Just a small contribution to this thread. I am working on transcribing some correspondence between residents of Dufftown and their emigrant relatives in the 1830's and '40's. From this correspondence, it seems that scarlet fever was a constant threat. An example (this is dated March 26, 1835): There has also been a great many deaths since you left this but by the mercy of God we and our nearest relations have all been spared except Mr. Ragg's little Sandy who died of scarlet fever the [illegible] of the present month and has been much lamented by us all, Isabella and James have had the fever also but are now quite recovered, Mr Stewart your own tenant's two little boys also died of the fever but it was a worse kind of it than Mr. Ragg's children had. There is at present three of the Major's Daughters in it also but they are in a fair way of recovery and they think that the rest will escape and a few weeks since Gordon's life was despaired of with inflamation in the bowels but is now quite recovered and also Mr. Charles Stewart who has had so many days of dishealth I may say years is in some degree better he has has [sic] been able to go once or twice down about length of the chapel and it is hoped that he will con - tinue so although he still remains with the loss of sight in one of eyes. And Mrs. Captain Grant sister to Mr. Forsyth died in about thirteen minutes illness and is very much regretted by all her friends it was supposed that it was the bursting of a blood vessel that was the cause of her death but there was no mark of it seen. [For thise with an interest: "Mr. Ragg" is Alexander Ragg, then postmaster of Dufftown. Sandy, Isabella and James are his children. "The Major" is, I believe, Captain Stewart of Pittyvaich, though I have yet to confierm this. Charles is the latter's son. I have not yet identified "Mrs. Captain Grant." The writer of the letter is Ann Shand, and the recipient was her father, William Shand, formerly of Mortlach, who had emigrated to Canada the previous year. Ann was staying with the Ragg's until her own emigration in 1836] Bill Ramp Lethbridge, Alberta Ray Hennessy wrote: > Margaret is right about epidemics in the 1840s. Many people don't > realise that rural Scotland suffered from the potato blight & famine > every bit as badly as the Irish. > Also in the mid-Victorian times, especially the 1840s, there were > cholera and typhoid epidemics in NE Scotland, & throughout the UK, > which could have taken whole families, especially the children, in a day.