Death pervaded eighteenth-century Halifax. Poorly built houses, inefficient fireplaces and scarcities of fuel allowed the harsh North American climate to take a heavy toll among the early settlers. Cold and damp penetrated the bones even of high officials who continually complained of such afflictions as rheumatism. Scores died every year from communicable diseases, the worst killer being smallpox. In Halifax, as elsewhere, medical assistance often only compounded one's misery. Unlettered barber-surgeons recommended, in their ignorance, bleeding and the application of leeches for virtually all ailments. While life remained precarious for all, the poor suffered most. Heavy labour, squalid accommodations, a vitamin deficient diet and excessive consumption of liquor left the common people prone to injury, disease and death.
St. Paul's graveyard, shown here, originally lay outside the town palisade but urban expansion eventually placed it in the midst of the built-up area. Shallow burials in overcrowded quarters resulted in the pollution of neighbouring wells by decaying bodies. The cemetery was finally closed in the 1840s. Few of the gravestones in St. Paul's date prior to the 1790s since eighteenth-century fashion deemed markers vain. The stones shown here all face toward Jerusalem in anticipation of Christ's Second Coming.
