Nationally, the flu killed more than half a million, accounting for more deaths than suffered by United States troops in battle during World Wars I and II combined. No one knows how many perished in other countries, but estimates start at 21 million.
Misnamed the “Spanish influenza” because Spain had suffered an early attack, the “flu,” as it was called after it became common, may have originated in the United States in the spring of 1918. Doctors theorize that the virus then traveled to Europe, where it mutated into an even more deadly form before returning to the United States in the late summer of 1918, probably carried by soldiers returning from World War I battlefields.
Silverton had a population of some 2,000 and enjoyed a measure of isolation, which probably postponed the onset of the flu. After hearing about the flu in other places, Silverton closed its schools in early October as a precaution. On Oct. 14, Dr. R. C. O’Halloran informed the town council that he knew of no local flu cases. The council authorized the health board to close businesses if necessary and instructed the marshal to clean up the alleys. Readers of the October 19 Silverton Standard would not have guessed from the paper that Silverton was about to face “the worst week ever known in San Juan County.”
Over 125 deaths were chronicled in the October 26 issue and on December 14, the Standard published a complete necrology with 146 names. The deaths came so quickly that the morticians could not keep up, so two mass graves were dug at Hillside Cemetery to bury the dead. Official enumerations later showed 833 influenza and 415 pneumonia cases in San Juan County for 1918, a sickness incidence 12 times the state’s norm.
Town Council meetings minutes at the time were stark— martial law was enacted by a reeling Town Board. People were ordered to stay in their homes, trains were banned and men from the high country mines were not allowed to come into town. Many of the sick were young people in their prime of life—many with young children, whom they left behind. And many were members of the same family, leaving that family decimated by the terrible plague.
Silverton never fully recovered from the flu. After the end of WWI, which resulted in a lack of demand for metals, and the loss of population from the flu, Silverton’s fortunes never regained the momentum it had in the glittering decade of 1900- 1910.
Today, thanks to the research of Freda Carley Peterson, we know who is buried in those mass graves at Hillside and thanks to the San Juan County Historical Society, a plaque has been set to commemorate the lives of those citizens whom we lost in that terrible year of 1918.
By Beverly Rich
