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21
An instauce has occurred where question has been made as to the activity
of the Board. It deserves to be cited as showing what their powers are in an
extreme case, and what difficulties and obstacles to sanitary improvement are
occasionally met with. In January, 1859, the Sanitary Inspector reported that
there was an open privy with a cesspool, at No. 30—31, Southampton Mews,
and that there were very foul smells in the premises. Notice was given to the
owner on Feb. 2nd, and a second notice in March. In April, the owner was
summoned. In May a magistrate's order was made to effect the necessary improvements,
and meanwhile to close the premises as unfit for human habitation.
In August the owner was summoned to show cause why the order was disobeyed.
In December (some delay having occurred through an informality of the order)
a penalty was inflicted for allowing the house to be still occupied without alteration.
This was not paid, and in January, 1860, the owner was imprisoned for
a month in default. In April, he was again imprisoned after a repetition of
these proceedings. Still nothing was done, and the rooms continued to be occupied.
As the measures against the owner failed to procure any improvement,
the man having no objection to the alternative of prison, application was made
by the Board for assistance to the steward of the Duke of Bedford, but even up
to the date of the present Report, the same conditions remain. Meanwhile, in
the summer of 1859, the houses of Bloomsbury-place and Bloomsbury-square,
on which these premises in the mews abut, were pervaded by bad smells and by
zymotic diseases, referred by the medical attendants of the cases to the miasms
of the mews. In the summer of 1860, again the same smells, and again the
same outbreak in the neighbouring houses, this time taking the form of
diphtheritis. In November, a child from the house itself, died of diphtheritis in
University College Hospital. Aud now, in the summer of 1861, among other
complaints, a medical practitioner writes from Bloomsbury-square—" As usual,
now that the abominations of Southampton Mews are upon us, and the smell
has been most unpleasant, diphtheria has broken out at No. 25 in this square,
also at No. 27." The Board will not fail to view with regret their inability
to afford, even with the extreme measures taken, due protection to their parishioners
in a case of such criminal obstinacy.