Whether or not it was brought by the troopships, America was in the middle of a smallpox epidemic.
The majority of Americans had lived three generations without contact with smallpox and were more likely to die from it, about two out five Americans survived infection. It was the reason for the high casualty rates among surrendered colonists held in British prison ships, only one in ten survived imprisonment.
Washington dealt with the disease in Valley Forge by inoculating healthy soldiers with pus from infected troops which was introduced into the bloodstream directly by a small cut made for the purpose. Pus is mainly a build up of dead bacteria, so soldiers treated in this way had a chance of building up resistance to the live disease. Some of them did die from this procedure, but his main army pulled through.
They destroyed vital supplies. What is one way the Eastern Front was different from the Western Front? The Eastern Front had front lines that moved widely, while the Western Front did not.
Some think it was called this because of how the skin turned dark at the late stages of the disease, but it was more likely called "Black" to reflect the dark and horrible time in history.
