VD

[Jib]

I have heard that they found a metallic injector amid the wreckage of the Queen Ann that was most likely used for the cure of VD with mercury. I have also heard tell that iodine can be used to cure such 'hurts'. Anyone (Mission?) know if this works.

I suppose the average seaman was exposed to all kinds of disease amid the stews of the various ports.

[Sjöröveren]

I can't attest to its efficacy, but I do know that injecting mercury or mercuric compounds directly into the peccant member (that would be Mr. Johnson) via the urethra was a very common treatment. Mercuric compounds were used in a wide variety of medicines, before the profound brain damage it causes was known. They used it because it seemed to improve symptoms. Since germ theory didn't come along until the last half of the 19th century, no one truly understood the true cause of disease. Therefore, any treatment which seemed to make your symptoms improve or disappear was considered to be a cure. Blue ointment (mercury blended into hog's lard) was another common treatment for both gonorrhea and syphilis. It was rubbed onto the patient's gums for a week or so, producing prodigious salivation. The week-long treatment gave rise to the old adage "one night on Venus, one week on Mercury."

[Jib]

Here lies another question: I have heard the rumor that these socially transmitted diseases are/ were native to the New World (seem to recall a tale that Columbus was 'gifted' with either gonorrhea or syphilis by the native americans). However I have also heard that the name "syphilis" is Greek and described a shepherd who had the infliction dating back to a much earlier time period.

[Matty Bottles]

Here lies another question: I have heard the rumor that these socially transmitted diseases are/ were native to the New World (seem to recall a tale that Columbus was 'gifted' with either gonorrhea or syphilis by the native americans). However I have also heard that the name "syphilis" is Greek and described a shepherd who had the infliction dating back to a much earlier time period.

The name is from 1530.

[Cheeky Actress]

Jib/Bloody Jack Madd/Sjöröveren

Perhaps this link will be helpful:

Bones rewrite syphilis history - Syphilis in the UK

[Guest]

They used it because it seemed to improve symptoms

I can't remember much from the VD class we had to go through in the Army, but basically, untreated, (I can't remember if it was syphilis or gonorrhea) the symptoms went away after awhile anyway.... The symptoms, not the disease....

So using mercury, would appear to have solved the problem.....(not that it did...)

[Jib]

Did not Al Capone die from VD?

[Matty Bottles]

Did not Al Capone die from VD?

Yep. Tertiary Syphillis.

[Mission]

The syringe is real. I'm certain I've posted this charming thing before:

It's a syringe for injecting things like mercury into the male member. I have one in my kit, but it has a straight "needle." Kinda' makes you squirm, doesn't it?

Iodine? I've never read that anywhere. I have read about the use of Guiac.

“Guiac was made from the bark of a tree that was first introduced into Spain in the year 1508 from the West Indian island of Hispaniola. In its original habitat, the bark of the guiac was used by the natives for treating their own cases of syphilis –it caused violent seating, they found, and was sometimes effective. By the middle of the seventeenth century the use of guiac had become so fashionable in Europe that mercury, temporarily, went out of favour with the medical profession. (In 1685 the governors of London’s St. Thomas’s Hospital resolved that ‘the ancient guiacum diet drink and no other is to be given to patients with the foule disease, or French pox, unless the physicians order other…’) Then, as the seventeenth century ended, mercury entirely regained its popularity with the medical profession, and was not to lose its prime importance until long after the eighteenth century was over. The crude students’ jest- ‘A moment with Venus may mean a lifetime with Mercury’- has only quite recently lost its significance.” (I forgot to copy the credit for this one and there are now dozens of references in my notes so I'm not exactly sure where I got this. Sorry about that.)

From Woodes Rogers:

“[1709, the city of Guiaquil] The River is large, receives several others, has many Villages and Farm Houses on its Banks, with abundance of Mangroves and Sarsaparilla, which impregnates its Water, and makes it good against the French Pox but in the Time of Floods it is unwholesome, because of the poisonous Roots and Plants wash’d down from the Mountains.” (Rogers, A Cruizing Voyage Round the World, p. 102)

For the most part, I agree with what Sjovern said. Ironically, nature did the same thing as Mercury; Syphilis has three stages and in going from stage 1 to 2 there is a period of remission. This period is often what the Mercury was credited with 'curing'. Of course, no one seems to be willing to commit to whether it did any good or not since the cure was as bad as the disease.

One further fun, footnoted thought on Mercury and VD:

"Noses were not the only facial casualties of syphilis: teeth would also decay as the disease progressed, especially if treatment was sought in the form of mercury pills – contributing to the ‘equation of loose teeth with loose morals’.” (Emily Cockayne, Hubbub: Filth, Noise, and Stench in England, 1600-1770, p. 30-1)

[Jib]

Yes indeed that "injector" makes me shiver! One of my room mates in college got some "bad love" and had to take a trip to health services. He spoke of the horror of a very large Q-tip and how it was used to swab him out.

I suppose the cure might not be much better today? A little punishment for the sin perhaps?

[Black Anne]

*shivers*

Definitely,feel bad for the poor gents that had to have that treatment! (the metal syringe)

[Jib]

I'm thinking it was harder to treat the ladies....

[Mission]

I'm thinking it was harder to treat the ladies....

I haven't actually read anything about treating them. I've read secondary sources that talk about finding remains of women who had venereal diseases, but so far that's been all. Of course (without meaning to be indelicate), the doctor would have had much easier access to the affected area, so I would actually think it would have been easier. Still, the focus of the primary literature I've read is on the men. If I find something else, I'll report back.