The New Hampshire Gazette And Historical Chronicle

Terrible Destruction by the Plague.
A L E P P O, (in Turkey) August 31.

The Turks say, that they have not for 86 Years past experienced the Calamity of the Plague to that Degree they have lately at Basora and Bagdad. On the 19th of January last the Plague broke out in the Suburbs of the last mentioned Place, and began to spread into the City ; and in the Months of February, March, and April, its Progress was so rapid, that out of Four Hundred Thousand Inhabitants, there remained but a Fourth Part. The Inhabitants of Hela, Iman Ally, Iman Huein, and Iman Mouffa, all proved the Victims of the Contagion. The Pilgrims who came to those Places in April, as usual, to pay their Devotions, found nothing but dead Carcasses and empty Habitations. The Pilgrims from Iman Ally, and the Jew Families who had escaped from Bagdad, went to Basora, and carried the Contagion there.---- Towards the End of March the Christians and Franks took the necessary Precautions to escape the Infection : but the Musulmen felt the Effects of it most dreadfully.----- Eight Thousand Turks in one quarter of the Town only, died between the 15th and 25th of April; and out of 200 Domesticks belonging to the Governor, he had but one Slave left alive, 'who was employed in fetching Rice for the Subsistence of his Master. There were 100,000 in that City, out of which 30,000 died, 5000 escaped into the Persian Gulph, 5000 others recovered from the Distemper, and 10,000 were so happy to escape the Infection.