Hints from the Health Department. Leaflet from the archive of the Society of Medical Officers of Health. Credit: Wellcome Collection, London
Annual report on the public health of Finsbury for the year 1914
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2 rooms. The baby was clothed in a cotton shirt, stiff cotton
binder, a dirty foul napkin, and a verminous, roomy, old brown
coat discarded by one of the older children. The tenement was
visited at 3 p.m. The mother was then dirty, untidy, and unwashed.
The older children were said to have been washed, but
were "not yet dry." The rooms, the chairs, the table and
domestic utensils were filthy.
3. The baby was 6 weeks old and the first child. The family
occupied one room. The mother was out at work as a machinist.
The father had been out of work for a long time. The mother
kept the father and the home. The baby was fat, but small. It
was left in charge of the mother's sister, who had had two children
and lost both. The mother went to her sister's house at meal
times to suckle the baby.
4. The baby was 5 weeks old and the ninth child. Six children
had died—only three now lived. The family occupied one room
at a weekly rental of 3s. The baby, at birth, weighed 9 lbs.—at
five weeks it weighed 8 lbs. 14 ozs. The mother was a jam
bottler, earning at most 8s. per week, and left the baby daily with
another woman in the same street. It was being fed on condensed
milk. The doctor who saw it said it was having insufficient
food. The mother was unable to afford more. The father was in
prison for ill-treating his wife.
5. The baby was 14 days old and the third child. One child
had died. The family occupied one room. The mother was dirty,
verminous, and smelt offensively. The mother and grandmother
were both drunk. The baby was very dirty and verminous;
apparently it had not been washed for many days. The walls oif
the tenement, the bedding and the pictures were verminous. The
father was a soldier, away from home.
6. The babies were twins, 5 weeks old, and the 10th and 11th
children. The parents had only lost one child, and occupied 2
rooms. The father was a labourer out of work. The mother had
casual employment, and at the time of the visit was out looking
for work. The babies were being bottle-fed by a girl 14 years of