Daily AncestorHectic fever
Hectic fever was the recurring fever with bright pink flushed cheeks that came with consumption and other long wasting diseases.
The word hectic once meant habitual or constitutional, and hectic fever described a fever that came back day after day in a person slowly wasting away. The pink flush on the cheeks was its most noticed sign.
Hectic fever was a symptom, not a disease of its own. When it appears as a cause of death, the underlying illness was very often tuberculosis.
As seen in a recordCause of death column, 1850 to 1880 federal mortality schedule
Sarah Lowe, 24, F, W, Feb., Hectic fever
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Daily Ancestor. "Hectic fever." Dictionary of Old Record Words. https://dailyancestor.com/dictionary/causes-of-death/hectic-fever. Last checked 2026-10-01.