London's Pulse: Medical Officer of Health reports 1848-1972

View report page

Hints from the Health Department. Leaflet from the archive of the Society of Medical Officers of Health. Credit: Wellcome Collection, London

Islington 1857

[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Islington, Parish of St Mary]

This page requires JavaScript

Text

Copy text to clipboard

TO THE VESTRY OF ST. MARY, ISLINGTON.
Gentlemen,
1. There is little that I need say by way of introduction to my Second Annual
Report. The assistance which I have received in various quarters, and my own
increasing experience in the matters relating to my office, have combined in rendering
this summary of the Sanitary condition of Islington in some respects, as it will probably
be regarded, more perfect than that which I last year had the honour to submit. On
the whole, you will, doubtless, consider there is no ground for dis-satisfaction. The
mortality has been even below that of 1856, and extensive improvements have been
effected in some of the warst-conditioned dwellings of the poor.
MORTALITY AND DEATH-RATE.
2. The more important particulars relating to the mortality of the parish are
embodied in the Tables appended to this Report. These Tables have been formed
from the returns furnished to the General Register office from the Registrars of Births
and Deaths for our Sub-Districts, and which, during the past year, have been regularly
forwarded to me from Somerset House. I take this opportunity of expressing the
obligation under which I lie to the Registrar-General for the only data on which I
could presume to furnish an account of the sanitary condition of the parish.

Table: The births which have been registered in Islington during the year have been 4591, as shown by the subjoined Table.

The births which have been registered in Islington during the year have been 4591, as shown by the subjoined Table.

West Sub-district.East Sub-district.Whole Parish.
Males.Females.Both SexMales.Females.Both Sex.Males.Females.Both Sex.
1st quarter3142916053162545706305451175
2nd ,,3032755782732615345765361112
3rd „2813045852812445255625481110
4th „3182996173052725776235711194
Total121611692385117510312206239122004591

Text

Copy text to clipboard

Assuming that the reproductive character of our population has not altered since
the last census, this number of Births represents a population of 143,830 persons, distributed
between the Sub-districts in the proportion of 74,976 persons in the West,
and 68,854 in the East.† The death-rate for the whole period then has been 177 in
the 1,000 of those living.‡
*Since the Great Northern Hospital in Maiden Lane has been established, a number of patients
dying there have been reckoned among the deaths of residents, because the places from which they had
come were not mentioned in the returns; probably many of these should have been omitted.
†This mode of computing the population of so rapidly and irregularly growing a district as this is
more likely to give correct results than that which I have hitherto used, founded on the increase
between 1841 and 1851.
‡By referring to Table VI. it will he seen how much in certain streets, &c., (marked *), the
population of which has been ascertained, this death-rate is exceeded.