View report page

10
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT
Health Problems in Kensington, 1856 - 1956
It is interesting to compare health problems in Kensington
nowadays with those of a hundred years ago. This was at a time when there
was no Welfare State; no National Health Service; School Health Service;
Maternal and Child Health Service; no London County Council main drainage
and no Metropolitan Water Board. Long before the Public Health Act of
1875; before Infectious Disease was notifiable, and when diseases such as
typhus, cholera, smallpox, plague and enteric were still rampant.
I have recently re-read the first report of the first Medical
Officer of Health of the Parish of St. Mary Abbots, Kensington, in the
County of Middlesex for the year 1856. This Dr. Francis Godrich submitted
his report to the Vestry on 22nd April, 1857, at a time when Kensington had
a total population of 44,000 people occupying 6,136 houses in an area of
1,942 acres. In that year there were 1,199 deaths, giving a death rate of
27•2 per thousand, or 1806 after deducting hospital deaths. The causes of
death in order of frequency were respiratory tuberculosis, bronchitis,
diarrhoea, (which included enteric fever),' old age, pneumonia and heart
disease. Respiratory tuberculosis caused 296 deaths; the next most
frequent, bronchitis, caused 94. It is interesting to note that there were
15 deaths from typhus, 2 from cholera, 13 from smallpox, 20 from scarlet
fever, 30 from measles and 19 from whooping coughs.
From the report it is evident that the health problems of the day
were many and varied. The Medical Officer of Health complained of people
in slum areas being unable to bury the deado In some cases, corpses were
retained for many days or even weeks in overcrowded living rooms, because of
inability to pay for the funeral. He complained of the effluvia nuisance
from tallow melting at the candle factory in the High Street opposite the
Vestry, describing it as "poisonous to the air of the neighbourhood". He
noted the dreadful conditions under which milch cows were kept on domestic
premises; the non-removal of domestic refuse; the 46 licenced slaughter
houses; the offensive smells from brick and clay burning in North Kensington
the necessity for condemning "putrid sausages, beef, mutton and fish"; the
use of alum for bread whitening. He also reported on the water supplies of
the borough, advising that all the superficial wells were generally unfit
for potable purposes and that many water storage cisterns were neglected,
dirty and fouled, while lead cisterns contaminated the water with lead salts.
Incidentally, he reported that he had examined the gas for illuminating
power and chemical purity:
Above all, he complained of the dreadful housing and living
conditions in certain parts of the borough. He complained, for example,
of the bad housing in Jennings Buildings. These were situated in a
cul de sac approached from an entrance in the High Street nearly opposite
Kensington Palace Gardens and standing on the present site of Kensington
Court. In all, approximately 800 people lived there and it is recorded
that there was a separate family in each room; no water supply; no
drainage and no water closet accommodation. Overcrowding was rife. For
instance, in one back room 1,008 cubic feet in capacity, lived 9 persons,
including the father ill with pleuritis. The mortality among the children
under five was 61.3% of the total deaths, and more than half resulted
from infectious disease. Mercifully, Jennings Buildings were demolished
in 1873.
An even greater public health problem was described as "the
gigantic evil of pig keeping in the Potteries". This area was described
in the following terms s-
"One of the most deplorable spots, not only in Kensington, but
in the whole metropolis, is the Potteries at Notting Dale, a locality which
is from its position, difficult to drain. It occupies eight or nine acres
of ground and contains about a thousand inhabitants, the majority of whom
obtain a living by rearing and fattening pigs upon the house refuse obtained