sam's story

sam's story

Sam never knew his mother. She died two days after he was born. She and her husband Stephen already had five children. Their three daughters and two sons were delivered without much complication. Sam, however was a breech baby. He presented butt first. Mrs Howlett, the midwife, recognized the problem. She knew that Elizabeth could never push Sam into the world so long as he remained with his ass out and his legs over his shoulders. Both of them would die.  
“We must have a doctor,” she told Stephen   shortly after Elizabeth’s water broke and her labor began.
Doctors were scarce in 1689, especially in mid-winter. Devon was well-populated and Plymouth a busy seaport, but even so their chances of getting someone who could help weren’t good. From her years at the bedside Mrs. Howlett knew that doctors rarely did much   anyway. Dr. Pearce lived nearby, but she wondered if they’d find him sober or if he would be of any use even if they did.
“We can’t get her to the hospital in Plymouth, but perhaps someone from there could come out here in time.”
“I don’t know,” Stephen hesitated. The thought of abandoning his wife weighed heavily on him. A master shipwright he knew his job at the yard, but he was much less certain of how to help his wife. But who else could he send into the   midnight drizzle? Peter, his eldest, was not yet twelve. He had no horse. Normally he walked the three miles to the yard on the edge of the Hoe above the town. The hospital was further still. Could he ride their cow?
“Go, please...we’ll be fine until you return. The boys will tend the fire to keep us warm and the water hot. The girls are very brave...they’ll keep their mother’s spirits up.   Elizabeth will be in   pain, but we’ll do our best to keep her comfortable. What she needs is a doctor to help the baby out, to deliver her. When a babe is breech like this one I know   I’ll not be able to bring it out. A doctor is the only chance, for Elizabeth and for the...