[Inclosure 1 in No. 163.]
Lord Granville to
Mr. Lowell.
Foreign
Office, April 8,
1881.
Sir: I have the honor to acknowledge the
receipt of your note dated the 1st instant, containing representations
on the part of the United States Government in regard to the reports
which have reached Her Majesty Government, through the British consul at
Philadelphia, respecting the alleged prevalence of disease in swine, the
meat of which is, in various forms, largely exported from America to
Europe, and especially, as it is understood, to this country. It is
needless for me, sir, to assure you that Her Majesty’s Government will
he happy to receive any trustworthy evidence of the non-existence of hog
cholera or trichinosis in the pork exported from the United States,
seeing that the stoppage of such an important article of consumption
cannot fail to occasion much inconvenience in this country.
With respect, however, to the strictures which appear to be conveyed in
your note regarding the trustworthy character of the information on this
subject supplied to Her Majesty’s Government, I would beg to draw
attention to the inclosed copy of a memorandum which has been furnished
to Her Majesty’s minister at Washington by Mr. Warrack, the British
vice-consul at Chicago, showing the official sources from which he
derived the statistical information furnished by him to Mr. Acting
Consul Crump, the accuracy of whose reports on swine disease is now
called in question. I feel bound on behalf of Her Majesty’s Government
to observe that they are not as yet in possession of any intelligence
calculated to throw a doubt on the prevalence of these diseases in the
United States. They moreover cannot but think that a reference to the
official statistics above alluded to will tend to disabuse the mind of
the United States Government of the idea that Mr. Crump has been imposed
upon by designing speculators, and will place them in a position to
withdraw the very serious insinuation contained in your note against the
good faith of that gentleman; a charge, the grounds for which Her
Majesty’s Government must confess they are at a loss to understand.
Her Majesty’s Government, however, can only wish to arrive at the true
facts of the case, and to find that the public confidence in the
wholesomeness of American pork may be safely re-established; and I
accordingly beg to inform you that they will take an early opportunity
of laying before Parliament the correspondence on the subject, in which
they will be happy to include any authentic information with which the
United States Government may favor them.
I have the honor to be, &c.,
[Inclosure 2 in No. 163.]
(memorandum.)
Illinois Agricultural Department’s circular 70, dated August 20, 1880,
and the latest available at the date of my letter of December 18, 1880,
states the number of hogs and pigs which died of cholera as follows:
1877, 1,445,268; 1878, 1,391,422; 1879, 676,738.
These are the “figures” returned by “assessors.” Years 1878 and 1879 are
verified by showing in detail the loss in each county. Vide for 1878, page 383 of the seventeenth volume Transactions
of Department of Agriculture, Illinois; and for 1879 see page 107 of
circular 70. For the year 1878 thirteen counties do not appear to have
reported, and there are three missing in 1879. The number of hogs
assessed per reports of assessors (see page 50 of circular 70), are, in
1879, 2,799,051; 1880, 3,133,557.
At this date, August 20, 1880, the percentage of deaths of the assessed
hogs in 1880 had not been ascertained, but in circular 72, of December
31, 1880, it is given 6 per cent, in 1879, 7 per cent, in 1880, and on
page 80 of circular 72 the following figures appear:
[Page 529]
| Year. |
Number of hogs assessed. |
Per
cent. died. |
Number died. |
Average weight. |
Value. |
|
|
|
|
Pounds. |
|
| 1877 |
2,961,366 |
12 |
358,844 |
104 |
$1,853,415 |
| 1878 |
3,334,920 |
14 |
474,758 |
108 |
1,438,589 |
| 1879 |
2,790,051 |
6 |
182,577 |
98 |
588,487 |
| 1880 |
3,133,537 |
7 |
227,259 |
104 |
937,293 |
This shows an increase of 12 per cent, in the number of assessed hogs,
and a further increase, viz, 1 per cent. in the rate per cent, of those
which died.
That there were more swine in Illinois in 1880 then in 1879 is
corroborated by the following statistics taken for the regular “Board of
Trade” circular issued daily from the best and most trustworthy sources
accessible to the publishers:
|
1880. |
1879. |
| Receipt of hogs at Chicago for
ten months to November 1* |
5,222,495 |
4,888,309 |
| Shipments same period |
1,285,993 |
1,509,840 |
| Number packed, including city
consumption, from January 1 to November 1, 1880 |
3,936,502 |
3,278,409 |
| Number packed from November 1,
1880, to December 17, 1880, the date of my advice being
December 18 |
1,505,050 |
1,300,000 |
| Total |
5,441,502 |
4,578,469 |
Increase of hogs killed in Chicago from January 1 to December 17, 1880,
863,033, or 19 per cent.
The increase in number assessed, as reported by the State assessors,
being the difference between 2,799,051 for 1879, and 3,133,557, is
334,506 or, 12 per cent.
It will be observed that the figures dealt with by the parties interested
in attacking the accuracy of Mr. Crump’s report are the deaths of the
assessed hogs, and they do not appear in any
of the numerous published communications to refer to the figures as
given by the only authorized State assessors of Illinois, and published
in the Illinois report of the deaths of the total so-called “hog crop”
of the State.
Something has been said by the parties who ignore the total deaths to show that the light weights of the assessed hogs, say an average of 108 pounds in
1878, 98 pounds in 1879, and 104 pounds in 1880, prove these to have
been among young “shoats” and pigs, but turning to the reports of the
assessors as detailed on page 81 of circular No. 70, dated August 20,
1880, we find that the gross weights of the “hogs and pigs which died of
cholera” and the number in the following years are as follows:
|
|
1877. |
1878. |
1879. |
| Number of hogs and pigs died of cholera |
|
1,445,268 |
1,391,422 |
676,738 |
| “Total gross weight of swine died of cholera” |
pounds |
106,949,832 |
139,853,508 |
49,326,591 |
| These give average weights in
these years of |
do |
74 |
100 |
73 |
As against 108 and 98 pounds, already quoted as the average weight of the
swine, which in these years (1878 and 1879) out of the assessed
numbers.
The figure—700,000—given by me was purposely put low, and was based
mainly on the statistics as published, and also on the general
information one gathers from dealers and farmers. Had the circular of
December 31, 1880, been available at the time I reported, or, rather,
had I reported after its issue instead of before, I would have made the
loss at least 750,000, perhaps 800,000. For if a loss of 182,577 accrues
in 1879 from a 6 per cent, rate on 2,799,051 assessed swine, and the
total loss in the same year is 676,738, then it is clear that if the
death-rate in 1880 is 7 per cent, and the deaths of assessed hogs
227,259 out of 3,13,557, the total deaths for 1880 of all the swine
raised in the State will be about 842,000.
J. WARRACK.
Chicago, March 16,
1881.
