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General => The Common Room => Topic started by: iolaus on Saturday 17 December 16 13:06 GMT (UK)
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Is there any way to calculate roughly when someone would have caught syphilis?
My gr, gr grandfather was born in 1861
married in 1883
first child born 1885 (my greatgrandmother lived till she was 56)
second child born and died 1886
third child born and died 1887
fouth child born and died 1888
fifth child born 1889 (lived till his 70s)
sixth child born and died 1891
seventh child born 1892 (lived till his 80s)
eighth child born and died 1893
ninth child born 1894 died 1895 (8 months)
tenth child born and died 1896
eleventh child born 1897 (mother died in childbirth he then died 13 months later)
in 1909 he was admitted to a lunatic asylum with GPI (tertiary syphilis)
he died 1911 of the same
I know I have heard there tends to be a pattern with children dying - but can't find it - and wondered if it could be worked out from the pattern of his childrens deaths (I'm assuming he passed it on to his wife who passed it to the children)
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GPI means General Paralysis of the Insane
If he died in 1911 I would have thought he caught it after the death of his wife as untreated it's a quick death
This is worth reading
goo.gl/cGBYSc (http://goo.gl/cGBYSc)
Also Wiki gives a very good timeline
goo.gl/sBFq3Q (http://goo.gl/sBFq3Q)
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Hi
The pattern is usually first children unaffected,next children die young,then stillbirths,then children born but dying young and then children who live but are sick before children who are ok.
Syphilis does have periods were the symptoms disappear and it looks like the suffer has recovered then he or she relapses.
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My g.g.uncle died of General paralysis of the Insane for 1 year and also pneumonia for 18 days, on 22 Aug 1902. He was married 3 times, he had one child with his first wife who died of typhus when that child was about 10 months old. He re-married 10 years later and had 2 more children, that wife died 2 years after the birth of the youngest from delerium tremens and cardiac failure. Five years later he married again and had 3 more children, the youngest was born the year before my g.g.uncle died. I've never bothered to get the birth certificate so I don't know that child's exact date of birth. I do know the 3rd wife was 47 when her husband died and she lived until 1941, dying when she was 86. None of her 3 children, nor the previous children of my g.g.uncle died and from the dates of death of his first two wives no reason to suspect there were any stillborn children.
I assume my g.g.uncle either picked up syphilis during the many years between his various wives and it lay dormant or else he didn't get it until after the birth of his last child. Either way seems a bit odd.
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General Paralysis of the Insane can occur up to 25 years after being infected, so it is possible that the first child who died in 1886 could have had congenital syphilis. Death certificates should of course confirm or otherwise. Could prove expensive though.
Jan
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GPI means General Paralysis of the Insane
If he died in 1911 I would have thought he caught it after the death of his wife as untreated it's a quick death
This is worth reading
goo.gl/cGBYSc (http://goo.gl/cGBYSc)
Also Wiki gives a very good timeline
goo.gl/sBFq3Q (http://goo.gl/sBFq3Q)
Sorry but this is incorrect.
Syphilis has 3 active stages, plus a latent stage during which time the infection is dormant. The primary stage is the chancre -- the painless ulcer which may go unnoticed if it's not in an area that sees the light of day much. That comes up anything up to 3 months after contact, and is infectious.
The secondary phase is very infectious; it's when the bacterium spreads around the body I foret how quickly that phase can begin but it's usually a few weeks/months after the primary chancre heals. I've seen people with active secondary syphilis a year after their first contact.
The bacterium then lies dormant unless and until tertiary syphilis can develop. This affects the heart or the central nervous system (or if you're particularly unlucky, both!) In the central nervous system, it can cause tabes dorsalis, which destroys the nerves to the feet producing numbness and a classical gait; and it can cause GPI, which was not a paralysis at all -- think of it more like a type of advanced dementia. Tertiary syphilis can rear its head anything up to 30 years after the primary infection.
So OP, I think that it's quite likely that he picked up the infection some time around the time that he married (and remember, he could have caught it from your gt-grannie rather than vice versa).
The list of child deaths is heartbreaking and even more so when you remember that it wasn't that uncommon, but remember that children died of many more things than congenital syphilis :-\ and in fact it's not unusual at all for children to survive congenital syphilis and live into adulthood (they cannot pass the infection on though).
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BTW, according to the divorce papers, my gt-grandmother almost certainly caught syphilis from her erring husband whilst she was pregnant. However, my grannie had no signs of congenital syphilis and in fact lived very healthily until well into her 90s.
