Inside the British village the place they locked folks in to die from lethal pandemic
The Covid-19 pandemic is permanently etched into the mind of every Brit who was lucky enough to survive.
Queueing for toilet roll, hazmat suit-clad medics at the scene of an outbreak and horrific visions of grannies and granddads taking their last breath alone will never leave our collective conscious. Enduring endless lockdowns trapped in our homes waiting for Boris Johnson to issue the latest update, it felt like we were the first to suffer self-isolation during those “unprecedented time”.
However, a small picturesque village in the Peak District self-imposed the horrors of lockdown 360 years before a bat halted the global economy.
Eyam, which is still known as the plague village, courageously cut itself off from the rest of the country in 1666 after an outbreak of the bubonic plague. At the time, London was ravaged with the black death which 100,000 dead, roughly one quarter of their population.
Back then, the deadly contagion was being spread by human body lice or fleas, according to modern science. Contact with the excrement of those parasites is also thought to have contributed to transmission.
Eyam became embroiled in one of the greatest natural disasters via a consignment of cloth ordered from London. The 160-mile journey north took an estimated 10 days – just long enough for the fleas and/or lice to survive on the cloth in the summer’s weather.
The historic cloth arrived damp and tailor Alexander Hadfield ordered his assistant George Viccars to dry it. A few days later and Viccars was dead – the first Eyam resident to perish from the black plague was recorded on September 7, 1665.
Tragically, the deadly disease had acquired a foothold in the remote village and other residents soon fell ill. Historians believe the bubonic plague was most likely spready via Viccars’ own body lice or fleas.
By the end of 1665, over 40 deaths linked to the plague had been recorded and by spring, many villagers were considering scarpering in an attempt to save themselves. As locals eyed up an escape to the nearby towns of Manchester, Sheffield and Bakewell, Clergyman William Mompesson recognised the dangers of the disease spreading and took action. He ordered Eyam to lock itself off from the rest of the country.
Thus, self-isolation and social distancing measures came to the tiny village. According to history blog Now I’m 64, the rules were simple:
- nobody was to enter or leave the village, for any reason
- food supplies would be delivered to drop-off points at the village boundary. Here villagers would leave coins soaked in vinegar to pay for the food delivered by the Earl of Devonshire’s men and others.
- church services would be held outdoors
- the churchyard was to be closed, and the dead buried in fields at the edge of the village
- families would bury their own dead
Without any scientific understanding of the disease, the people of Eyam sacrificed themselves in an effort to save the larger populations around them. The bravery of Clergyman Mompesson likely saved thousands of lives.
When the brutal restrictions were lifted, 260 villagers had died, estimated to be around one third of their population. Mompesson’s heroic actions hit him personally as his wife was one of the fatalities.
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