This. My grandparents lived through that in Philly. This is exactly what they said. The "bodies stacked like cordword" were mostly regular deaths that didn't get picked up in a few instances in the slums because the funeral directors or whatever didn't want to go into the filthy slums. But the newspapers made up a bunch of hysteria about it.

My grandfather was a West Point man and an engineer. Very rational and calm under pressure.

He said that "Spanish flu" was mostly a hoax and that the original "virus" was some kind of biological agent from a government program. I thought he was just being a wacky elder...till learning much more about all that within the past ten years. Grandpa, forgive me for not being able to hear you then! Though admittedly I was like eight years old.