After cycling 600 miles, Karl arrived in Sydney on March 12, 1900, and reported to the Truro Daily News:
“… instead of talking about the war as in other parts of Australia, more people were excited over the Bubonic Plague, which had just struck Sydney. The disease came from the East Indies, carried by rats on board the vessels. The authorities do not understand it as yet, and nothing is done for the sufferers except removing them to the quarantine station. The plague is spreading, and thousands are being inoculated; whole blocks near the wharves are abandoned and deserted. The ferry boats running across the harbour to the different suburbs have changed their landing places, going away around to a different part of the city.”
Just days before Karl’s arrival, the Department of Public Health of New South Wales published an eight-page handbook on March 1, titled Prevention of Plague: Instructions to Householders. At the time, the transmission of the disease was poorly understood, and authorities believed it had been introduced by diseased rats, with the potential for widespread devastation.
In reality, bubonic plague is caused by the Yersinia pestis bacterium, which infects rat fleas. When an infected flea bites a human, the bacterium spreads through the lymphatic system, releasing toxins that cause haemorrhaging in internal organs. The resulting discolouration of the skin led to its infamous name—the “Black Death.”
Australia's first case of bubonic plague was reported in January 1900. Over the next eight months, 303 cases were recorded, and 103 people died. In response, the government imposed strict quarantines, detaining infected individuals and close contacts for 10 days. Authorities also launched a massive public health campaign: fumigating and burning garbage, disinfecting public spaces, and exterminating over 100,000 rats in an effort to curb the spread.
On April 14, 1900, The Bulletin, a widely read Australian magazine known as the “Bushman’s Bible,” published a satirical yet urgent poem offering a simple prescription for avoiding the plague:
Fear not the foul disease, though it rage along the quays,
Oh, faint heart, be at ease;
Wash and Pray!
Bathe in the early morn, when the day is newly born,
Weal soul, be not forlorn,
Pray and wash!
When the east is growing red, slide quickly out of bed,
And swiftly wash your head,
Wash and pray!
And when day is nearly done, and westward slopes the sun,
And the stars come one by one,
Pray and wash!
Oh, quickly wash your feet, when the night is falling fleet,
And the evening star goes downward the dull sky rim to meet,
And the parrot crieth sadly in the fields of golden wheat,
Wash and Pray!
Wash your socks—oh, wash them soon, and your mangled shirt at noon,
And your collar ‘neath the beams of cold white crescent moon,
Pray and wash!
There is but one gospel true and I preach it unto you,
When the plague comes like the spectre that haunts the sombre yew,
And its bony feet are on the street and tread them night and day—
Wash and pray!
But more especially wash this earthly tenement of clay—
Wash and pray!
Even without full scientific knowledge of disease transmission, the emphasis on sanitation and personal hygiene—though wrapped in poetry—was surprisingly aligned with modern disease prevention practices.
For Karl, arriving in a city on edge must have been unsettling. The usually thriving harbour saw parts of its waterfront abandoned, streets near the outbreak emptied, and fear lingered in the air. The war Karl had expected to hear about was overshadowed by an invisible enemy.
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