“The Blog of Death” Ernest Hendon: My Story
My name is Ernest Hendon. I am the last remaining survivor of the Tuskegee Experiment. Maybe you never heard of that. A lot of people never have. I was a nobody, and all the men involved in the experiment were nobodys, so there wasn’t a lot to say about it for a lot of years.
1932
I was at the barber shop last week, and a lady named Eunice Rivers told me she was a nurse and asked me if I would like to help out with a medical study. She invited me to come to a clinic in the city and listen to some doctors talk to me. It sounded like a good idea so I decided to go. They told me I have some bad blood, and that they will give me free meals, free rides and burial insurance for when I die if I let them study my blood. That seems nice. It will take some burden off my family if I get sicker from this bad blood I have. I think I’m gonna do it.
1933
I’ve been going in regularly for them to check my bad blood, and there doesn’t seem to be any change. I’m never sick from it. Awhile back I had some sores on me. Then I had fevers and aches and sickness feelings, but that all went away so it probably didn’t have nothing to do with my bad blood. I see Dr. Vonderlehr sometimes, and he asks me questions and nurse Rivers tests my blood some more. I don’t really know what they are getting out of it, but if they say it helps then I just trust them.
1937
A lot of time has passed since my last post, but nothing important has really happened. Every time I go in to get my blood checked I hear about different men from the study that died. I never know how, I just know that it’s a lot. I even heard some of the men say that they have been having a lot of body pain, and a couple of men even went blind. Some of their wives even had babies that were born sick. I don’t know if that’s from their blood problems or if it just happened.
1943
It’s been a long time since I’ve had anything to say. There still haven’t been many changes. I’m kind of weak and tired a lot, but for the most part, my blood hasn’t made me too sick. Dr. Vonderlehr isn’t working here anymore. His assistant Dr. Heller has taken over and we deal with him and nurse Rivers when we go in. There have been a few times that I didn’t see the point in continuing with this whole thing and nurse Rivers tells me what a service I am doing for my community and how all the black people are being helped by what I’m doing. I guess I’ll keep doing it.
1958:
Today I got a special award from the Surgeon General of the United States. It says that they are grateful for my 25 years of active participation in this medical research study. That’s really nice. I’m glad that me having my bad blood problem is helping them in some way. Maybe if they figure out why I have it, then they can help someone else. They say this is a study that will do us good, so I’m proud to be one that they chose.
July 25, 1972
I am shocked and don’t really know what to say as I listen to the news. I’m confused about everything that I am hearing. One of the men that I would see when I went to the clinic for my check-ups was on the news today. His name is Peter Buxtin. He is telling everyone that none of us men ever had any “bad blood”. He is telling people that those doctors knew we had syphilis, and they wanted to see how bad it would hurt us or if we would get better without medicine. He said that we never got any medicine that whole time we were going to the doctor. It was just aspirin they were giving us. I don’t understand it. I don’t know why they would do this to us. I guess since I was just a ignorant black man that it didn’t make any difference to anybody and I didn’t matter anyway.
July 27, 1972
This is one of the men from the study. His name is Charlie Pollard.
Today Charlie went to see an attorney in Alabama. He mentioned the news stories, just recently out, that "blew the whistle" on the Tuskegee Syphilis Study. He told everyone that he had been one of the subjects in the study for the past 40 years, and felt that his being in the study without knowing what it was and that he was being denied treatment was a violation of his civil rights-- so he found that attorney that represented Rosa Parks in her action against the bus system of Montgomery. He is going to file a lawsuit against Alabama.
1974
Some good seems to be coming out of this study. I heard that Senator Kennedy held some kind of hearings, and created something called the National Research Act. It will protect people and their rights in medical research. Through all the studying for the hearings they found out that 51% of people wouldn’t have participated in the medical research. At least we would know all about the plans and the reasons they were studying us. It would have been nice to know the truth before I said yes.
December 1974
I found out that this civil rights man that Charlie talked to, Fred Gray has filed a big lawsuit for a lot of money against Alabama for letting the study go on for so long. I read that he wants us to have 1.8 billion dollars. He said they violated the fifth, ninth, thirteenth, and fourteenth amendments of the U.S. and Alabama Constitution of 1901. I’m sorry to say that it never got to go to trial. Today we found out that the government settled it for $10 million. Mr. Gray got $1 million for that. We didn’t get much, about $30,000 each. It seems like they just want to bury this thing. I’m glad Charlie did it though. At least people are hearing about it.
1986
This year nurse Rivers died. I still don’t really know how I feel about her after everything that happened. We always had good relations between us. She would pick us up and take us to the doctor and she would always tell us what a help we were to everything. She said at least we were getting check-ups for free which is a lot more than a lot of people were getting. I don’t think she ever meant to be bad. She was just a nurse doing her job. A lot of people see her as a traitor to our people, but I don’t know. I am sorry she died though.
May 16, 1997
Life has gone on all these years. Nothing special has happened. I would just like to forget everything that happened. After today, maybe I can. Today is a very special day. I am 89 years old, and since I was a young man the medical professionals watched me go without treatment to see what syphilis would do to me. It has not been talked about, or acknowledged much by the people around us. Most everyone that was in it with me is dead and gone. I’m glad I’m still here to see the day that President Bill Clinton is saying for everyone to hear, that they hurt us on purpose, and that they are sorry for it. They are giving us some money too, although that doesn’t help much. I’m an old man, what do I need with money. I’m just glad to hear that they won’t ever do this to anyone else. President Clinton said that the United States government did something that was deeply, profoundly, morally wrong. He said it was an outrage to our integrity and equality for our citizens, and that he was sorry. It doesn’t change everything that happened, but for some reason it feels nice to hear them say out loud that they did us wrong.
December 3, 1999
This is Herman Shaw. He was the most educated of us to survive this long. He died today. We chose him to speak for us all after President Clinton apologized to us all and our families. He was a good man. He was with us from beginning to end of this study.
