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The Dead Brontes (Health)
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Ishmael


In: Toronto
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The Dead Brontes


Members of the Bronte Family that did not die young:
  • Patrick (father)
  • Charlotte
Everybody else:
  • Elizabeth (mother)
  • Maria
  • Elizabeth (daughter)
  • Branwell
  • Emily
  • Anne
Everyone is sure of why Branwell died; he drank himself to death. But no one else's demise comes in for any special mention, despite the regularity with which they all drop dead. But as the Applied Epistemologists say, same effect, same cause. So they all drank themselves to death. Or none of them did.

That first option is out, as Branwell was the only drinker. That means Branwell didn't drink himself dead neither. So what else could have caused them all to die?

Well, we're all told that such a catastrophic death toll was nothing particularly unusual for the period. You can believe that if you like. I don't. And there is the rather curious fact that three of the siblings demised in quick succession: Branwell, Anne, and Emily. Within about a two month window.
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Ishmael


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This train of thought was prompted by my indulging in To Walk Invisible last night on PBS. It wasn't until after the program finished, however, that I came to question the orthodoxy on this.

And that's when I remembered a small detail briefly mentioned in the drama.

This is the Bronte Family Home. Though I think at the time it had a wall around it.



Looks alright. But being the son of a minister myself, I noted that the home was provided to the family by the church. This meant that it was paid for by the Parishioners.

Now. Small, out-of-the-way Parishes tend to be rather poor. So it is quite likely that the house they were given was purchased at a bargain. What might have made the property inexpensive?

Well here's a clue:



Nothing unhealthy about that location.

(and I'm certain everyone at the time understood the mechanics of groundwater)
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Mick Harper
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In: London
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At first I was going to suggest laudanum. The family that gets high together writes together. But the deaths are too close. What about arsenic wallpaper if they are shabby gentile?. But if it is groundwater maybe the lead mines of ... er ... Yorkshire?

PS There's nothing poor about that house even allowing for touristic gentrification.

PPS Not paid for by the parishioners in rural England but usually by the local Big House.
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Ishmael


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Its the grave yard I thought might be the culprit. Contaminated well water. The graveyard makes the property inexpensive. Church can then afford to build a nice house. Someone was looking for a deal. That's my thesis. And the property was in some way deadly.
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Hatty
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In: Berkshire
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The official version seems that the family deaths were caused by TB. The four eldest girls had been sent away to school where two of them died, the dampness there being blamed rather than their home environment. If the parsonage's well-water was contaminated, everyone in the household would have died relatively quickly wouldn't they?

The Rev. Patrick Bronte sent four of his five daughters: Maria, Elizabeth, Emily, and Charlotte to the Clergy Daughter’s School at Cowan Bridge. Anne remained home. In 1825 Maria and Elizabeth died of tuberculosis at the school. It was stated they became ill from the dampness and terrible living conditions so Emily and Charlotte were sent home.

The brother's death is put down to some sort of TB/alcohol/opium combination. Anne and Emily are said to have had the disease.

Charlotte may have died from something else though, it's under 'women's diseases'

On 29 June 1854 Charlotte married Arthur Bell Nicholls, her father’s curator, and within nine months she was dead. First of all her death certificate stated “phthisis’ (consumption), better known as tuberculosis, as the cause of death but Charlotte Bronte Nichols was also pregnant and she suffered from extreme nausea from this condition. In 1972, a professor of obstetrics and gynaecology, Philip Rhodes, stated that it is most likely she suffered and died of hyperemesis gravidarum which because of her pregnancy the salts and water are pulled from her system.
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Ishmael


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Hatty wrote:
The official version seems that the family deaths were caused by TB.


TB is a perfect disease to be produced by contaminated water. That's my understanding anyway.

The four eldest girls had been sent away to school where two of them died, the dampness there being blamed rather than their home environment.


TB is a slow moving disease. One gets infected long before symptoms show up. And people who get the symptoms are often reticent to reveal that they have them---as they hope that the symptoms are not as they appear.

If the parsonage's well-water was contaminated, everyone in the household would have died relatively quickly wouldn't they?


No. The human immune system can often put up with a lot of crap. Some people are stronger than others. It looks to me like the water contamination rose and fell in different periods over the years with the final wave killing off three children in quick succession.

