Essay by Dr. Charles T. Jackson, of Boston, Massachusetts : lead pipes used as conduits for drinking water : contrasted with pure block tin pipes : brief history of lead diseases, New-York, April, 1852.

  • Jackson, Charles T. (Charles Thomas), 1805-1880.
Date:
1852
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Essay by Dr. Charles T. Jackson, of Boston, Massachusetts : lead pipes used as conduits for drinking water : contrasted with pure block tin pipes : brief history of lead diseases, New-York, April, 1852. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    physician, and was not cured, but gradually became very much emaciated and died in the course of the year, of lead poison. I published at the time an account of these cases in the Boston Medical Magazine. The lead in this sugar was believed to have originated from the use of lead-lined vats used to contain the acid syrup of sugar cane in Barbadoes, The sugar was smuggled from the adjoining British Province of New Brunswick, and I subsequently learned that upwards of one hundred indi- viduals had suffered injurious effects upon their health by the use of sugar from the lot which had been brought to Calais. The perfectly even diffusion of the lead, in all the samples of sugar, proved that it must have been introduced in the process of manufacture in the state of solution, and that it was not an accidental mechanical mix- ture. The small portion taken daily of this sugar in tea and coffee, pro- bably not more than four or five teaspoons-ful per day, shows how powerful is this poison, even when taken in small quantities at a time. In 1836 I had occasion to analyze some water that was brought to me from New Bedford, and which had been drawn by a lead suction pipe from a well. From the small quantity, five thousand grains weight, of this water, I extracted a distinct globule of metallic lead. This lead was in the water in the condition of some soluble salt, or of oxide. In 1838 I had occasion to analyze some well water from a leaden pipe, for an eminent physician of Boston, and found 0.6 grain of oxide of lead in a gallon of the water. In 1843 this water was again analyzed by me, and I found 0.18 grain of oxide of lead in a gallon of the water, and discovered, by enquiry, that two of the physicians of that institution were suffering obviously from lead colic and partial paralysis. I directed the use of sulphuric and lemonade, and sulphate of morphia, with occasional doses of Epsom salts, and learned afterwards that the disorder had been removed. The lead pipe was taken up, by my advice, and one of cast iron substituted, and there has been no trouble from the water since. The same year I discovered lead in another speciman of water from a lead suction pipe in Boston. I analyzed a portion of the blackened lungs of a patient who died of lead colic and paralysis, at the Massachusetts General Hospital, and found in eight hundred grains of the dried lung, globules of lead, by the usual pro- cess of reduction. I suppose the man had been a house painter, but I do not know the history of his case. In 1844 I detected lead in water from a lead suction pipe in Brooklyn; and soon after in water drawn through a lead pipe in the town of Dedham. In 1846 I discovered lead in water from a suction pipe of lead in Rox- bury ; and in water from a lead suction pipe in Lynde-Street. I obtained 0.72 grain of oxide of lead from the gallon. In 1847 I found in water pumped through a leaden tube, in Beacon- Street, 0.56 grain of lead per gallon of the water. The same year I detected 0.56 grain of oxide of lead in a gallon of water, from a lead pipe in Dedham. A gentleman from Woburn, Mass., called upon me that year, and stated that his family, particularly the children, had suffered much from pain in their bowels, resembling, from his description, lead colic; and that the