Certainly nothing can be more open and explicit than the account given by Dr. Peirson, of Salem, of the cases seen by him.  In the first nineteen days of January, 1829, he had five consecutive cases of puerperal fever, every patient he attended being attacked, and the three first cases proving fatal.  In March of the same year he had two moderate cases, in June, another case, and in July, another, which proved fatal.  “Up to this period,” he remarks, “I am not informed that a single case had occurred in the practice of any other physician.  Since that period I have had no fatal case in my practice, although I have had several dangerous cases.  I have attended in all twenty cases of this disease, of which four have been fatal.  I am not aware that there has been any other case in the town of distinct puerperal peritonitis, although I am willing to admit my information may be very defective on this point.  I have been told of some ’mixed cases,’ and ‘morbid affections after delivery.’” [Footnote:  Remarks on Puerperal Fever, pp. 12 and 13.]

In the “Quarterly Summary of the Transactions of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia” [Footnote:  For May, June, and July, 1842.] may be found some most extraordinary developments respecting a series of cases occurring in the practice of a member of that body.

Dr. Condie called the attention of the Society to the prevalence, at the present time, of puerperal fever of a peculiarly insidious and malignant character.  “In the practice of one gentleman extensively engaged as an obstetrician nearly every female he has attended in confinement, during several weeks past, within the above limits” (the southern sections and neighboring districts), “had been attacked by the fever.”

“An important query presents itself, the doctor observed, in reference to the particular form of fever now prevalent.  Is it, namely, capable of being propagated by contagion, and is a physician who has been in attendance upon a case of the disease warranted in continuing, without interruption, his practice as an obstetrician?  Dr. C., although not a believer in the contagious character of many of those affections generally supposed to be propagated in this manner, has, nevertheless, become convinced by the facts that have fallen under his notice that the puerperal fever now prevailing is capable of being communicated by contagion.  How, otherwise, can be explained the very curious circumstance of the disease in one district being exclusively confined to the practice of a single physician, a Fellow of this College, extensively engaged in obstetrical practice, while no instance of the disease has occurred in the patients under the care of any other accoucheur practising within the same district; scarcely a female that has been delivered for weeks past has escaped an attack?”

Dr. Rutter, the practitioner referred to, “observed that, after the occurrence of a number of cases of the disease in his practice, he had left the city and remained absent for a week, but, on returning, no article of clothing he then wore having been used by him before, one of the very first cases of parturition he attended was followed by an attack of the fever and terminated fatally; he cannot readily, therefore, believe in the transmission of the disease from female to female in the person or clothes of the physician.”