The Confederate Yellow Fever Conspiracy: The Germ Warfare Plot of Luke Pryor Blackburn, 1864-1865 (Five Stars)

Dr. Blackburn has been identified in some Civil War books in general terms as an expert in Yellow Fever who tried to infect target groups in the North and the Union-occupied areas of Norfolk (Virginia) and Newbern (North Carolina) using clothes used by victims of the disease. Sometimes he is also mentioned as being involved in a failed attempt to use the disease to attack President Lincoln.

H.L. Greene, however, has gone several steps beyond this thumbnail treatment of the plot. He extensively researched the topic and produces a biography of Blackburn that includes his doctoral thesis on the disease and his efforts to fight yellow fever outbreaks. Greene discusses the knowledge (or lack of it) of germ theory and how medical doctors of the time thought that "unhealthy air" transmitted the disease. Obviously, Blackburn thought that another means of transmitting the disease was via "humors," specifically yellow bile and black bile... both produced in the course of the disease. He also must have come to the conclusion that sweat could carry the disease.

When Blackburn traveled from Bermuda (where he was working with Confederate Secret Service agents involved in asymmetric attacks against the United States) he collected contaminated bed linens and clothing and packed them in such a way as they would contaminate "clean" clothing. The trunks were then shipped to "targets." Much of this information came about because of the British discovery of unshipped trunks in Bermuda after Blackburn's departure.

Fortunately, Blackburn did not properly identify the true vector of the disease and his efforts seem to have been wasted. I say "seem to" because one of the targets, Newbern, did indeed suffer a Yellow Fever outbreak at about the time that trunk should have arrived. I believe that I came across an entry that identified the Patient Zero being a sutler, which would explain how the disease started...

Written very well and in detail. There are some things that are unknowable 150 years after the fact but the author discusses some things that can be deduced from the known information and discusses various explanations for apparent discrepancies in dates and testimony. Overall, a very interesting book, well-illustrated with photographs and maps.