Charlotte may have died from something else though, it's under 'women's diseases'


I thought Charlotte died as a relatively old woman! My god. She died before she was 40. That means they all died except for the father!!!

Maybe he drank wine?!?!

[color=darkblue]On 29 June 1854 Charlotte married Arthur Bell Nicholls, her father’s curator, and within nine months she was dead. First of all her death certificate stated “phthisis’ (consumption), better known as tuberculosis, as the cause of death


They all died of TB! Every last one of them!

I promise you. It was that house that killed them.
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Mick Harper
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Houses do have TB. My flatmate got it (condemned house, squatted) and I had to go off for tests. I don't buy the 'cheap house' theory - surely nobody's that poor. Unless you're a hippy squatter of course. The graveyard theory is good AE-wise (single cause/single outcome) but I rather think, if true, there'd be a literature on it. Maybe there is.
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Hatty
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In: Berkshire
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According to this Haworth church website the father who had traipsed around the surrounding villages in the course of his parish priest duties was long lived even by modern standards. So despite being in the house he wasn't necessarily in the house http://www.haworthchurch.co.uk/history/

Patrick Bronte died in 1861 at the age of 84, having outlived his entire family and having served the Parish of Haworth for 41 years. He is still the longest serving incumbent of Haworth Parish Church.


The parsonage we see today is post-Bronte by the sound of it

In 1879 it was decided to take down the old church building and build a new one. This caused a national outcry as Haworth and the church had already become a place of Bronte pilgrimage. However, it was proved that the building was unsafe and unsanitary as water from that graveyard was seeping in through the floor, so the work went ahead.

Ishmael was right!
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Ishmael


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Yes. I was right.

In fact, scholars know the truth too but, as is usual, hesitate to put the blame squarely where it belongs.

After I told my wife about my ideas, she Googled members of the family and found this posted to Wikipedia, under the entry for
    Emily Bronte.
    Death

    Emily's health probably was weakened by the harsh local climate and by unsanitary conditions at home, the source of water being contaminated by runoff from the church's graveyard. Branwell died suddenly, on Sunday, September 24, 1848. At his funeral service, a week later, Brontë caught a severe cold which quickly developed into inflammation of the lungs and led to tuberculosis. Though her condition worsened steadily, she rejected medical help and all offered remedies, saying that she would have "no poisoning doctor" near her.
Scholars are in possession of a perfectly reasonable means by which to account for the death of every single Bronte. Yet, they persist in adding more causes than are sufficient to explain the phenomenon (in clear violation Newton's first rule of reasoning and, in AE terms, ignoring the First Presumption of Newton's Hammer: "One effect, one cause"). In fact, in the case above, orthodoxy confuses the obvious, singular, sufficient causality, by surrounding it with multiple, superfluous causality, in the very same sentence, as well as in the sentence to follow. Insane.
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Ishmael


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Mick Harper wrote:
I don't buy the 'cheap house' theory - surely nobody's that poor.


I didn't say Cheap House. I said Cheap Property. In fact, I specifically said that the home "looks alright." And so it did. Like a white-washed tomb. Remember. It was this very presumption that led me to the graveyard.

At the end of To Walk Invisible, a written epilogue informs the viewer of the fates of Emily Bronte and Anne Bronte, stating that both died within two months of Branwell's death. In response, I immediately told my wife; "No way Branwell died of drinking. With two of Branwell's sisters dying so near to his own death, all three deaths have to be related."

That was when I remembered a single line of dialogue from the film. That the house had been provided the family by the Church. Relating to my own experience growing up in a preacher's family, I said, "That house was built in an unsanitary location. Someone was looking to save some money."

Later, when investigating my notions, I stumbled across the picture of the adjacent graveyard. Bingo!
  1. Church Parsonage =>
  2. Cheap Property =>
  3. Insanitary Conditions =>
  4. Graveyard
Such is human nature. When we make purchases for ourselves, we choose what is best for us. When we make purchases for others, we choose what is best for us (this is why state charity also invariably does more harm than good).

No one wants to live adjacent a graveyard. And for a good non-rational reason: Fear of ghosts is likely an evolutionary instinct. Consequently, property is cheap there. Yet, in the age of enlightenment, when Ghosts were dismissed as superstition, mankind boldly set-up house amidst gravestones. Or certain sectors of mankind anyway. The very poor and those whose housing was provided them by the Church.
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