Odderøya – the Quarantine Station and Cholera Cemetery

Agder · Norge · Cemetery

As early as 1804 Kristiansand established a quarantine station and quarantine hospital on Odderøya outside the town – in time the largest in northern Europe. The 1799 decision to build a hospital for plague-stricken ships' crews met fierce local resistance, and Swedish builders had to be hired. The station stayed in operation until 1914. Those who died in isolation were not laid to rest among the town's other dead but buried in the island's own cholera cemetery, down by the sea some way from the hospital. Cholera was long believed to spread through "miasmas" in the air, and separate epidemic graves were a way of quarantining the contagion even after death. When cholera arrived on the steamer Constitutionen in 1853, five of the first six infected died. Today people swim in the cove beside the burial ground.

FAQ

Hvor ligger Odderøya – the Quarantine Station and Cholera Cemetery?

Odderøya – the Quarantine Station and Cholera Cemetery ligger i Agder, Norge.

Oplysningerne bygger på lokal folketro og vidneberetninger.

Image: Carsten R D · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons