Supposed Case of Yellow Fever

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SUPPOSED CASE OF YELLOW FEVER.

On Wednesday night Mr. Loring W. Gross, ship joiner, and a member of Engine Co. 8, of 140 South 3d street, was taken ill. His friends sent for Dr. Wade, who attended him. It is asserted that Dr. Wade told the patient's mother that the disease was yellow fever. Mr. Brown, of the firm of Tuttle & Brown, corner of South Seventh and Fourth, hearing the rumor that the medical attendant had pronounced the case one of yellow fever, deemed it advisable to send for another physician also. Accordingly he sent for Dr. Brady, who called to see the patient yesterday, but found he had expired shortly before. He saw that the patient had every symptom of yellow fever, and was of the opinion that the man probably died with that disease. An undertaker had been called in, whom Dr. Brady warned not to bury the patient without a permit from Dr. Cleveland, the Health Officer, and enjoined him to notify the Health Officer of the case without delay. Instead of doing so, the undertaker, it is alleged, placed the body in a coffin forthwith, and had it taken off to Cypress Hills within four hours after death. After his return from Cypress Hills, he called at the Health Officer's house, and tendered a certificate from Dr. Wade, setting forth that the deceased had died of "bilious remitting fever."

The Health Officer, hearing of the case meanwhile, procured the services of a policeman and two darkies, and went to the house where the body lay. Everything about the case tending to the belief that the disease was really yellow fever, the policeman took to his heels and vanished, leaving the Health Officer alone with the darkies. The latter by Dr. Cleveland's direction took the straw mattrass on which the deceased had slept, with the bed clothes, &c., and buried them in a vacant lot to avoid infection.

The deceased was a ship-joiner by occupation, and was in the way of his business exposed to infection in repairing vessels which might have come from infected ports. The two last vessels he was employed on were the barque Abrahams and the brig Sears, of New York. We are unable to learn from whence these vessels last came into port.

The deceased's mother, we understand, now denies that Dr. Wade told her that the case was one of yellow fever. She admits that yellow fever was spoken of, and says that the Dr. said that the disease was one which down South they might call yellow fever, but he regarded it as bilious remittent fever.

There can be no question, if the above facts are as stated (and we have taken every pains to learn the truth) that the yellow fever is at last really in our midst. Whether the infection will spread, is another question; but that it might have every chance of doing so the undertaker left the body from yesterday until to-morrow in the receiving vault, where persons are constantly passing, in and out every day.

The Health Officer, we understand, intends to bring Dr. Wade before the Board of Health, for breach of the charter, which provides that the medical attendant shall report to him every case of contagious disease which occurs in his practice. Even if the case turns out not to have been one of yellow fever, it is contended that Dr. Wade has broken the law, by omitting to report the case as one of bilious remittent fever. The penalty incurred by the Dr., if the charge is substantiated, is $250.

The undertaker, Mr. Hendrick, has also rendered himself liable to a penalty of $100, for interring the body without a permit. It is true he obtained a permit from the office of Dr. Cleveland, on Dr. Wade's certificate; but this was after the interment had been actually effected.