Pandemics then and now

Fairfax George Bullock 1900-1985

Fairfax George Bullock, my great-grandfather, wrote the story of his life in 1979, recounting his various memories. He was born in 1900 and when he turned 18, he was conscripted into the army. It was February 1918 and the end of the first world war was just a few months away. Luckily, he never actually had to serve on the front line. But there was a tragic episode during his time in the army and that was his encounter with the Spanish flu epidemic. 

This really struck me as we’ve just come through our own pandemic and I was left reflecting on the differences there would have been in our respective experiences. 

Below is a quote from the memoir. At this point in the narrative, he’d been in training in Rugeley, and now they’ve moved back up north to Guisborough. 

However, when we arrived at Guisborough, it was like being in a different world, & all the chaps remarked about it. There were lots of trees & hedges, which were just opening into leaf whereas Rugeley Camp was a very desolate sort of place, full of nothingness. I suppose other parts of Staffordshire were alright & as good as any other place, but I am just talking about where the camp was. I never left the camp very much the weather was too bad, but I was in Rugeley once & it was right enough in there. Well, now let’s get back to Guisborough. There was a full Brigade of men stationed there under canvas. Two Battalions of the Northumberland Fusiliers (which I was in) & two of the Durham Light Infantry. The two large fields which the camp took up, belonged to Lord Guisborough & the iron railings on both sides of the main drive, from the road, in between the two fields, to the Hall, had to be taken up, in order that the military transport could move about more freely. They had all to be put back again of course, when the Army finished with it. It was a very pleasant place to be & we were there all summer. However, we had a Calamity there, for it was during that summer (& a nice one weatherwise) that the gigantic Flu Epidemic spread all over England & our camp got its share. Every Hospital & any other place that could help in that direction, was full to overflowing & the result of that was, that we had to make part of our field into a hospital for our flu victims, by just railing it round, but they were just in tents. I don't know how many men were lost in the Brigade, but they were carrying out the dead one every day & putting more victims of it, in their place. I know that the last time our Company were called out on parade there were only six men & the Captain, the commander of a Company, said, that we had to spend our time clearing the camp up & that is what we did for weeks. Now we had to go round (inside the railings) to pick papers up but we didn't get it. All the six of us were still there when the Epidemic passed over & none had had it. I don't know why.

The scale of death seems enormous to me, considering these are all meant to be relatively healthy young people. I’m not sure exactly how many would be in a company, but I’ve read it would be around 100-250. For there only to be 6 left must have been devastating. 

This blog post from the LSE  examines the impact of the flu pandemic at that time. Martin Bayley also points out that there was no memorialisation of the dead of this epidemic.

The virus proved disproportionately deadly to adults between the ages of 25-34, and women in particular. Whilst the gender ratios were overlooked, contemporary discourse privileged the deaths of the young, with the death of children understandably marked out as particularly tragic. Other communities also received disproportionate coverage and ‘heroisation’ including serving police officers, health workers, and soldiers.  

This blog post has a nice overview. If we thought the response to the Covid pandemic was poor, that’s nothing as to the response of government in 1918. To be fair, there was not as much understanding or knowledge of how viruses work and how to treat them. And with the war, presumably it was felt that keeping up morale was more important. Either way, there wasn't the consciousness of living through a pandemic or epidemic like we had just recently. People's experiences weren't as widely reported on or shared. And maybe the attitudes towards disease were different. This was a pre-antibiotic, pre-NHS age where the idea you could pop down to your GP, for free, and get price capped treatments for your ailments would be really radical. But a lot of people died. I can't help but think that if it were me, I'd be highly disturbed by being surrounded by so much death like that.