"This paper reviews the literature on occupational diseases in 19th-century France published in the first three series of Annales d'Hygiène Publique et de Médecine Légale (1829–1903) and in the reports from departmental sanitary commissions. Its results are threefold: it shows how exhaustion from overwork obliterated occupational diseases in medical representation; how only workers' protests imposed their acknowledgement; and lastly, that it was the costs for hospitals to treat work-related injuries that led to legislation on employers' accountability."