As for native americans dying of disease:
The Spaniards brought smallpox to the Aztec. That started the epidemic on that corner of Central America, in the 1500's.
Smallpox was -intentionally- given to Native Americans in the 1700's, by Wm. Amherst in Massachusetts, via infected blankets offered as "gifts." It was an intentional attempt at genocide.
Other diseases were "given" to Native Americans by settlers and Colonialists during that window between the early 1500's and the mid-1700's:
Among the diseases introduced to the Native American population were smallpox, bubonic plague, chickenpox, cholera, the common cold, influenza, diphtheria, malaria, measles, scarlet fever, sexually transmitted diseases, typhoid, typhus, tuberculosis, leptospirosis, yellow fever and pertussis.
Those diseases did not exist in what is now called the United States. It was all imported by Europeans, including those coming over on the Mayflower.
Leptospirosis was the primary cause of disease and death among the Wampanoag tribe, and most of the Settlers coming from the Mayflower.
This is NOT what we should be thankful for. Especially /most/ of us, whose forefathers didn't settle in the "New World" at all. Most of us here in the Villages can't even claim ancestry in this continent dating back further than the early 1800's.
|