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Washington's Other War · Plausibly Live - The Dave Bowman Show Podcast

0:06
From the On Air Across America NEWSROOM, I'm Alex Ross, and
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this is your Morning News update.
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A federal judge has ruled that FEMA cannot withhold
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counterterrorism grants to compel state and local election
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changes. The administration sought paper
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ballot audits, citizenship checks and other safeguards.
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Judge Amir Ali ruled that Congress did not authorize FEMA
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to impose those requirements through an unrelated grant
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program. Defense Secretary Pete Pete
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Hegseth has directed U.S. military, cyber and intelligence
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organizations to defend November's elections against
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foreign interference. Military cyber Security
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Assistance has occurred since election systems were designated
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critical infrastructure in 20174 Personnel were injured Monday
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during an aircraft landing mishap aboard USS Dwight D
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Eisenhower. 2 aviators ejected and were safely recovered.
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The Navy has not announced A cause.
1:00
USS Theodore Roosevelt has departed San Diego for an
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expected extended deployment. USS Abraham Lincoln is nearing
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Hawaii after 311 days away from home.
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In football, 38 year old Case Keenum accounted for three
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touchdowns as Chicago defeated previously unbeaten Philadelphia
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27 to 7. For the On Air Across American
1:22
network, I'm Alex Ross. When, in the course of human
1:47
events, it becomes necessary to talk about the past, we have to
1:52
remember that history is strange, it's alien, and it
1:56
won't give us what we would like to have.
1:59
It's more than just dates or places.
2:02
History is the story of humanity and of our civilization, and
2:07
from that past we begin to understand what the future might
2:11
be. This is Dave does History.
2:17
When we think about the American Revolution, we tend to remember
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the battles Lexington, Concord, Bunker Hill, Trenton, Saratoga,
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Yorktown. We remember Washington crossing
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the Delaware Continental soldiers freezing at Valley
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Forge, British redcoats marching across the colonies.
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While George Washington was trying to build an army capable
2:41
of defeating the most powerful military empire in the world,
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something else was also moving through North America, something
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Washington feared enormously. It was a disease called
2:55
smallpox. And to us today, it is consigned
2:58
to history. To an American living in
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17751776, it was a terrifyingly familiar fear.
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Smallpox could enter a community almost unnoticeably.
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Deaf, blindness, scars, shattered families behind it.
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Now imagine what it could do to an army.
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Thousands of men crowded together, shared tents,
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quarters. Constant movement from colony to
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colony, new recruits arriving every day.
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It was war within a war, a fight against an enemy that didn't
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care whether you wore red, blue, patriot, loyalist or even
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understand what was going on. This was Washington's other war.
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And this is Dave does history well.
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Good morning. Good evening here.
3:52
Good afternoon. Wherever you are, whatever you
3:54
do, a lot of things were happening in history, and this
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is the day we set aside to take a look at some of those.
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We continue our look into 1776, the American Revolutionary War.
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When we picture the Revolution, as I said, we picture those
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muskets, the skirmishes, those artillery duels.
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But really one of the biggest fights was against something
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called variola Major. Major I guess I don't speak
4:25
Latin very well. Otherwise known as smallpox, a
4:28
disease that to us today is virtually non existent.
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But to the colonials it was as terrifying as anything you can
4:40
matter. It's it's like reading about
4:42
leprosy in the Bible. I mean, it was, it was feared,
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not just hated, it was feared. The problem, of course, was
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there was a major divide between the British regulars and the
4:58
Continental Army and the recruits that we were getting.
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The British regulars had come from or areas that were
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basically urban centers and large garrisons.
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They had been exposed to smallpox as children, and
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because of this, they had a baseline immunity against
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smallpox of roughly 80%. That's pretty good in an era
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when vaccinations and inoculations and those sorts of
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things were not necessarily well done.
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On the colonial side, it was different.
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And this is, this is strange to us because we tend to think of
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the way smallpox ravaged the native populations, the
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indigenous populations, and we never think about it affecting
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the colonial populations. But at this particular point in
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our in our timeline, most colonials were aggregarian.
