Calomel

Mercury(I) chloride is thechemical compound with the formula Hg₂Cl₂. Also known as calomel (a mineral form, rarely found in nature) ormercurous chloride, this dense white or yellowish-white, odorless solid is the principal example of amercury(I) compound.

Contents 1 History 2 Properties 3 Preparation and reactions 3.1 Calomel electrode 3.2 Photochemistry 4 Related mercury(I) compounds 5 Safety considerations 6 References 7 External links

History

The name calomel is thought to come from the Greekκαλός beautiful, and μέλαςblack. This name (somewhat surprising for a white compound) is probably due to its characteristicdisproportionation reaction with ammonia, which gives a spectacular black coloration due to the finely dispersed metallic mercury formed. It is also referred to as the mineral horn quicksilver orhorn mercury. Calomel was taken internally and used as a laxative and disinfectant, as well as in the treatment of syphilis, until the early 20th century.

Mercury became a popular remedy for a variety of physical and mental ailments during the age of "heroic medicine." It was used by doctors in America throughout the 18th century, and during the revolution, to make patients regurgitate and release their body from "impurities". Benjamin Rush, a famed physician in colonial Philadelphia and signatory to the Declaration of Independence, was one particular well-known advocate of mercury in medicine and famously used calomel to treat sufferers ofyellow fever during its outbreak in the city in 1793. Calomel was given to patients as a purgative until they began to salivate. However, it was often administered to patients in such great quantities that their hair and teeth fell out.^[3] Shortly after yellow fever struck Philadelphia, the disease broke out in Jamaica. 

A war of words broke out in the newspapers concerning the best treatment for yellow fever;
bleeding or calomel.
Anecdotal evidence indicates calomel was more effective than bleeding. ^[4]

Lydia E. Pinkham's Vegetable Compound

Lydia Estes Pinkham (February 9, 1819 – May 17, 1883) was an iconic concocter and shrewd marketer of a commercially successful herbal-alcoholic "women's tonic" meant to relieve menstrual andmenopausal pains.

Contents 1 Biography 2 Lydia E. Pinkham's Vegetable Compound 3 The original product and its modern descendants 4 Drinking songs 5 References 6 Notes 7 External links

Like many women of her time Lydia Pinkham brewed home remedies, which she continually collected. Her remedy for "female complaints" became very popular among her neighbours to whom she gave it away. One story is that her husband was given the recipe as part payment for a debt,^[6] whatever truth may be in this the ingredients of her remedy were generally consistent with the herbal knowledge available to her through such sources as John King's American Dispensary which she is known to have owned and used.^[4] In Lydia Pinkham's time and place the reputation of the medical profession was low. Medical fees were too expensive for most Americans to afford except in emergencies, in which case the remedies were more likely to kill than cure. For example a common "medicine" was calomel, in fact not a medicine but a deadly mercurial toxin, and this fact was even at the time sufficiently well known among the sceptical to be the subject of a popular comic song.^[7] In these circumstances there is no mystery why many preferred to trust unlicensed "root and herb" practitioners, and to trust women prepared to share their domestic remedies such as Lydia Pinkham.^[8]

Lydia E. Pinkham's Vegetable Compound  became one of the best known patent medicines of the 19th century.