  I found urlLink this article from emedicine , which explained that before Roe v Wade, in 1965, at least 265 women died (surely more went unreported from the scandal associated with the act) that year from illegal abortions.
The article also explained the nature of laws regarding the issue that have historically looped together contraceptive use and abortion. I quote: "Before the 19th century, most US states had no specific abortion laws. The provisions of British common law took precedence, and women had the right to terminate a pregnancy prior to viability. Beginning with a Connecticut statute and followed by an 1829 New York law, the next 20 years saw the enactment of a series of laws restricting abortion, punishing providers, and, in some cases, punishing the woman who was seeking the abortion.
The first US federal law on the subject was the notorious Comstock Law of 1873, which permitted a special agent of the postal service to open mail dealing with abortion or contraception in order to suppress the circulation of “obscene” materials. From 1900 until the 1960s, abortions were prohibited by law. However, the Kinsey report noted that premarital pregnancies were electively aborted, and public and physician opinion began to be shaped by the alarming reports of increased numbers of unsafe illegal abortions.
" Also interesting, I found urlLink from the Allen Guttmacher Institute that the legality of abortion almost never plays a consequence in the rate at which women seek abortions. I quote: "Yet, while it may seem paradoxical, a country's abortion rate is not closely correlated with whether abortion is legal there. For example, abortion levels are quite high in Latin American countries, where abortion is highly restricted. (In fact, 20 million of the 46 million abortions performed annually worldwide occur in countries with highly restrictive abortion laws.
) At the same time, abortion rates are quite low throughout Western Europe, where the procedure is legal and widely available. Also, Eastern and Western Europe have the world's highest and lowest abortion rates, respectively, yet abortion is generally legal throughout the Continent.
" 
