Stirpes, Volume 40, Number 4, December 2000 Page: 43
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cemeterie-4begt to collect accurate burial
records. The collection of this information,
whether in the field (cemetery), or through
the historical records, is fascinating but time
consuming.
The Boerne Area Historical Preservation
Society (Survey, 1983) collected cemetery
information about Boerne and its surrounding
area and published this information in two
volumes.
Whether due to losses resulting from
nature or man, or to a small and changing
population, many graves were not included in
the Boerne Area Historical Society's
inventory (Survey, 1983). Because of Boerne's
unfortunate founding, frequent disputes and
changes of county lines, disease, droughts,
and Indian massacres that further reduced
the population, mortality rates were unusually
high (White, 2000). The mortality rate in
Boerne is not comparable to most U.S.
statistics, even for the rural south, because
of the hardships and diseases of those first
immigrants.
Because of the vastness of such a
project, I decided to look at only one section,
of one cemetery, of mortality changes from
1800 to 1900, deaths of males and females,
deaths by age, and by region. Fortunately, a
friend helped in the cataloging and data
analysis.
First, we determined the number of males
and females between 1800 and 1900, though
the earliest grave was 1721 and the latest
1998. Next, we next categorized burials by
age and by gender (see Table 6). Then we
compared the Boerne cemetery data with the
data collected in the 1880 U.S. Census, which
acted as our baseline. From our research, we
knew to expect higher mortality rates in rural
areas, in the South, and for males. This
proved true.
Finally, historical records for Boerne
were consulted relating to disease and natural
disaster for the time periods of this study.
Disease, starvation, drought, and Indianmassacres affected the mortality and
morbidity rates. Major causes of death in the
rural south were related to wars, war-related
diseases, and nutritional disturbances.
The Settling of Boerne by Immigrants
In 1842, a wave of German immigrants
came to Boerne. During a two-year period, 36
ships brought more than 5,000 immigrants.
Because of false promises for land and poor
management of the immigration process,
these immigrants were left on Galveston
beach to die. The surviving immigrants began
walking more than 40 miles from Boerne to
New Braunfels through heavy rains. Epidemics
of typhoid, typhus, and malaria reduced one
fourth of the population of immigrants. The
survivors began to fan out toward Comfort,
Fredricksburg, Sisterdale, and other small
Texas towns.
Later, because of Boerne's climate and
therapeutic springs, trains would deliver
hundreds of sick people to recuperate there
or, unfortunately, to die. Boerne had 13
sanitariums and hotels for the ill, which
literally outnumbered the town's actual
population. The Veteran's Administration
offered to build a hospital in the city of
Boerne because of its many ill citizens, but
Boerne declined.
In 1858, only 10 households existed in
Boerne. Boerne was not included in the U.S.
Census until 1910, in which 886 individuals
were counted.
Since the 1800s
Since the 1800s, the United States has
been in an epidemiological transition. Not only
has life expectancy changed, but here has
been a shift in the causes of death. The risk
of death by infectious disease has decreased,
but the risk of death by degenerative disease
has increased.
After the Civil War, disease and disability
increased in the south. Infectious diseases,
hookworm, nutritional diseases, poverty, and43
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Texas State Genealogical Society. Stirpes, Volume 40, Number 4, December 2000, periodical, December 2000; San Antonio, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth39842/m1/45/: accessed April 24, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Genealogical Society.