Race and Medical History in the South

Published Feb 01, 2019 by

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Curative Corpus

With the start of Black History Month, The Country Doctor Museum interprets the legacy of medicine along racial lines in a new exhibit, Race and Medical History in North Carolina, and through the research shared in this online post. Within the museum’s archives housed at East Carolina University’s Laupus Health Science Library and the museum’s object collection are artifacts, medical receipts, ledgers, correspondence, and other material related to slave medical care and the treatment emancipated slaves received from white physicians in the 19^th and early 20^th centuries.

Note that Dr. Powell treated a “little negro at James Bell” several times in July and August of 1840. Patient Accounts Ledger, July 29 to August 24 1840, Joseph J. W. Powell Papers (#453.2.d), East Carolina Manuscript Collection, J. Y. Joyner Library, p. 1.

The ledgers featured in the exhibit reveal slave owners sought medical assistance from country doctors, especially when their enslaved were sick or injured. The physical hardship slaves endured made them more susceptible to diseases such as malaria, yellow fever, and pneumonia, as well as receiving injuries from farm accidents or physical punishment.[1] Medicine and science were biased disciplines at this time, especially regarding race.[2] Scientists and scholars, such as physician, Dr. Samuel A. Cartwright, published theories that dehumanized African-Americans and may have influenced country doctors practicing in the South.[3]

An article excerpt from Dr. S. A. Cartwright.
Dr. Samuel A. Cartwright, “Dr. Cartwright on the Caucasians and the Africans,” DeBow’s Review 25, no. 1 (July 1858): 45-46.

Generally, African-Americans and whites received similar medical care at this time.[4] However, because of perceived differences between the two races, country doctors could make slight adjustments to medications or therapeutic and diagnostic techniques whether a patient was white or not. Many slaves, especially those with West African heritages, tended to distrust the harsh medical treatments used on them, such as bleeding, leeching, and the use of purgatives and strong laxatives. To combat such treatments, slaves practiced their own form of health care which included use of medicinal herbs and African spiritual healing. In these small ways, enslaved individuals in North Carolina were able to attend to their own health despite being owned by someone else.[5]

“When the slaves on the plantation got sick they relied mostly on herbs. They used sage tea for fever, poplar bark for chills.”

– Hattie Rogers, former slave who lived near New Bern.[6]

Many of these traditions lasted well after slavery was abolished in 1865. Physicians in the Reconstruction-era South used terms such as “negro” and “colored” to describe African-Americans in their ledgers and receipts. For example, J. T. Lewter, a physician and business owner in Hertford County, segregated records of his African-American patients to a “negro” ledger beginning in 1869.[7] This segregation lasted well into the mid-20^th century, not just for lunch counters or movie theatres, but also for medical clinics and hospitals.

Negro Account Ledger Cover, Murfreesboro Historical Association Collection, J. T. Lewter Papers (#691.1.4.a), East Carolina Manuscript Collection, J. Y. Joyner Library.

During the decades following the Civil War and Emancipation, African-Americans continued to enter the medical profession. The first black physicians in North Carolina received professional licensure in May 1886. These were three classmates—M. T. Pope, L. A. Scruggs, and John T. Williams—who graduated from Shaw University’s Leonard Medical School. Despite the growing number of non-white physicians in the state after Drs. Pope, Scruggs, and Williams, African-Americans were a vast minority of the medical community. Out of over 3,000 physicians to receive medical licenses in North Carolina from 1859 to 1920, only 176 (or about 5.5%) were African-American.[8]

Problems of racial disparityare an area the medical field continues to encounter,[9] so it is helpful to reflect on the long history of segregated medical care within North Carolina. To learn more about the intersection of race and medicine, see the following suggested reading list and bibliography of archival sources used in this post and in the exhibit at the museum.

Race and Medical History in North Carolina is currently on display at The Country Doctor Museum.