HISTORICAL SURVEY 27 



research. Scurvy, however, is the first disease the etiology of which 

 was associated with a definite mode of nutrition. The reasons why 

 scurvy gave no immediate impulse to research were to be looked for 

 in the variety of the feeding, which might have been responsible for 

 the onset of the disease. It was difficult to conceive of the disease 

 as being due to a lack of one and the same substance in the diet. 



It was Kramer (32), an Austrian army physician, who recognized 

 for the first time, the existence of scurvy. In 1720 with a field army 

 in Hungary, he was confronted with a severe epidemic of scurvy. He 

 wrote to the authorities and to his colleagues to secure help. 

 A shipment of dried antiscorbutic herbs was hurried to him in spite 

 of which thousands died of this disease. He then made the following 

 entry in his book: 



Scurvy is a terrible disease for which there is no known cure. Medication 

 does not help, neither does surgery. Be careful of bleeding; shun mercury 

 as a poison. The gums may be massaged, the stiff joints may be rubbed 

 with fat but all in vain. If one could only have available a supply of green 

 vegetables, or a sufficient amount of the vital antiscorbutic juices; or if one 

 could have at hand oranges, limes or lemons, or their preserved pulp or juice 

 so that a lemonade could be made out of them; or administered as such in 

 three or four ounce doses then one could be in a position to cure this dreadful 

 disease, without other help. 



As we see, Kramer selected a method of treatment which could 

 not be better chosen even today. 



Bachstrom (33) recognized in 1734 that the incidence of scurvy 

 was not due to cold weather, sea air or salted meat, but to a lack of 

 fresh vegetables. The latter, he perceived, was the primary cause 

 of the disease. Lind (34), in his work on scurvy, has noted many 

 cases which were cured by administration of oranges or lemons. 

 Cider was next to oranges in its efficacy. At that time, he 

 made the important observation that very severe cases could be 

 cured in 6 days, and recognized also that hard work accentuated the 

 symptoms of scurvy. Coming now to the modern history of scurvy, 

 we must give prominence, above all others, to the name of Barlow (35) 

 who attributed the onset of infantile scurvy (also called, Moller- 

 Barlow's disease) to milk which had been heated for a long time. It 

 was only lately, in 1907, that scurvy in guinea pigs was discovered 

 a discovery of the greatest significance to vitamine research. The 

 work of Hoist and Frolich (36) on this subject was repeated on all 

 sides, and their results were completely corroborated. 



