bed

1847 Salem Reg. (MA) 17 June 1/3, ‘Where’s B?’ says one. ‘Sick in the bed with a rash crisis—red as a lobster from head to foot.’ 1918 Waterloo Eve. Courier & Waterloo Daily Reporter (IA) 24 May 2/4, A woman sick in the bed was uninjured, altho the house was wrecked. 1930 Amarillo Globe (TX) 29 Aug 15/3, [Letter:] I have a wife and four children and one of them is sick in the bed. I need work badly. 1944 PADS 2.13 AL, Sick in the bed. . . Other American dialects omit the article. . . General. 1945 PADS 3.12 cSC, Sick in the bed. . . We never say sick in bed. 1946 AmSp 21.270 neKY, Phrase, ‘In the bed.’ ‘He’s been sick in the bed all week.’ ‘I was so tired (tard) I was in the bed before eight o’clock.’ This use of the definite article may derive from a time when one house normally contained one bed. 1965–70 DARE (Qu. X43b) Inf MS63, Stayed on the bed; (Qu. BB41) Infs AR21, VA74, (Sick) in the bed; (Qu. BB42) Inf MA5, In the bed; (Qu. BB43) Inf GA42, On the bed; GA72, Homesteaded in the bed; (Qu. II3) Infs AR3, 18, 33, Thick as six in the bed; KY44, Like two in the bed. 1973 Patrick Coll. Sth, In the bed. . . Sick in bed. “She is in the bed.” 1987 Kytle Voices 149 NC, There’s not a one of us couldn’t have lain up in the bed many a morning if we’d had the chance to work at a more convenient time. 2009 Aiken Std. (SC) 15 Nov sec A 7/5, At the end of the year, they took the courting to the next step. He was sick in the bed, having spent so much time studying and trying to graduate.