On December 14, 1895, more than 30 brass band musicians sat down to dinner at a pub in the Belgian village of Ellezelles. They’d just played at a funeral, and, as was tradition, had gone to Le Rustic for a meat-heavy meal, complete with a large quantity of smoked and pickled ham. Within 24 hours, almost all of them fell sick with stomach problems, blurred vision, speech difficulties, and even paralysis. A week later, three had died and ten more were critically ill.
Suspicion quickly fell on the ham—musicians who hadn’t eaten it seemed unharmed—and local officials launched a full investigation, including interviews with survivors and background checks on the meat’s origins. Local medics would have suspected botulism, also known as “sausage poisoning,” says Frank Erbguth, a clinical neurologist at Paracelsus Medical University in Nuremberg who has studied the history of the condition. Associated with consumption of certain types of ...
