Caregiving — Are We Better Off Now?

People were sick a lot in the nineteenth century (and other times, obviously). But I’ve been thinking about that recently as I’ve looked through Julia Wilbur’s diaries and read about her and others’ illnesses.

In the 1800s, the home was the optimal center of care for the sick and elderly. Hospitals were places of last resort.

As I described in my biography of her, Julia was the one unmarried sibling in a family of 10. Her mother died shortly after giving birth to the youngest child in the family. Julia, then age 19, took on care for her younger siblings. She did not keep a diary at that time, but I cannot imagine her protesting her role. 

At other times in her life, she took on caregiving for a niece whose mother died in childbirth and for her father on several occasions. She often wrote about visiting acutely ill family and friends, with loved ones taking turns sitting by the bedside of the afflicted. Doctors would visit and, for the wealthy, sometimes remain on scene for the duration, whether cure or death. It fell to family to feed, bathe, comfort, and tend to ailing patients.

Note the sad flowers in the photo. One of her brothers decorated a coffin of a sisten with them; he himself was buried less than a year later. Julia wrote in her diary about taking turns with other family members to sit by his bedside. When a huge fire raged nearby and he heard none of the hubbub, Julia realized that he was not long for the world.

“Flowers that Theodore brought to put on Sarah’s coffin.” A year later, he was also dead.

In 19th century families elsewhere, households accommodated the sick, elderly, and dying, as well as those with mental illnesses. Daily activity often swirled around people convalescing in their own or the “front room.”

Without a Family or Money

If you had no family but had money, you could at least guarantee fulfillment of your physical needs while remaining at home.

With neither, the last stop could have been the poorhouse or other institutions for the indigent. Many grouped the elderly, indigent, mentally ill, and orphans in one place, and a rather unpleasant place at that — called an almshouse, poorhouse, asylum, etc.

In the mid to late 1800s, a few less draconian homes for seniors began to open, most often by groups taking care of their own. Some of the fraternal organizations, such as the Odd Fellows and Masons, maintained homes for members, as did some religious groups. Anyone who has visited Lincoln’s Cottage in Washington knows that it sits on the campus of the Soldiers’ Home, which did (and still does) maintain facilities for elderly veterans.

All in all, growing old or sick in 19th century America was not fun, but family helped lessen the pain and discomfort.