So syphilis can kill unborn or newly born babies - but it often doesn't.
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Interesting subject.
My husband has two brothers in his tree, both married, neither had children. I had often wondered why? Both had been in the army, both had syphillis, one was discharged because of it. I have to assume that this was the reason for no children and hence the end of that family line.
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Hi,
I have some questions.
I have a female born in 3rd Qtr of 1866 who married in October 1893. This female died age 30 in February 1897. Death certificate from the Lunatic Asylum, Wells, gives cause of death as General Paralysis of the Insane more than 2 years.
Is this definitely tertiary syphilis?
If so, would the infection have been likely caught prior to her marriage in 1893?
Thank you in advance for any information
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You have her marrying after her death
According to wkipedia (not always accurate I know) it is only caused by syphilis and says 10-30 years after infection https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_paresis_of_the_insane
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Post now modified with correct date of decease.
Thanks for pointing out my error iolaus.
Ray
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My great grandfather was admitted with it in 1904. He was said to be violent, and was admitted on an Emergency Certificate, whatever that means. Looks like it had driven him mad and he'd become dangerous. He lived another 13 years before dying in the hospital in 1917.
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I would say she had it before her marriage
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On the 1901 census my g.grandfather a butcher with his own shop was living with his 3rd wife and his 5 children from that and his previous 2 marriages. In August 1902 he was found wandering and, originally, it was thought he was a labourer, he was found to be a tall, well nourished but demented man. Apparently, he'd had a previous attack some 8 years previously which would have been between his 2nd and 3rd marriage. So he married his 3rd wife whilst already infected but it must have been dormant then as he had 3 perfectly healthy children with his 3rd wife.
It all seems very sad to me, his first wife dies after only 20 months of marriage leaving him with a baby to look after, yet he doesn't marry for another 10 years. That wife died 4 years later (from delerium tremens so not a very good wife) and left him with another 2 children to look after. At some stage after that wife's death he left Manchester (leaving his 3 children with his mother) and went to Yorkshire where the family originally came from. It seems it was in Yorkshire that he became infected, but it was also where he met his 3rd wife. She was 41 but still managed to give him 3 more children, but just as he must have thought he was settled, his past came back to haunt him and kill him.
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I was once told that the phrase about the sins of fathers being revisited on their children refers to syphilis. I don't know if that's true!
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Interesting conversation. I have one in my family tree too. All his children lived. So I wonder if he caught Syphilis after his wife's last child or she stopped having children because he caught it. It killed him but she died 10 years later of a heart attack.
Would be interesting to look at his childrens families
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Hello
I have a man Richard Davies dying in Staffordshire Asylum near Burntwood in the 1870's,his son is one of the staff,as his son is law who also dies of syphilis and his grandson dies there in 1914 William Smith also with syphillis
It seems the whole family revolved around the Asylum either as a patient or as a warder.
So in that case it's not just passed on to the sons but also grandsons.
Ciderdrinker
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Lizzie,
My G grandfather also lived in Manchester. He was in Ancoats Hospital in 1901, and then Cheadle in 1903.
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She was 41 but still managed to give him 3 more children, but just as he must have thought he was settled, his past came back to haunt him and kill him.
Turns out she wasn't 41 at all when she married in 1996 she was only 32, so I've no idea why she would give a much older age on the census after her marriage.
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doddsie4 - I have lots of ancestors who lived in Manchester up to and including my parents. A nephew of the g.uncle who died in Prestwich Hospital of General Paralysis of the Insane also ended up in Prestwich Asylum with what was probably schizophrenia.
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She was 41 but still managed to give him 3 more children, but just as he must have thought he was settled, his past came back to haunt him and kill him.
Turns out she wasn't 41 at all when she married in 1996 she was only 32, so I've no idea why she would give a much older age on the census after her marriage.
It may have been to make their ages appear closer and less unusual
That said my grandmother was convinced she was a good ten years older than she actually was before she died
Also who filled in the form? If it wasn't her it may have been her husband, or an older child, who guessed and got it wrong
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I don't know who filled in the form (1901 census), I would think both she and her husband could write.
My paternal g.gran only had her age on census correct up to the age of 18, then she started losing years - even whilst married to her first husband who was about 5 years older than her. By the time she was with my g.grandfather she had "lost" about 9 years and she must have thought she'd fooled him by having a baby at 51, but no on her death certificate of which he was the informant he gave her correct age. ::)
Gone off topic now.
