Holmes: «The Contagiousness of Puerperal Fever», a compilation of cases against the profession
A compilation of American and European cases of childbed fever showing that outbreaks follow particular physicians. From the compilation it follows that the disease is carried by whoever attends the delivery, and therefore a physician must give up obstetric practice after performing a post-mortem on a woman dead of the fever.
The compilation was made in 1843 by the American physician and writer Oliver Wendell Holmes, drawing among other things on Gordon's treatise and quoting his confession directly. The argument was not experimental but cumulative, exactly the kind the profession could reject as an insult: Charles Meigs, professor of obstetrics in Philadelphia, declared Holmes's reasoning flawed and its author a sophomoric writer.
The journal in which the essay appeared closed within a year, and the text barely circulated. The practice of obstetric wards was not changed by it; Semmelweis with numbers, and then Pasteur and Lister with germs, would be needed.
Why this date
medium for the imprint. The essay was read to the Boston Society for Medical Improvement and printed in The New England Quarterly Journal of Medicine and Surgery, volume 1. The sources disagree about the pages: the catalogue record of the reprint in the «Classic pages in obstetrics and gynecology» series gives pp. 503-530 and dates the volume 1842-1843, the English Wikipedia gives p. 213 and April 1843. The original could not be checked. The axis year 1843 is not contested by either version.
What it grew from
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Gordon: childbed fever is brought to the woman by whoever attends her delivery
influenced · Confidence: high
Holmes built his proof on Gordon: he quotes him directly as the man who suspected that he himself was carrying the disease and who could predict the outcome from the name of the attendant.
Dispute: The descent itself is not disputed: Holmes quotes Gordon in the text of the essay. The source found asserting the link is an encyclopedia entry of the Embryo Project (Arizona State University), not a monograph; the extent of the borrowing could not be checked against the essay itself within this piece of work.
Link sources
- Shaikh S. «"The Contagiousness of Puerperal Fever" (1843), by Oliver Wendell Holmes», Embryo Project Encyclopedia, Arizona State University (2017) Verified 20 Sep 2026
Holmes quotes Gordon as saying that he suspected he was carrying the disease to patients and that he could predict which patients would die of puerperal fever based on who attended to them.
- Gordon A. «A Treatise on the Epidemic Puerperal Fever of Aberdeen» (1795), Holmes O. W. «The Contagiousness of Puerperal Fever» (1843), Internet Archive, OCR (1843), 3 Verified 5 Oct 2026
I could venture to foretell what women would be affected with the disease, upon hearing by what midwife they were to be delivered, or by what nurse they were to be attended, during their lying-in: and almost in every instance my prediction was verified.
"Verified" means that on that day the quotation was found at the address given, word for word. No date means we have not been able to open the source yet, not that the quotation is wrong.
- Shaikh S. «"The Contagiousness of Puerperal Fever" (1843), by Oliver Wendell Holmes», Embryo Project Encyclopedia, Arizona State University (2017) Verified 20 Sep 2026
Other links
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Disinfection of hands with chlorinated lime in a maternity ward
parallel to · Confidence: medium
Holmes and Semmelweis arrived at the same conclusion about the carrier independently of one another, neither aware of the other's work, and both were rejected by their profession.
Dispute: Mutual ignorance is asserted by a single source found, Caroline de Costa. No second historian asserting it directly could be found, and the paper by Lane, Blum and Fee (American Journal of Public Health 100(6), 2010, pp. 1008-1009), devoted precisely to the pair Holmes and Semmelweis, proved inaccessible, so its position is not taken into account here. Separately: the question of Semmelweis's later acquaintance with the English literature is not settled by this quotation, which concerns only the moment of discovery.
Link sources
- de Costa C. «Childbed fever: A major cause of maternal mortality», O&G Magazine 11(1) (RANZCOG) (2009) Verified 20 Sep 2026
The two men worked independently, neither aware of the other's findings.
- Shaikh S. «"The Contagiousness of Puerperal Fever" (1843), by Oliver Wendell Holmes», Embryo Project Encyclopedia, Arizona State University (2017) Verified 5 Oct 2026
Obstetricians, including Charles D. Meigs, a physician of obstetrics and professor at Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, contended that Holmes's argument was flawed and referred to him as a sophomoric writer.
"Verified" means that on that day the quotation was found at the address given, word for word. No date means we have not been able to open the source yet, not that the quotation is wrong.
- de Costa C. «Childbed fever: A major cause of maternal mortality», O&G Magazine 11(1) (RANZCOG) (2009) Verified 20 Sep 2026
What became of the journal in which Holmes's paper appeared is taken from the Wikipedia article as an entry point. It has not been checked against the journal itself, the New England Quarterly Journal of Medicine and Surgery.
Node sources
- Shaikh S. «"The Contagiousness of Puerperal Fever" (1843), by Oliver Wendell Holmes», Embryo Project Encyclopedia, Arizona State University (2017) Verified 5 Oct 2026
In Part II, Holmes outlines numerous cases of puerperal fever as evidence of the link between the spread of puerperal fever and the actions of the physicians in charge of the cases.
- Shaikh S. «"The Contagiousness of Puerperal Fever" (1843), by Oliver Wendell Holmes», Embryo Project Encyclopedia, Arizona State University (2017) Verified 5 Oct 2026
Obstetricians, including Charles D. Meigs, a physician of obstetrics and professor at Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, contended that Holmes's argument was flawed and referred to him as a sophomoric writer.
- «The Contagiousness of Puerperal Fever» (2025) Verified 5 Oct 2026
Due to low circulation of this specialized journal and the fact that the journal was discontinued after just one year, the paper was not properly brought to the attention of either physicians or the public at large.
- Holmes O.W. «The Contagiousness of Puerperal Fever» (1843) (1843) Verified 5 Oct 2026
It is a disagreeable declaration for me to mention, that I myself was the means of carrying the infection to a great number of women.
"Verified" means that on that day the quotation was found at the address given, word for word. No date means we have not been able to open the source yet, not that the quotation is wrong.