SURVIVAL OF A ONE-POUND FEMALE INFANT BORN IN 1847

After a thorough literature search of the survival rates of premature infants, I believe the infant described below was the smallest to survive until this century.1 I am mindful that the reported birth weights in the past may have been inaccurate because the weighing of newborn infants was not an accepted practice prior to this century. 2 Mrs. A. (aged 30) weaned her first child on the 17th of November 1846, a fortnight after which (1st December) she menstruated naturally. Two days after the catamenia disappeared (7th December), she conceived, having the same sensations post coitu which she felt at her previous conception. At four months she quickened. She was delivered (by a midwife) of her second child, a female, on the 14th of May 1847-on the hundred and fifty-eighth day of gestation. The child had only rudimentary nails, and almost no hair, except a little, of slightly reddish colour, at the lower part of the back of the head. It weighed one pound, and measured eleven inches. It was merely wrapped up at first, laid in a box about a foot long, used by the father (who is a slater) for carrying nails, and set on the kitchen fender, before the fire, to keep it warm. It came on very well, and was subsequently treated very much the same as other children, except perhaps, that it was a little more looked after than usual, being considered a curiosity. She is still of small make but is quite healthy, and takes her food well.