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It is an interesting issue. Syphilis seems to carry a much more negative impression than any other bacterial infection and we must be careful how we divulge the information.
Case in point, I was doing some genealogical work for a client searching for a lost set of step-kin.
Searching army records I found that the Attestation Papers of his ggfather showed that he was hospitalized twice for syph, but then went on to sire a number of children with no known problems. My client was NOT amused.
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Syphilis seems to carry a much more negative impression than any other bacterial infection and we must be careful how we divulge the information.
People today should not be so sensitive about their ancestors. The difference between their ancestors and people today is that there are ways of preventing syphilis and if anyone is unlucky enough to get it, it can be treated without detriment to the sufferer or his family. I'm sure people today are just as, if not more, promiscuous than years ago, they have more opportunity for a start and most of them don't think it wrong to have many sexual partners before marriage.
Anyone who is offended by something that happened to an ancestor perhaps shouldn't be researching (or getting someone else to research) their family history.
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I agree completely with LizzieW. Syphilis was an unfortunate fact of life for many of our ancestors, as TB was (another disease which I was taught used to be considered "shameful").
I think that, before anyone knew about microbes, illnesses could be seen as a judgement; and syphilis was a judgement on matters sexual, and we all know how prurient some people can be about that!
It would be nice to think that with better knowledge, we could shed these attitudes. An ancestor had syphilis? That meant they were infected by having sex with another sufferer (and remember not all sex is consensual). And guess what? If they'd never had sex, they would never have had any descendants and couldn't be your ancestor!!
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Here's an interesting article about the history of syphilis:
http://www.rootschat.com/links/01j47/
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Children born to parent(s) with syphilis could show the proof in their teeth. The teeth of the child could have characteristic malformations.
It would be difficult to hide the fact if some of the children had their teeth malformed.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congenital_syphilis
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I've not paid much attention to syphilis until now, as I have found some WW1 medical records for an ancestor's brother. He received a pension for a few years after discharge.
It's a little unclear what the dates are referring to but in a report written in 1918 it states he had had syphilis 45 years ago. I have his date of birth as 1864 but the army record says 1860. Either way, if it was 45 years ago he wasn't a teenager yet.
So, I'm left wondering whether he was born with it or whether it wasn't 45 years ago.
His main symptoms causing his medical discharge are shortness of breath and palpitations. His heart sounds are somewhat irregular. But he is almost 50. One of his records says his disability is Arterial Sclerosis due to O.M.S. After a few years he is declared well again and his pension is stopped.
What sort of things might provide clues as to when he was infected please?
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Have you considered the effects of chlorine or mustard gas? My uncle was severely debilitated from mustard gas warfare when he returned to his parents farm in 1919. It was 1922 before he was sufficiently recovered to begin working on the farm.
Alex
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Thanks Alex.
He was in the Labour Company of the Royal Fusliers and was in England, so unlikely to have been exposed to gas.
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I have someone in the family dying in 1906 from general paralysis 3 years. His army records indicate that he caught syphilis when he was about 18 years old, being hospitalised several times with primary and secondary symptoms. He married in his late twenties and had three children quickly; the period of no children after that corresponds with his period of illness. His wife lived into her sixties with no apparent sign of the illness and all three children likewise lived into old age with no sign that they suffered affects of this illness. I guess they must have been born during a period of dormancy and this was the cause that all of them escaped this infection.
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It's a little unclear what the dates are referring to but in a report written in 1918 it states he had had syphilis 45 years ago. I have his date of birth as 1864 but the army record says 1860. Either way, if it was 45 years ago he wasn't a teenager yet.
So, I'm left wondering whether he was born with it or whether it wasn't 45 years ago.
I wonder if instead of 45 years ago it's written after he (or someone) SAID four to five years ago and it was heard as 45 and written as such
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I have ancestor who may be a candidate for syphilis (it didn't occur to me before)
He was born 1822, married 1843, died 6 moths later of 'Paralysis' and a posthumous son was born 3 months later.
The son seems to have escaped, he lived until at least 1901 married and had 5 children.
The young widow lived to be 77.
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I wonder if instead of 45 years ago it's written after he (or someone) SAID four to five years ago and it was heard as 45 and written as such
That could be it. I don't think the syphilis was considered medically relevant to his symptoms as it is mentioned just the once in this document and not in his other military documents.
What does make me wonder though is that when he was in his twenties his mother died of paralysis and pneumonia in an asylum. She'd been there for about a decade.
