of disease in warfare was generally known for centuries prior to the siege at Fort Pitt, but that doesn't mean that they actually used it there.

I think Shwa has the better of the argument here. I think the Brits may have wanted to do it or tried to do it. They may even have succeeded in murdering a few people that way.

That being said, I think the primary vectors of spread were the colonialists' livestock and their escaped feral counterparts. As I have stated in the opening post and elsewhere, I suspect strongly that the Americas would not have been conquered by the Europeans if there weren't a massive native die-off first. Africa and Asia and "Exhibits 'A' and 'B'" as to what happens when the Europeans try to colonize a fully-settled continent. They fail.

[wyly]

I think Shwa has the better of the argument here. I think the Brits may have wanted to do it or tried to do it. They may even have succeeded in murdering a few people that way.

That being said, I think the primary vectors of spread were the colonialists' livestock and their escaped feral counterparts. As I have stated in the opening post and elsewhere, I suspect strongly that the Americas would not have been conquered by the Europeans if there weren't a massive native die-off first. Africa and Asia and "Exhibits 'A' and 'B'" as to what happens when the Europeans try to colonize a fully-settled continent. They fail.

shwa has the better?...shwa claimed small pox can not be spread by clothing/blankets...incorrect, the entire argument ends on that point...medical knowledge of of smallpox was sufficient enough that people were routinely infected in order to prevent epidemics, that same knowledge was used to begin epidemics as well...

small pox less of a factor than desotos pigs, incorrect...

historical records indicate a mortality of between 65-85% among native americans from small pox...the effect of having such large numbers of people die in any society will severely hamper that society to function normally...

[Oleg Bach]

Humans are humans and come in all shapes and sizes and levels of sophistication. Why are we historically led to believe that those from the east were sophisticated and intelligent and those in the west were NOT...how could that be - sounds like self justification for bad and ruthless behavour on the part of Europeans - They dummied down their population so as they could invade without guilt - just like the Amwercans keep their populace un-informed as far as other nations - so they can de-humanize them and plunder them - Take Iraq - the craddle of civilization - WE were led to believe they were barbarians and invading and destroying them was no big deal - well we succeeded - we bombed and ripped Iraq back into the stone age...cos they were sub human...mean while the west behaved in a sub-human fashion dealing with them.

[Shwa]

scientifically impossible? yes it is, it's highly infectious...

"Contaminated clothing or bed linens also can spread the virus. Those caring for people with smallpox need to use special safety measures to ensure that all bedding and clothing from the infected person are cleaned appropriately with bleach and hot water."

http://www.niaid.nih.gov/topics/smallpox/Pages/transmission.aspx,

Pfft. as IF "science" counts compared with so many opinions. The scientific data shows that more people believe that smallpox could not be transmitted in any way in the mid-18th century, therefore smallpox was not transmitted via infected blankets.

See? Science.