Daily AncestorPleurisy
Pleurisy means inflammation of the lining around the lungs, causing sharp chest pain with each breath; in old records it often went with pneumonia.
Pleurisy is inflammation of the pleura, the thin lining around the lungs and inside the chest wall. Its sign is a stabbing pain when breathing in.
The term is still used today. On older death records it usually reflects a chest infection such as pneumonia or tuberculosis, since pleurisy was more often a sign of those than an illness on its own.
As seen in a recordCause of death column, 1850 to 1880 federal mortality schedule
Thos. Gray, 55, M, W, Married, N.C., March, Pleurisy, 10 days
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Daily Ancestor. "Pleurisy." Dictionary of Old Record Words. https://dailyancestor.com/dictionary/causes-of-death/pleurisy. Last checked 2026-10-01.