Nellie Ryan 18771870s, 20s, chicago, illinois, illegalmidwife, 19thcenturyOn October 12, 1877, Nellie Ryan, an unmarried 21-year-old white woman from Turner Junction, Illinois, died in Chicago due to a criminal abortion perpetrated two weeks earlier. The autopsy report noted “The internal surface of the womb showed no marks of violence, but was inflamed and in the incipient state of gangrene.”

Amelia Spork, a doctor or midwife, was arrested for Nellie’s death but released by the Coroner’s Jury. A man named Dougherty was sought by police in connection with the case, which was considered a double homicide.

There are a lot of articles about Nellie’s death at Newspapers.com.

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I have no information on overall maternal mortality, or abortion mortality, in the 19th century. I imagine it can’t be too much different from maternal and abortion mortality at the very beginning of the 20th Century.

Note, please, that with issues such as doctors not using proper aseptic techniques, lack of access to blood transfusions and antibiotics, and overall poor health to begin with, there was likely little difference between the performance of a legal abortion and illegal practice, and the aftercare for either type of abortion was probably equally unlikely to do the woman much, if any, good.

For more on this era, see Abortion Deaths in the 19th Century.

For more on pre-legalization abortion, see The Bad Old Days of Abortion

Sources:

• Homicide in Chicago Interactive
• “The Nellie Ryan Murder,” The Chicago Tribune, Oct. 13, 1877

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