View report page

153
causes, including seven deaths from violence, viz., two of
women from injuries (verdicts of manslaughter having been
returned), two of infants suffocated, one in bed with the
parents and one otherwise, but how is unknown; one of a
child at 3, from injuries due to an accidental fall, one of a man
from injuries, also due to an accidental fall, and one of a
woman from internal hemorrhage from violence—how caused
is unknown. These deaths from violence were in the proportion
of 3.7 per cent. on total deaths; the relative proportion
for the parish, as a whole, being 3.5 per cent. Fifteen
inquests were held, viz., in the seven cases of violence and in
eight cases of death from "natural causes." The proportion
of deaths in respect of which inquests were held to total
deaths, was 8.0 per cent., the relative proportion of such cases
in the parish, as a whole, being 8.2 per cent.
The recommendations of the Special Committee designed
to effect an amelioration of the conditions of life in the
district, to which in their report the excessive mortality is
attributed, have already been set out, in brief (at page 146). In
the second report for 1896 I dealt, in a measure, with those
conditions, and suggested remedies. For what it is worth, I
reproduce here what I had to say on the subject a year ago.
And firstly, with regard to the question of—
Overcrowding, the figures I submitted went to show
that, on an average, there was not much appearance of
overcrowding, the average number of persons to a room,
being, in round numbers, two. The houses, apart from the 23
common lodging houses, number about 253; they contain
about 1,606 rooms, which were inhabited by 1,187 families,
comprising 3,231 persons. At the same time it can hardly be
doubted that individual cases of overcrowding are by no means
rare. The table at page 154, showing the occupation of the
houses, needs no comment, excepting that ten persons in any
one of the houses in the district would not constitute overcrowding,
provided that the lodgers were evenly distributed in
the several rooms,