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house directly into the sewer in front, are combined with the drains from
adjoining houses, and the combined drainage enters the sewer by one drain
under one of the set of houses. From a variety of causes this common drain is
liable to get obstructed, and in consequence a number of houses suffer from choked
drains instead of one. In some cases the water for brick-making has been taken
from the open sewers in the neighbourhood of Gospel Oak Fields, and being
saturated with decomposing organic matter, will probably for a long time give
rise to noxious emanations in the houses built with these bricks. In many
houses the receptacle for water is placed in objectionable proximity to the dustbin
and water closet, and is uncovered, so that it gets contaminated with the
gases from these places. Very often there is only one tank to supply water to
the house and to the water closet, and no precautions are taken to prevent the
escape of effluvia from the closet into the water tank. It will be seen that some
of these causes, especially the open sewers, may be removed by you, and that
the recurrence of others may be prevented by increased vigilance in future on
the part of your officers, whilst others can only be obviated by the public being
alive to these matters, and taking care to protect themselves.
By reference to Table 0, it will be observed that the mortality in some streets
and places is twice as high as in others. In this Table I have taken a number
of places as specimens from different parts of the Parish, and calculated the
annual death-rate during four years. Amongst places with high mortality may
be noted Henry Street, Mary Street, and Mary Place, Hampstead Eoad; Drapers
Place, Holbrook Court & Place, Midford Place, New Inn Yard, and Little George
Street, Hampstead Eoad; Hampton Court, Somers Town; Chad's Place, James
Street, Wellington Square, Cooper's Buildings, Melina Place, near Cromer
Street, Poplar Place, and Wilson Place. All of those places have had an
average annual mortality over 30 in the thousand. They are most of them
densely populated by the poor and dirty, and abound with children. There is
a very great difficulty in London for poor people with large families to get
lodgings in any place which is not already thronged with children; so that some
streets and courts literally swarm with children, whilst adjoining streets have
scarcely any. These crowded streets are the constant hotbeds of disease of
various kinds, which, from close proximity and want of pure air, is transmitted
from one to another, and propagated de novo.
Very little has been done in this Parish to abate overcrowding, and distribute
people more evenly through the Parish; extreme cases of overcrowding brought
under my notice have been proceeded against; ten such cases have occurred
during the year 1859; but no systematic efforts have been made in this direction.
In some districts of the Metropolis, it has been made a rule not to allow any
room to be so crowded as not to give 300 cubic feet of space for each occupant,
or 400 for each adult, and 250 for each child There are difficulties in carrying
out such a rule, especially in cases of great poverty, but some such standard,
followed with discrimination, is really required; and this cannot be considered
too high, being much lower than one would like to see, but probably as high as
can be expected, on account of pecuniary considerations. It is about the standard
employed by the Inspectors of the Registered Common Lodging Houses, and the
rooms in these houses, it must be remembered, are only occupied at night, and
are not used for cooking, washing, and other domestic purposes.