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will be explained shortly), was 138, or 1.54 percent. on the population,
which is 0.26 higher than the rate for all England. Assuming this as
the natural rate of increase, more than 1 percent. of the general increase
was due to immigration, and points markedly to the development of the
trading and manufacturing energies of the town.
Mortality—Rate of—Comparison with other Districts—with
Former Years—of Early Life—from Epidemic Diseases—
Relation to Social Position—to the Sanitary conditions of
Houses.
The mean annual mortality of this parish during the eleven years
1846—56, deduced from the registered deaths, and the present estimated
population was 2½ percent. But this mode of deduction is liable to
two great sources of error. 1st. From undue increase by the mortality
of the Surrey County Lunatic Asylum, whose inmates are derived from
the whole County of Surrey, to which a very small proportion is contributed
by this parish, which undergo no natural increase, and are subject, as in
all such institutions, to a high mortality (which in this instance is 9.06
percent.), and by the deaths in the House of Correction and St. Peter's
Hospital, the population of both of which institutions was not included
in the last census: and 2ndly, from a decrease by exclusion of the deaths
of the Wandsworth portion of inmates of the workhouse which are
registered in Battersea, the w orkhouse being situated there on the confines
of the two parishes. To deduce a correct natural death-rate,
therefore, it is necessary to withdraw from the calculation the mortality
and population of the Asylum, minus that portion contributed by
Wandsworth, together with the mortality in the House of Correction
and St. Peter's Hospital, and to add to it the deaths of inmates of the
workhouse belonging to Wandsworth. This done shews an annual rate
of 2.395 percent. for the years 1846—55. But this is inclusive of the
cholera years, 1849 and 1854; if these be excluded, the rate is 2.179
percent., which may be taken as the average natural death-rate, and is
22 in 10,000 less than that of London, and 4 in 10,000 less than that
of all England during the ten years, 1843—53, exclusive of 1849; it is
49 in 10,000 less than that of the other districts south of the Thames,
but about 2 in 1,000 more than the whole Wandsworth district.
A comparison of this average rate with that of last year shews an
advantage to the latter. Applying the same calculation as before the
death-rate for the past year was 2.137 percent., which is 0.042 less
than the average of ten preceding years.
From the foregoing statistics an important fact is deducible; viz.,
the existence of a high rate of increase and of a diminished mortality—
conditions which it is the especial object of sanitary legislation to produce
and maintain.
Of the 314 deaths which occurred last year (181 males and 133 females),
74, or upwards of 23.5 percent. died under the age of 5 years, and 50,
or 15.9 per cent. did not attain the age of 1 year. Nearly ¾ths of this
mortality of infants, which was not much short of ¼th of the whole, was
due to diseases intimately associated with the use of an impure