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5
Annual Report of the Medical Officer of Health—1897.
Prom Table I. it will be seen that the number of males in the parish is some 200
in excess of the females. This may, I think, be explained by the following facts, (a) the
presence of a number of factories where men are employed either exclusively or mainly,
(b) the comparatively small number of domestic servants employed in the parish, (c)
the presence of the Salvation Army Shelter which attracts to the Parish a daily average
of several hundred men. (In 1895 the Senior District Magistrate estimated the
Salvation Army accommodation at 550 per night) and (d) Bethlem Hospital, in which
there is an. excess of male patients. Another point brought strongly into relief by
Table I. is the fact that the division of the parish into sub-districts affords a more
equal grouping of inhabitants than a division by Wards.
Thus the greatest difference between the individual sub-district population is
6,796, whereas in the Wards the extreme difference is 9,304.
This disproportion which will be alluded to again in the course of this Report has
an important bearing on various matters of administration.
Population.—The number of inhabitants for the whole parish, according to the
Census of 29th March, 1896, was 60,278 as against 59,712 in the Census of 1891. In
the middle of 1897 the figures estimated on the foregoing Census reached 60,388.
The rate of increase was extremely low, compared with that of London generally.
Births and Birth-Rate.
Table II. gives the birth-rate per 1,000 per annum for the years 1895, 1896 and
1897 in each sub-district, of the parish, in London, and in the thirty-three large
English towns.

It will be seen that the birth-rate is 1.6 lower than that of the preceding year,
and is considerably above that for the whole of London. The diminished rate of
increase of population in the three sub-districts of the parish of St. George's is, therefore,
not attributable to a falling off in the number of persons born into the parish, but
rather to a relatively high death-rate. A reference to the section of the mortality of
infants and children will reveal the fact that in the year 1897, nearly one-half, i.e.,
47.3 of the total deaths in St. George's, Southwark, have taken place under five years
of age.
The fact is notable that the birth-rate in St. George's is higher than in London
and in the thirty-three large towns. This may, I think, be partly explained by the
fact that limitation of families is carried into effect by the better-to-do classes rather
than by the poor.