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introducing the reports made to the Committee for Drainage,
&c., on the subject.
REPORT No. 4, DATED MARCH 27, 185G.
In consequence of a complaint made and signed by thirteen individuals, of
being annoyed and injured by an excessively offensive stench, proceeding from
premises connected with, and belonging to, the Tower Hamlets' Cemetery, I
visited the spot on the 22nd instant.
In a shed was a steam engine, employed in working two lift pumps for
the purpose of raising the contents of a well or shaft, 30 feet deep, to an
overflow tank, a little above the level of the adjacent sewer, with which the
tank was connected by a drain.
The fluid raised by the pumps was the evident cause of the pollution of
the atmosphere, and it was equally clear that the source of such pollution
was not to be attributed to the natural drainage of the Cemetery itself.
When the land of the Cemetery was being prepared for the purpose of
interment, it was drained to the depth of about 20 feet. The drains which
were then constructed, poured their contents into a large underground
reservoir, which was relieved by flowing over into an Artesian well, constructed
for that purpose. The Artesian well having been rendered useless through
obstruction, the shaft, (the subject of the present complaint,) was sunk, and
pumps used to raise the drainage into the sewer. After using the pumps
some time, the fluid thrown up by them, instead of being tolerably clear,
became slate-coloured, muddy, of a very offensive smell, and much larger in
quantity. On opening the drains, this offensive fluid was found to enter the
drain directly, and at a particular spot, where it rushed in with violence, and
continues to do so at the present time.
In the immediate neighbourhood is a pond belonging to the Great Central
Gas Company, into which refuse has been thrown in abundance. That pond
has been rapidly sinking since the steam engine in the Tower Hamlets'
Cemetery has been used, and in all probability it will soon be exhausted,
when the large drain in the Cemetery will admit of repair. In consequence
of a remonstrance from the Vestry of the Poplar district, I am informed that
the persons employed at the Great Central Gas Company's Works will not
be permitted to continue to throw the refuse into the pond where it has
usually been thrown, that they will consume it instead by evaporation in
pans placed under their retorts, while the furnaces used in heating the
retorts will consume the gases which will be given off.
I think it fairly conclusive that the liquor in the pond, having found its
way through a rent in the soil, has burst into the drain in the Tower Hamlets'
Cemetery, and the process of pumping, which has produced the effluvium