Page:Immigration and the Commissioners of Emigration of the state of New York.djvu/220

192 When the first deaths occurred, the corpses were often suffered to remain in the steerage for full twenty-four hours. In some cases the bodies were covered with vermin before they were removed.

There was no physician on board. Although we found a large medicine-chest, it was not large enough for the many cases of sickness, and was, in fact, emptied after the first two weeks of the voyage.

The captain seems to have been sadly deficient in energy and authority in matters of moment, while he punished severely small offences; as, for instance, he handcuffed a passenger for the use of insulting words; but he did not enforce the plainest rules for the health and welfare of his passengers. Instead of compelling them, from the first, to come on deck and remove the dirt, he allowed them to remain below, and to perish among their own excrements. Of the whole crew, the cook alone fell sick and died, as he slept in the steerage. Three passenger girls who were employed in the kitchen, and lived on deck, enjoyed excellent health, during the whole voyage.

The physicians above mentioned, to whose report we refer for particulars, most positively declare that it was not the Asiatic cholera, but intestinal and stomach catarrh (catarrh ventriculi et intestinorum), more or less severe, and contagious typhus, which killed the passengers. From what we saw and learned from the passengers, we likewise arrive at the conclusion that the shocking mortality on board the Leibnitz arose from want of good ventilation, cleanliness, suitable medical care, sufficient water, and wholesome food.

The present case is another instance of the mortality on board the Hamburg sailing-vessels, and increases their bad reputation. Of 917 passengers on board of two ships of the Sloman line, not less than 183 died within one month! As often as complaint has been made here, it has not induced them to make any improvement. It appears that the Hamburg authorities either did not care to examine the merits of the charges brought against their ships or that they were imposed upon by their officials. On the other hand, local interests, friendly feelings, family connections, and other personal considerations, usually prevailing in small political communities, seem to stand in the way of energetic administration of the police of emigrant ships, and of the removal of the several grievances. While the average deaths that take place in the Bremen sailing-vessels amount to one-eighth or one-fourth of the total number of emigrants forwarded, the proportion on board the Hamburg sailing-vessels is more than two per cent.!!

Thus, of 11,264 steerage-passengers who arrived, in 1865, in our port, from Hamburg, 128 died on the passage; of 14,335 who arrived in 1866, 387; and of 8,788, in 1867, not less than 199.

In our opinion, it is of great importance for the interest of humanity, in which both Europe and this country are concerned, and as a matter of political economy, that the transportation of emigrants across the Atlantic to this port should be confined to steam-vessels, as they not only convey the passengers more comfortably and land them in better health, but, in consequence of the regularity and rapidity of the passage, save an immense amount of labor for their own benefit and that of this country.

We are sorry to say that our laws afford very inadequate relief for the