Continuing our popular series "Illnesses of Major General Andrew Atkinson Humphreys Who Has Been Dead for 132 Years,"
-"Florida illness." To my exasperation there is no mention of this malady anywhere on the internet nor does biographer Henry Hollingsworth Humphreys explain the diagnosis that he makes. AAH was first sent to Florida on April 12, 1836 and by September 30 his health was broken. Florida illness.
He delights in extremes...He is transferred in a few days from the center of civilization to trackless forests. In January he luxuriates in all the delights of our Capital; in February, he suffers from hunger, thirst, and fatigue in the hummocks of Florida.
1. He did not delight in extremes. He was a "sympathetic child" grown into a physically and psychologically vulnerable man and was unsettled by sudden shifts in circumstances. As we saw last time he wrote some of the darkest words this reconstructive historian has ever read when his "studies were broken up" by "duty" in hellish Provincetown, Massachusetts.
What were these all-important studies, was he making a topographical survey of the female body? HHH doesn't say.
Bipolarity, "Darling I don't know why I go to extremes?" (Major General Billy Joel) There's insufficient bi there, too little highs to correspond to his "despair;" in his entire life, except when he was being shot at at Fredericksburg and Gettysburg, there is no frisson of the positive. It's depression, unadulterated.
2. Henry is not a reliable historian -or- he cannot write. The man cannot get dates right. "In February," AAH is in Florida, suffering. Three sentences before, in the same paragraph, HHH opens Chapter IV with,
Humphreys' Journal of the Florida campaign opens at Camp Georgia, Tampa Bay, April 12, 1836.
When the hell did AAH get to Florida? How does HHH know he was suffering in Florida in February if AAH's journal starts April 12? Maybe Andrew called on the phone? Ah, hadn't thought of that.
AAH had a devil of a time with those devilish Seminoles in the Florida territory.
The death, from natural causes, of a comrade named Herring got to him:
And this:
-"Florida illness." To my exasperation there is no mention of this malady anywhere on the internet nor does biographer Henry Hollingsworth Humphreys explain the diagnosis that he makes. AAH was first sent to Florida on April 12, 1836 and by September 30 his health was broken. Florida illness.
He delights in extremes...He is transferred in a few days from the center of civilization to trackless forests. In January he luxuriates in all the delights of our Capital; in February, he suffers from hunger, thirst, and fatigue in the hummocks of Florida.
1. He did not delight in extremes. He was a "sympathetic child" grown into a physically and psychologically vulnerable man and was unsettled by sudden shifts in circumstances. As we saw last time he wrote some of the darkest words this reconstructive historian has ever read when his "studies were broken up" by "duty" in hellish Provincetown, Massachusetts.
Bipolarity, "Darling I don't know why I go to extremes?" (Major General Billy Joel) There's insufficient bi there, too little highs to correspond to his "despair;" in his entire life, except when he was being shot at at Fredericksburg and Gettysburg, there is no frisson of the positive. It's depression, unadulterated.
2. Henry is not a reliable historian -or- he cannot write. The man cannot get dates right. "In February," AAH is in Florida, suffering. Three sentences before, in the same paragraph, HHH opens Chapter IV with,
Humphreys' Journal of the Florida campaign opens at Camp Georgia, Tampa Bay, April 12, 1836.
When the hell did AAH get to Florida? How does HHH know he was suffering in Florida in February if AAH's journal starts April 12? Maybe Andrew called on the phone? Ah, hadn't thought of that.
AAH had a devil of a time with those devilish Seminoles in the Florida territory.
Poor fellow, with his talents and ambition, to die so young was indeed hard.
Seems obvious transference, AAH onto Herring. But nothing prepares the reconstructive historian for this:
September 25, he reached Charleston, South Carolina, on his way north, broken in health from the exposure, fatigue, and privations endured in the Indian campaigns...These, with the pestilential climate, had wrought their work upon a very strong constitution.
September 30, 1836, his resignation was tendered, accepted, and announced in orders from the War Department.
April 12-September 30: The Short Unhappy Life of Andrew Humphreys, Soldier.
This step was not taken without consulting his father..who approved it.
Remember, his father had gotten him into West Point to "control" him.
On the next page, HHH writes,
He intended joining [the Corps of Engineers] after a short visit to his parents, when an attack of Florida illness, more severe than those which had preceded...
WHAT PRECEDED?! This is the first mention of "Florida illness!"
...prostrated him for a year, and at times even his life was in danger.
No. Whatever "Florida illness" was it was not physical, no strictly physical illness is going to knock you on your ass for a year. Let's say it was malaria: you'd get sick, recover, or DIE. It is not going to come--September: health "broken,"--go away,--"Humphreys had been...seeking employment...,"--and then come again. What Humphreys had was a nervous breakdown.
Thanks to the careful nursing of a gentle and loving mother,...
Mother could not help a son suffering from, e.g. malaria, but a gentle and loving one of those could help her sympathetic child who had cracked up.
...the skilful handling [of a physician], his life was saved for future usefulness to his country.
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