About the first of December, 1831, I entered into an agreement in Philadelphia with a large contractor, who had engaged to open a canal from the city of New Orleans to Lake Ponekertrain. He had hired about one hundred and fifty men, and chartered a brig to carry them to New Orleans. We sailed about the sixth of December, and made our passage out in twenty days. The captain of the brig was a young man who was but little acquainted with that coast. As he found that I was more experienced than himself, he was very civil to me. I gave him A few months after they grew so riotous that the City Guards had to be called out to suppress them, when they were discharged by the company, and I was released from my contract. After they had spent all their wages they returned to their work and were very orderly. This canal is only six and a half miles long, and eight feet deep, but has added greatly to the wealth of the city. There was an old canal, formed mostly by nature, running nearly parallel At Covington I found a number of steam sawmills, and abundance of sawed timber and boards, a few hotels, boarding houses, stores, and a printing office and several dwelling houses. This place is considered a healthy resort in the sickly season. Many small vessels find employment here in transporting lumber, brick, and cotton. We soon took in a cargo of lumber and returned to New Orleans, where we discharged it; when I entered on board of another schooner and made a trip to Mobile, which I found a very handsome city. The houses are built in modern style, the place has in it a number of large elegant hotels and stores, and many handsome streets. I was much annoyed with musquittoes while we remained in port, but soon left for New Orleans, where we landed after a passage of A number of seamen remain here a long time after they are restored to health, without receiving a discharge from the doctor, who is making fifty cents per day, or more, for their board. These men leave the hospital in the morning in pursuit of work, which they generally find, purchase their dinners at eating houses, and return to the hospital at night, where they receive their small rations and lodgings, the keeper pocketing his seventy-five cents per day from government during their stay here. They are left to decide for themselves when it is best to be well. In consequence of this, many of the sick in the hospital are crowded out of comfortable lodgings. It will easily be seen that the greatest part of the tax collected from the hard earnings of seamen is used to enrich political favorites. I remained in this establishment about sixty days, during that time the yellow fever raged there violently, causing a number of deaths in the house. Many patients were brought there who were unable to walk or stand on their feet, and were most of them soon cured. After I left the hospital I found some light employment for a few days, when I agreed to take another trip across the lake. Previous to my going on board of the vessel I returned to the hospital, where I had left some of my clothing, took with me such as I wanted, and left some of my heavy articles in charge of a sailor named Daniel Dunn, with whom I had formed a short acquaintance in the hospital, and proceeded over the lake, where we remained a few days, and then returned to the city. On my return I found the cholera had broken out and was raging to such an alarming degree that the inhabitants were terror-struck. The returns of deaths were over two hundred per day. Laborers wages for digging in the church burying ground was seven dollars per day. Not being able to procure laborers sufficient to dig single graves, they dug canals about one hundred rods in length, of sufficient depth to place three coffins one above the other, the water in the bottom of it being about eighteen inches deep. All graves dug in New Orleans are half filled with water before the coffins are deposited in them. The morning after my return I proceeded to the hospital to see after my clothing. On visiting the building I was much surprised on walking through many of the rooms without seeing a living soul. In the back yard I found eight or ten dead bodies laying on the ground in a putrid state. I then searched the upper stories, and in a room called the small-pox ward, I found one dead body laying on a bed covered with a woollen blanket, in a very putrid state, the offensive gas rising through the blanket like a dense fog. Some few were still alive, but suffering for want of attendance. On descending the stairs I met the assistant physician of the hospital, and asked him the cause of this great neglect of the few who were still living. He told me that Doctor M'Farlane, the proprietor, was very sick, and that the cook, steward, washer woman, and the black man who conveyed the corpses to the grave, were all dead, and that they could not procure any assistance. He asked me if I would try to hire some help for him. I told him that I would use my best exertions to procure him some, but if I could not obtain any I would assist him myself. I then left him and returned to my lodgings. Just before I left my boarding house to visit the hospital I heard one of the boarders, a journeyman hatter, who had been on a drunken frolic for some days, say that he had spent all his money and had not enough left to get his bitters that morning. Knowing that the want of money in such circumstances stimulate men to undertake unpleasant jobs sooner About this time three or four carts arrived at the door, when we were requested to assist in carrying out the few sick persons that remained in the building, which we found to be only sixteen, being all that were left alive out of about sixty inmates that I left there some ten days before. The doctor showed us a number of rough boxes, called coffins, which were placed in the back yard. Many of them were made very wide, that they might hold two dead bodies. He requested us to harness up a poor old half-starved horse, which we found on the premises. After a long search we found the old harness scattered about the yard, which we gathered up, both of us being ignorant of the way of putting it together. After a long consultation we placed it on the horse's back, which was so sore that he trembled badly during the operation. After we had rigged him and the cart, we agreed to take on one of the double coffins for the first load. We opened one of them and placed a large body in it, and then hunted for a small We now returned to the hospital and took in two more bodies, enclosing them in single coffins. This time we found a number of chickens busily employed in the hospital yard picking maggots out of the eyes and ears of the putrid bodies laying on the ground in the yard. The hatter and myself had a long consultation about handling the putrid carcases, and agreed between ourselves to pick out the soundest of them first. We noticed some cartmen drawing a number of loads of wood and depositing them on a vacant lot of ground near the hospital. A report was circulated that the Mayor of the city had ordered the building to be burned down that night. We proceeded back to the grave-yard, where we met with a more peaceable reception. On our return we found the fowls still busily engaged on the dead bodies, which had become more putrid during our short absence. This was one of the most unpleasant scenes I ever witnessed. We stopped on our way and took some refreshments, and then conveyed two more loads to the burying ground, carrying two at each load. About sunset we unharnessed our old horse and put him in his place. Having satisfied our employer we took our discharge. We agreed between ourselves to stop at the hospital a short time and see what disposal was to be made of the remaining dead bodies. Soon after sunset some eight or ten men made their appearance and took up an old door and bored one or two holes through it, and putting a rope through On viewing the place, while passing it the next morning, I could not discover a particle of bone larger than a man's finger-nail left. The Cholera raged in New Orleans to a frightful degree for some months after; the average number of deaths in the city was two hundred per day for several weeks. Soon after this I made a trip in a little schooner to St. Marks, and a small port called Magnolia, in West Florida, and then returned to the city, where I remained about two months, when I found employment as a mate on board of a brig called the Commodore Barry, bound to New-York, where I was to receive my wages and be discharged. We performed our passage home without meeting with any occurrence worth recording. New Orleans is one of the most immoral cities I ever visited. All kinds of amusement are indulged |