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My great great grandfather died of paralytica in Menston hospital in 1927. I've got his notes from the hospital, and everything seems to tally up with him having syphilis. What I'm wondering is how he's likely to have caught it, in people's opinions. He was 50 when he died, had been married since 1903, had three children who all reached adulthood (with no children dying or still births) and his wife didn't die for another 18 years. Would he have got it from playing around, or maybe from his wife?
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It's one of those diseases which can lie dormant for years, so he may have caught it in his pre-marriage days
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It's one of those diseases which can lie dormant for years, so he may have caught it in his pre-marriage days
would his wife not have caught it from him, or his kids been given it at birth? It's not a disease I've read much on.
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Hello
I have a man Richard Davies dying in Staffordshire Asylum near Burntwood in the 1870's,his son is one of the staff,as his son is law who also dies of syphilis and his grandson dies there in 1914 William Smith also with syphillis
It seems the whole family revolved around the Asylum either as a patient or as a warder.
So in that case it's not just passed on to the sons but also grandsons.
Ciderdrinker
No, syphilis cannot be handed down through subsequent generations like this. Children can be infected if the mother has active syphilis during pregnancy, but these infected children are NOT infectious and won’t pass it on to anyone else.
Of course, in due course the next generation could catch syphilis as an std independently of their parents!
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My great great grandfather died of paralytica in Menston hospital in 1927. I've got his notes from the hospital, and everything seems to tally up with him having syphilis. What I'm wondering is how he's likely to have caught it, in people's opinions. He was 50 when he died, had been married since 1903, had three children who all reached adulthood (with no children dying or still births) and his wife didn't die for another 18 years. Would he have got it from playing around, or maybe from his wife?
Syphilis is a sexually transmitted disease. One person catches it from another. You’ll never know who he caught it from.
I really don’t like the phrase “Playing around”. Perhaps one or both partners had other premarital or extra marital partners. What’s new?
But not all sex is consensual. Even some “consensual” sex is really coercion - financial need, violent partner, grooming etc etc. People sometimes comment on STIs as though there is blame to be attached, and that is a barrier even nowadays to some people (especially vulnerable people) seeking treatment.
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It's one of those diseases which can lie dormant for years, so he may have caught it in his pre-marriage days
would his wife not have caught it from him, or his kids been given it at birth? It's not a disease I've read much on.
Read back through the thread. Syphilis is only infectious at certain parts of the disease cycle.
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Venereal diseases became such a problem that special Lock hospitals, or Lock wards attached to main hospitals were opened for the treatment of such. These were well used in Naval and Garrison towns where prostitution was rife.
Interesting reading can be found here.
https://archive.org/stream/lockhospitalsloc00lown#page/n10/mode/1up
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Genealogical gynaecology.
Martin
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Well no - men get syphilis too, and in greater numbers than women!
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My great great grandfather died of paralytica in Menston hospital in 1927. I've got his notes from the hospital, and everything seems to tally up with him having syphilis. What I'm wondering is how he's likely to have caught it, in people's opinions. He was 50 when he died, had been married since 1903, had three children who all reached adulthood (with no children dying or still births) and his wife didn't die for another 18 years. Would he have got it from playing around, or maybe from his wife?
Syphilis is a sexually transmitted disease. One person catches it from another. You’ll never know who he caught it from.
I really don’t like the phrase “Playing around”. Perhaps one or both partners had other premarital or extra marital partners. What’s new?
But not all sex is consensual. Even some “consensual” sex is really coercion - financial need, violent partner, grooming etc etc. People sometimes comment on STIs as though there is blame to be attached, and that is a barrier even nowadays to some people (especially vulnerable people) seeking treatment.
Not always, as Boris' great great etc granny found out - you can catch it from touch, i.e. nurses and physicians got it
http://www.theweek.co.uk/91211/swiss-church-mummy-is-boris-johnson-s-ancestor (http://www.theweek.co.uk/91211/swiss-church-mummy-is-boris-johnson-s-ancestor)
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Just to add -- my Gt Grandfather died of 'Paralysis' in 1896 in the Lancashire Asylum in Whittingham, Preston.
That was shock enough to find he died in the Asylum -- but when I discovered that the cause of his death ---- 'Paralysis' meant 'Paralysis of the Insane' - it was an even bigger shock. He came from a staunch Methodist family and already had several children at the time of admission.
