Hidden Terrors: The Scourge of Cholera in Jackson's America

Drawing on accounts of ordinary Americans, Hidden Terrors offers the first comprehensive history of the enigmatic illness behind the 1830s cholera pandemic--and its profound consequences for the nation. From 1832 to 1836, cholera erupted across US cities as well as in small towns, rural farms, prisons, and plantations.Its victims experienced ghastly symptoms--vomiting, explosive diarrhea, painful spasms, turning blue, and collapsing into comas--and often perished within hours of first becoming sick.They frequently woke up healthy, began to feel ill by nightfall, and did not live to see another day.Cholera killed people much more quickly than other diseases with which Americans were familiar, and its causes would not be discovered until the later development of bacteriology.It afflicted rich and poor, people of every race, religion, and region.As Hidden Terrors reveals, many powerful people in the 1830s wanted their contemporaries to understand cholera as anything but a frightful and un