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42
Fields. There were 421 deaths in these three parishes in the second and third weeks
of July, when the East End was quite free from the disease. It ultimately reached
Stepney, through Clerkenwell and Shoreditch. The epidemic did not reach its
height in the East End until the end of August. Defoe, in his Journal of the
Plague year, says that the pits were about 40 feet long, 15 to 16 feet wide, and
about 20 feet deep. At first, they used to bury 50 to 60 bodies in each pit, but
later, they made larger holes and buried from 200 to 400 bodies according to
the number that the cart brought in a week. No bodies were allowed within
G feet of the surface. There was a very large pit in Aldgate Churchyard, in
which 1,114 bodies were buried.
In three weeks there were 2,006 deaths in the parish of Stepney and 1,206
in the Parish of Whitechapel. It must be remembered that these parishes were
then but sparsely populated, and that the people resided mostly in riverside
parishes, such as Shadwell and Wapping. In 1660 there were only a few houses
along the portion of the Whitechapel Road where No. 167 is now, with fields
at the back. According to an old map which I have consulted, there had only
been a slight increase between 1660 and 1733, but in 1745 new buildings were
being erected. On account of the number of bodies that had to be buried and
the difficulty of carting them, the plague-pits were placed close to the main road.
It is, therefore, quite possible that there was a plague-pit at the rear of No. 167,
Whitechapel Road.
The bones were placed in four large boxes, covered with vegetable charcoal,
and were reintcrred in the Chingford Mount Cemetery, after a license had been
obtained from the Secretary of State.
Whilst preparing the foundation for the erection of new buildings at the
rear of Nos. 12 and 14, Church Lane, a quantity of human bones were unearthed.
At the rear of No. 12 the remains of 30 bodies, and at the rear of No. 14, 15
bodies were removed. The ground must have at one time formed a portion of
Whitechapel Churchyard before it became encroached on by buildings. There
had been a post-mortem examination on one body, the skull having been
properly sawn in order to examine the brain. The bones were placed in
suitable cases and the Home Secretary informed of the facts. A license was
obtained from the Secretary of State allowing the bones to be removed to
another burial ground.