The "Intermittent Fever" Epidemic of the 1830's on the Lower Columbia River

During the 1830's the aboriginal population of the lower Columbia River region of southwestern Washington and northwestern Oregon was largely destroyed by a disease which contemporary chroniclers refer to as intermittent fever. The epidemic seems to have wreaked the greatest havoc among the Chinookan-speaking peoples living on the borders of the Columbia River from the Dalles westward to the Pacific Ocean, as well as among the Athapascan-speaking Tlatskanai of the Clatskanie Hills of coastal Oregon, and the Salish-speaking Cowlitz who lived on the lower reaches of the Cowlitz River in present Lewis and Cowlitz counties, Washington. We propose to discuss the nature and effect of the epidemic. Such a discussion would appear to be best handled under three topic headings, viz

Archaeology · Geography · Sociology · Demography · History · Migration, Health, Geopolitics, Historical Geography

• Another Look at the "Fever and Ague" of Western Oregon

  R Boyd, Robert T Boyd•Ethnohistory•1975

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