Throughout the epidemic, she utilized her nursing skills and medical knowledge to care for a number of people including family members and neighbors. All of them survived.

Philadelphia, PA

My great-grandmother cared for family members and neighbors during the 1918 influenza epidemic in Philadelphia. All of her patients survived.

Her name was Elizabeth Hughes. She was born in New Ross, County Wexford, Ireland. As a young woman she was trained as a nurse and worked in the incurable disease ward of a hospital. She and the other nurses protected themselves from contagious diseases by smoking a pipe filled with herbs.

Elizabeth was married and widowed twice. By the turn of the century she and her four children had all settled in Philadelphia arriving at the pier at Washington and Delaware Ave. By 1918 she and her family had been living in a Jewish – Irish Catholic neighborhood in Philadelphia for a number of years. At the time Elizabeth’s two sons were in the Marine Corps fighting in France. So in addition to the hardships experienced during the epidemic, she also had the worriment of having two sons in a combat zone. Throughout the epidemic, she utilized her nursing skills and medical knowledge to care for a number of people including family members and neighbors. All of them survived. One in particular was my grandfather, Joseph Riley, who was her son-in-law.

Her successful treatment involved rubbing the chest with goose grease and then covering the chest with flannel cloth. She also administered a shot of whiskey in hot water. Elizabeth continued to smoke a pipeful of herbs to protect herself from disease. When she could no longer acquire the herbs she needed, she switched to Granger’s pipe tobacco which was the closest thing she could find to the herbs she normally used.

Because she was recognized in the neighborhood as a healer, she couldalways obtain a bottle of whiskey whenever she needed it, even during Prohibition. She would simply go to the back door of the local pharmacy and the druggist would hand her a bottle.

My family has always been proud of the service my great-grandmother provided to the people of her neighborhood and to the family during the 1918 health crisis. Both her sons Jim and Jack survived the war and lived to old age. Three of Joseph Riley’s children were born after the epidemic including my mother who was born in 1921. My father, who was a child at the time of the epidemic would often recite these lines to me:
                 I had a dog and his name was Enza.
                 I opened the door
                 And in flew Enza.

I did not think it was clever.

My sister and I as well as most of my cousins would not have been born if Elizabeth had not been able to save Joseph’s life. We owe our existence to the training Elizabeth received in Ireland.

Contributed by Patricia Haines , great- granddaughter of Elizabeth Hughes.