I obtained copies of his papers from Lancashire Archives - and the Doctor who recommended admission had written all the fanciful statements my Gt Grandfather was coming out with -- he had a really good job on a high wage (completely incorrect) -- he had travelled to various parts of the world in hours (untrue) -- etc etc.
Reading up afterwards I discovered that many people suffering this way came out with similar statements.
On these admission papers, a relative stated that my Gt Grandfather had completely changed 2 years previously -- hence in about 1892. After 2 years in the Asylum he died aged 46.
Seems therefore that he lasted 4 years after either contracting the disease of Syphilis - or the condition worsening.
I don't think the family knew of the real cause of his 'insanity' -- he was brought home for burial and when his wife died some years later she was buried in the same grave.
In addition -- his son, my grandfather -- named MY father after my Gt Grandfather. I hardly think he would have done that had he really known the cause of HIS father's condition.
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My late OH was in the forces in the 1950s at a time when every public toilet had a warning notice about Venereal Disease. At the time members of the Forces were issued with condoms; other ranks were issued with what they described as "wellington boots" and officers issued with gossamer condoms.
If one of HM forces caught a venereal disease then lower ranks records would state caught from visiting a brothel, etc., but officers only caught the disease from toilet seats.
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Not always, as Boris' great great etc granny found out - you can catch it from touch, i.e. nurses and physicians got it
Allegedly! Because we all know that the upper social classes would never get something like this from the more, shall we say "traditional" route, hey?! ::)
But one other thing to remember, in all seriousness, is that not all cases of "syphilis" were actually that. It was a common condition, and I'm sure the doctors were skilled at spotting common problems - but there was no understanding of many other diseases that we know about now, and so I''m sure that some of the folk who had a diagnosis of syphilis may well have been suffering from other psychiatric or neurological problems. The bacterium which causes it wasn't discovered until 1905; the blood tests that we now use to diagnose it came later.
(I think the same about TB by the way - everyone knew it made you lose weight and cough up blood. Consequently such symptoms were attributed to TB and that may well have been correct a lot of the time. But when did you ever see a Victorian death certificate with "lung cancer" on?)
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Not always, as Boris' great great etc granny found out - you can catch it from touch, i.e. nurses and physicians got it
Allegedly! Because we all know that the upper social classes would never get something like this from the more, shall we say "traditional" route, hey?! ::)
But one other thing to remember, in all seriousness, is that not all cases of "syphilis" were actually that. It was a common condition, and I'm sure the doctors were skilled at spotting common problems - but there was no understanding of many other diseases that we know about now, and so I''m sure that some of the folk who had a diagnosis of syphilis may well have been suffering from other psychiatric or neurological problems. The bacterium which causes it wasn't discovered until 1905; the blood tests that we now use to diagnose it came later.
(I think the same about TB by the way - everyone knew it made you lose weight and cough up blood. Consequently such symptoms were attributed to TB and that may well have been correct a lot of the time. But when did you ever see a Victorian death certificate with "lung cancer" on?)
It seems like any contact with the mucous membranes of an infected person would put another person at high risk of catching it, so any nurse washing an incapable person would be greatly at risk, especially when they wouldn't have understood the need for extreme hygiene precautions in those days.
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---- but only during the infectious phase, and that doesn't include GPI
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---- but only during the infectious phase, and that doesn't include GPI
So do syphilitic people only show signs of fever, sickness or insanity after the infectious period ends?
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GPI is tertiary syphilis and is often decades after the infectious part
While not impossible it's quite hard to catch blood borne viruses through exposure to the mucus membranes - even when you get splashed in the face - eyes and mouth
- can't remember the exact figures but I remember being told them after it happened to me and needed to have blood tests done and beign surprised at exactly how low it was - different figures for each disease
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This Forum is quite amazing -- we get medical lessons as well as Family History tips.
The other week I was involved in a topic and learnt how to make some sort of Scottish cake. (Can't remember it's name now -- but it sounded delicious.)
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My late OH was in the forces in the 1950s at a time when every public toilet had a warning notice about Venereal Disease. At the time members of the Forces were issued with condoms; other ranks were issued with what they described as "wellington boots" and officers issued with gossamer condoms.
If one of HM forces caught a venereal disease then lower ranks records would state caught from visiting a brothel, etc., but officers only caught the disease from toilet seats.
My dad was in the Navy in WW2. The sailors were told that the only people allowed to catch VD from a toilet seat were Winston Churchill and the Archbishop of Canterbury.
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The Amy regarded venereal diseases as self inflicted injury.