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5
The principal cause which swells up our death rate is
the disproportion of deaths in children under the age
of 5 years, the number being, in 1857, 228, and in 1858,
191, or about one-third of the total number of deaths.
That the gross mortality of the parish is greatly increased
by the large amount of infant mortality, will be
obvious by comparing the deaths in various localities.
In 7 houses in Princes Court the total mortality was
6, 5 being children. In 47 houses in Bedfordbury the
total mortality was 27, that of infants 14. In 52 houses
in Drury Lane, 12 out of 19 deaths were children under
5. In 180 houses in the Strand, out of 12 deaths 3 only
were children. In 38 houses in the Haymarket, in
7 deaths, 3 of children. In 46 houses in Craven Street
only 1 death under 5 years to 8 adults. But it will
be said that the children of the inhabitants of the
Strand, &c., live away from London, and no very just
comparison can be made. I have, therefore, selected
some of our worst courts and some of our best, but all
occupied by the working classes. In Bedfordbury and
the courts branching out from it on each side there are
141 houses. In Duke's Court, Broad Court, Cross
Court, Russell and Crown Courts, there are 144
houses. In the Bedfordbury districts there were, in
1858, 43 deaths, of which number 24 were children
under 5. In Duke's Court, &c., there were 41 deaths,
of which 16 were children under 5.
I have given tables of the deaths in the two subdistricts
into which the parish has been divided for
registration purposes. The Charing Cross District,
taking in all the parish west of Leicester Square,
including part of Buckingham Palace, the Green Park,
part of St. James's Park, St. James's Palace, Carlton
Gardens, the Haymarket, Coventry Street, Spur Street,
Orange Street, the south of Hemming's Row and
Chandos Street, and then all south of the boundary of
St. Paul, Covent Garden—the Long Acre district being