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They were isolated. There were very, very few small
6:00
or, or large cities and, and gatherings like that.
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The exposure to smallpox was infrequent.
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Sometimes you had local outbreaks, but most of the
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population had not been exposed to smallpox, leaving a baseline
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immunity of roughly 20%. You got to look at this immunity
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divide to understand what George Washington was faced as we began
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the American Revolutionary War. When Washington took command of
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the army, he turned to the only physical, the only containment
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system that he understood, which was physical isolation.
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He had spent his life, his early life getting some immunity.
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When he was in Barbados he had a brutal 24 day illness, the age
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of 19. And once of course you've had
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the disease and survived, you are lifelong immune and he
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understood that. But he also understood that we
7:02
had to, we had to be isolated. And so this is what he did.
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When he got to Cambridge in July 4th, 1775, he took command of
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the army surrounding Boston. He turned to the only
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containment strategy that he understood, which was strict
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physical isolation. In his general orders of July
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4th, 1775, he established A dedicated quarantine hospital at
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Fresh Pond. He stationed armed sentries and
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strictly prohibited soldiers from fishing or traveling near
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the pond to keep all that stuff the the smallpox out of his
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supply lines. It was the only way that anybody
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at that point knew how to do anything.
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Was it effective well enough so that the army stayed together,
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hung together until evacuation day and the British left Boston?
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And if you recall, when we talked about evacuation day, who
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were the first troops that Washington sent in?
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He sent in smallpox immune troops to make sure that the
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British had not, you know, left smallpox infected things behind.
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In the meantime, we talked about Lord Dunmore down in Virginia,
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who had kind of a different idea.
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Remember, he's not worried about smallpox.
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He's got an 80% ice baseline immunity.
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So he's not really thinking in these terms.
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When he offered freedom to self emancipated slaves who bore arms
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for the crown, he formed what was known as the Ethiopian
8:46
regiment. We talked about this in the
8:47
burning of Norfolk and the the grievance that he has burned our
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cities and those kinds of things.
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In the meantime, he assumed things that were not true.
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The Continental, like the Continental recruits, these,
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these former slaves did not have that baseline immunity.
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They were trapped aboard the crowded British flotilla at
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Gwen's Island. They immediately, almost
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immediately had this breakout of smallpox that just ripped
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through the loyalist population that had begun to stay there
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with Lord Dunmore on his ship. It killed nearly 500 Black
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Loyalists within a matter of weeks.
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Can you imagine that? You know, I talk about this on
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occasion. We don't really understand death
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anymore. We don't see it.
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We don't experience it the way the colonials would have.
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We, we don't have the familiarity with it. 500 deaths
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within just a couple of weeks are what happened.
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In the meantime, General Howe is expelling 300 sick, destitute
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civilians from Boston directly into the continental lines.
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He's sending people who are infected into the American
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lines, hoping that this will happen.
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Washington is horrified. He says, hey, these guys are
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just using a, they're, they're using biological weapons against
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us. He called it a weapon of
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defense, as a matter of fact. And it was, it was scary.
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I mean, it was absolutely horrifying These these ideas
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that that the the British would actually do this.
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Washington was convinced that smallpox was being weaponized,
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and he issued A strict ban on inoculation.
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Yes, you heard that correctly. His first act was to say we're
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not going to inoculate people because inoculation in those
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days was a iffy proposition at best.
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And in the meantime, there was concern, what are we going to do
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here? How are we going to respond to
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this and more importantly, what will happen going forward from
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here? This is a war within a war.
12:17
Welcome back. It's me Dave.
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You want to join me? Text machine 2095653283565.
12:24
Dave, I don't know why I'm stumbling over that number
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lately. I've been saying that number for
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20 years. Oh, suddenly I can't say it.
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Welcome back. Washington was afraid that
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unquarantined self administered inoculations would be disabling
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to his regiments. That's one of the reasons why he
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banned inoculations. He was afraid that these were
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going to be essentially home medicine, which was known in
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that era. He declared that any officer who
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underwent unauthorized inoculation would be cashiered,
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disgraced, and publicly denounced as a traitor to his
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country. In 1776, Washington still
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believed that strict prohibition was his best defense.
