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[CHAPTER 6]
[Page 1]
SLAVE HEALTH, REMEDIES, AND HOSPITALIZATION
One of the early discoveries of the colonists in regard to their enslavement of the Indians—and more particularly, the Negroes--was that sick slaves could not and would not labor properly and that the success or failure of crops depended upon their health and well-being. In order to insure the health of their slaves, three choices were open to the early planters. The first of these—and in most cases, the safest--was to secure the services of a good physician to attend them. The second, was for the planters to treat them in the matter of whatever “simples” were needed, and where the services of a physician were not thought necessary. The third course was to employ the services of some slave on the plantation or on an adjoining plantation, who was fairly conversant with the medicinal value of the many herbs with which the nearby woods abounded.
In the matter of plantation physicians or physicians for plantation slaves, there were varying conditions under which the doctor served. Sometimes a planter who was also a physician would care for his own slaves as well as those of his neighbors, either by yearly contract or a set fee for each call.1 His mode of traveling was usually by boat, buggy, or horseback.
An interesting fact is that many of the early records of Louisiana speak of medical men as surgeons; however, it must be remembered that this was still in the days of herbs and “simples” and that a doctor’s principal activities were those of blood-letting,
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