Week 43 - Cause of Death - The Strangling Angel of Children
Death is one of the certainties of life. Let's explore causes of death this week. Do you have a relative who died in an unusual way? Perhaps you've found an unusual record that shows the cause of death.
Finding the cause of death is a challange. The Dutch BMD records simply state the date and name, plus some biographical details such as place of birth, age and the parents. But then I discovered that Amsterdam kept statistics for the cause of death between 1811-1868, Staten van overlijden naar geslacht, burgerlijke staat, leeftijd en maand van overlijden. (Statistics for deaths according to gender, civil state, age and month of death).
Here I found the reason that Cornelia Blomberg, my grandfather's sister, died at the tender age of six. It took me some time to browse through the online scans, but I knew the address of the family at the time, which did not yet include my grandfather (he was a born in 1991) and the date of her death - 29 November 1890.
Little Cornelia died of diphtheria, a highly contagious infection of the nose and throat that affected mostly young children and the elderly. At the beginning the symptoms are very much like a cold: fever, coughing, malaise. But then the tell-tale thick membrane forms over the back of the throat, which narrows and obstructs the breathing passage. Other complications can follow which can affect the heart, the nervous system or the skin, depending on the bacterial strain involved. The symptoms are caused by the toxin excreted by the bacteria.
In the family advertisement announcing her passing she is remembered as "onze lieveling" - our darling. It must have been heart rending for her mother to see her child struggling to breathe and not be able to do anything about it.
Treatment for diphtheria advanced rapidly in the 1890's, such that in 1894 the toxin was identified and an anti-toxin was developed and in the spring of 1913 Behringer developed a vaccine. But all this was too late for Cornelia.
Diphtheria is highly contagious and easily spread and so I look over the page to see if there were any other cases. I can see only one other. A five-year old boy also died on 20th November and he lived on Kwakersdwarspad, which is judging by Google maps not too far from the Nassaukade where the Blomberg family lived. Possibly the families knew each other and the children played together.
This record makes for depressing reading. Pneumonia is often cited, as is eclampsia, which are seizures mostly suffered by babies and infants. Out of a total of 68 entries, a staggering 41 are for babies and young children under the age of 10!
The one person who bucked this trend was the poor guy who probably fell into the canal and drowned - he is recorded as "opgevischt" - fished out.
References:
Finding the cause of death is a challange. The Dutch BMD records simply state the date and name, plus some biographical details such as place of birth, age and the parents. But then I discovered that Amsterdam kept statistics for the cause of death between 1811-1868, Staten van overlijden naar geslacht, burgerlijke staat, leeftijd en maand van overlijden. (Statistics for deaths according to gender, civil state, age and month of death).
Here I found the reason that Cornelia Blomberg, my grandfather's sister, died at the tender age of six. It took me some time to browse through the online scans, but I knew the address of the family at the time, which did not yet include my grandfather (he was a born in 1991) and the date of her death - 29 November 1890.
Little Cornelia died of diphtheria, a highly contagious infection of the nose and throat that affected mostly young children and the elderly. At the beginning the symptoms are very much like a cold: fever, coughing, malaise. But then the tell-tale thick membrane forms over the back of the throat, which narrows and obstructs the breathing passage. Other complications can follow which can affect the heart, the nervous system or the skin, depending on the bacterial strain involved. The symptoms are caused by the toxin excreted by the bacteria.
In the family advertisement announcing her passing she is remembered as "onze lieveling" - our darling. It must have been heart rending for her mother to see her child struggling to breathe and not be able to do anything about it.
Treatment for diphtheria advanced rapidly in the 1890's, such that in 1894 the toxin was identified and an anti-toxin was developed and in the spring of 1913 Behringer developed a vaccine. But all this was too late for Cornelia.
Diphtheria is highly contagious and easily spread and so I look over the page to see if there were any other cases. I can see only one other. A five-year old boy also died on 20th November and he lived on Kwakersdwarspad, which is judging by Google maps not too far from the Nassaukade where the Blomberg family lived. Possibly the families knew each other and the children played together.
This record makes for depressing reading. Pneumonia is often cited, as is eclampsia, which are seizures mostly suffered by babies and infants. Out of a total of 68 entries, a staggering 41 are for babies and young children under the age of 10!
The one person who bucked this trend was the poor guy who probably fell into the canal and drowned - he is recorded as "opgevischt" - fished out.
References:
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