Arthur Devlin (216) and Anthrax

Arthur Devlin and his connection to the Pasteur Institute can be found at

Soon after their arrival in Australia, the Pasteur Mission was contacted by Arthur Devlin, a grazier who owned several properties that were affected by a sheep disease known as Cumberland Disease. They agreed to look into this matter while they were in Australia, and within a couple of months the Pasteur Mission announced that they had successfully made a culture of Bacillus Anthracis from the blood of a sheep that had died of Cumberland Disease. As a result of this, it was proposed to proceed to a trial of Pasteur's Anthrax Vaccine.

The trial was held under the supervision of two graziers and three government officials at Junee Junction during September and October 1888. The trial was undertaken on thirty-nine sheep and six head of cattle. It was a complete success: all vaccinated animals remained in very good health, whereas all nineteen unprotected sheep and one of the two non-vaccinated cows died within a few days. The success of the Anthrax Vaccine trial prompted the Government to offer Loir a laboratory and assistants to manufacture the vaccine, which would then be sold to graziers. It was some time, however, before this proposition led to concrete results.

Loir's main task consisted of the preparation of Anthrax Vaccine, using cultures he had brought with him from Paris. Arthur Devlin became the official vaccinator for New South Wales and, with the aid of his sons (including Leslie Devlin) vaccinated 3,000,000 sheep and 50,000 cattle during the following eight years. Loir also devised a vaccine for another cattle plague in Australia: pleuropneumonia.