| Following the cholera epidemics of 1832 and 1834, all passenger ships arriving in the St. Lawrence River made a compulsory stop at the Grosse Île quarantine station for inspection. If the answers on the questionnaire met the health and security regulations, the ship continued on to Québec City. If not, passengers with contagious diseases were quarantined and nursed at the station's hospital. Grosse Île is the burial ground of thousands of Irish immigrants who fled their country during the famine and fell victim to the typhus epidemic of 1847. That year, medical officers and volunteers from the clergy removed more than 4,500 bodies from the ships. Doctors examined more than 68,000 immigrants, of whom 5,424 landed on the island only to die there. RG 42, vol. 12, file 12 |