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But things change. As you you may know that's it's
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an idea, but sometimes they don't survive.
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The problem that he was facing, of course, was the failure of
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the invasion of Canada. The retreating northern army was
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drifting down the Rushloo River in total ruin and John Trumbull,
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who witnessed the horrors at Crown Point in 1776, recorded in
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his journal. I did not look into a single
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tent or Hut in which I did not find in either dead or a dying
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man. The problem, of course, is that
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the army that had tried to take over Canada had completely and
14:00
utterly failed and was bringing back more of the same problem.
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They had to try to save that retreating force from total
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destruction. A council of war executed an
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emergency separation. They established a 3000 patient
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isolation hospital at Fort George.
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There they would segregate and the infected while diverting the
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healthy ranks east towards Fort Ticonderoga to hold the line
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against the British invasion. This was an important idea
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because you, you run into a situation here where it's, you
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got to keep these troops separated by sending them and,
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and, and imagine if you will, for just a moment, the care
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that's being provided. What, what care could you
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provide in today's world if, if by some chance you managed to
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get smallpox, the treatment today would be much different
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than anything they could possibly have done in 17751776.
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Basically, they were just waiting for you to die.
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You know, we read about the Black Plague and how people, you
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know, would get it and they either died or they didn't.
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I mean, that's pretty much what it was.
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And in in the same way with smallpox, you could be left
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scarred, you could be left blinded.
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In many cases you would die. And so you had to separate these
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troops out because if you didn't, well, people were going
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to, you know, die. By the summer of 1776, the army
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in the north was suffering, of course.
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But a critical proof of concept, concept plan was emerging in
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Boston in 1776, July of 1776. So after the fall of Boston to
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the colonials, after we recaptured it, municipal
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authorities temporarily suspended the anti inoculation
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laws under strict sentry control and nearly 5000 civilians would
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be immunized within 12 days with minimal mortality.
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Imagine this the the city says we we got to do something.
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And so the civilians decide, hey, we're going to, we're going
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to, we have to do something here.
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And so they begin to inoculate their citizens, even though the
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military is saying absolutely not, we're not doing that kind
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of the opposite of the way it is today, isn't it?
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Today the military says you will get inoculations.
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And it's the civilian population that seems to have a problem
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with that. 5000 civilians immunized within 12 days.
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The epidemic then burns itself out safely.
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And this shows proof of concept that immunization is
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logistically possible and that's going to change things.
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Prior to this time, you, you had two ways of doing this, one
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called variolation, which you take a live human smallpox
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virus. It's highly contagious,
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compares, you know, carries A1 to 2% mortality risk at a normal
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infection rate. So what you're what you're doing
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here, we're not talking today about modern vaccinations.
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We're not talking about today where you where you use a needle
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and you involved. What they did was they
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deliberately made an incision, inserted the live dangerous
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human smallpox pus into a soldiers arm.
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Every, every soldier who would be inoculated by this or every
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civilian inoculated this way, became actively contagious for
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nearly a month, making mass variolation A colossal strategic
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risk. But it also made things possibly
17:57
safer. And the the experiment at Boston
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would kind of prove that later vaccinations would use animal
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cowpox virus. It was safe, It was not
18:06
contagious, but it was unavailable in 1776, and
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Washington had no way of doing that.
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And that, of course, was the was the point that the scientifics
18:20
side of this became very possible.
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The problem, of course, is that Washington is at a crossroads.
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This is dangerous. This is do I do this?
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Do I not do this? How do I do this?
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Should I even do this? What it's not the easy decision
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that we think it is today. We didn't we look at it today
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and go, well, of course you get vaccinated for smallpox.
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It's not a big deal. But in 1776, it is in 1776, no
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one knows for sure that this was actually going to work.
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Despite the the success in Boston, there's still great fear
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because if the army is destroyed, whether by the
19:01
British or by the virus, we lose the American Revolutionary War.
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So Washington has to make that decision.
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Can you imagine all the things we give him credit for, all the
19:14
things we talk about with George Washington?
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This may have been his best decision.
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Digging up the past without the permits, brushes, or awkward
19:55
conversations with archaeologists.
19:58
This is Dave does History. Welcome back.
20:03
So Washington makes this decision.
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He he actually writes to Adams when he says, I have determined
20:11
that the troops shall be inoculated.
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Now this actually happens in 1777, February of 77, after the
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battles at Trenton and Morristown, the disease starts
20:22
to spread. He's he's having issues and it
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it gets worse before it ever gets better.
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Washington is actually this letter was to Hancock.
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I'm sorry I said Adams, but he, he wrote, it's interesting
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because we get, we get inside Washington's head, we have the
20:42
letter he writes in there. I am divided in my opinion.
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He's he's vacillating. He doesn't know what to do when
20:49
it comes to the smallpoxy. And that is actually crossed
20:52
out. It's lined out.
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And then he wrote below that I have determined that the troops
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shall be inoculated. And on February 6th, he ordered
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Doctor William Shippen Junior to begin mass variolation and
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created the first military sponsored mass immunization
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mandate in military history. And that again, it's a huge
21:17
risk, but you're losing otherwise.
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So what are you going to do? He wants operational security.
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Executing this mandate requires absolutely operational security.
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If the British command learns that thousands of Continental
21:32
troops are bedridden at Morristown, NJ, with undergoing
21:37
variolation, what would they have done?
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Even though it was February, even the Howe brothers would
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have said, OK, I guess we have to go attack now.
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They could have wiped out the entire Continental Army in a
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single stroke. And of course, that's what the
21:53
danger of smallpox was. Instead, Washington established
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mandatory entry hubs at Philadelphia and Alexandria to
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inoculate new recruits before they even got to camp, much much
22:04
as we do today. I mean, you get, you go to boot
22:07
camp, OK? The first thing to do is cut
22:09
your hair. Second thing they do is give you
22:12
inoculations before you even get uniforms.
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They start them, as I recall, anyway.
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That was a long time ago for me, but it seemed like that was one
22:23
of the big things we did. He established these centers, He
22:28
staggered the process through the winter months when the
22:30
frozen roads prevented any British offensives.
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And of course, that was the key, was keeping that out there.
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That way it was a biological equalizer.
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Morristown Mandate that Washington wrote, served as the
22:47
ultimate equalizer. By the siege of Yorktown in
22:50
1781, the Continental Army had had achieved complete
22:55
immunological parity with the British regulars.
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Imagine that we had started out completely at the mercy of this
23:04
disease. But by the time Yorktown rolls
23:07
around and, and keep in mind, the Continental Army has grown
23:10
there. We've added the French army into
23:11
that. We've added Spanish troops into
23:13
that, some Holland, some Dutch troops, all of these folks from
23:17
around the world. By the time 1781 rolls around,
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by the time of the Battle of Yorktown, the Siege of Yorktown,
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we are completely on an immunological parody with the
23:27
British Army. By overcoming smallpox through
23:31
military discipline and public health logistics, Washington
23:35
eliminated Great Britain's greatest asymmetrical advantage.
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Britain could have won the American Revolutionary War not
23:44
through military stuff. They could have just killed us
23:49
all via the use of biological weapons.
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But by the time this happens, by the time we get to the end of
23:59
all this, by the time we realize that the war is won, Washington
24:05
has figured it out and he has saved not only his army, but in
24:10
a way he has saved his country again.
24:12
Because this spreads throughout the nation, and eventually
24:16
everybody pretty much becomes inoculated because the idea of
24:20
dying of smallpox is not appealing.
24:24
But living is a free American actually is.
24:28
Take the time right now. Tell the people that matter in
24:30
your life You love them very much.
24:31
You'd miss them if they weren't there.
24:32
So don't pass up those opportunities.
24:34
You don't want to have that real ground.
24:35
I'll see you tomorrow for plausibly live.