The bride and the groom, being either poor orphans, beggars, or disabled, were wed in an effort to ward-off diseases.
[2] It is hoped that by performing this form of charity the souls of the deceased would reward their efforts and intercede to block the evil decree.
[1] Rokhl Kafrissen wrote for the Tablet magazine: The cholera wedding didn’t have one single interpretation.
[3]Kafrissen wrote that "The first evidence of a plague wedding is from 1831, during Russia’s first cholera pandemic and then another written reference to one taking place in 1849 in Krakow.
[5] According to Nathan Meir, "In the early 20th century, a new category of marginal persons appeared: those who carried the physical and mental scars of World War and pogroms.