Daily AncestorSnake bite
Snake bite on an old record meant death from the venom of a poisonous snake; statisticians counted it as a poisoning.
Wiktionary gives snake bite as another form of snakebite. The 1911 Census Bureau manual indexes snake bite and snake venom poisoning under other acute poisonings, not under injuries by animals.
IPUMS has a code for death by poison and another for injury from animals; the manual's choice shows a snake bite death was thought of as poisoning by venom.
As seen in a recordCause of death column, 1850 to 1880 federal mortality schedule
Ephraim Tuxbury, 12, M, W, July, Snake bite, 1 d.
Sources
How to cite this page
Daily Ancestor. "Snake bite." Dictionary of Old Record Words. https://dailyancestor.com/dictionary/causes-of-death/snake-bite. Last checked 2026-10-12.