London's Pulse: Medical Officer of Health reports 1848-1972
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Hints from the Health Department. Leaflet from the archive of the Society of Medical Officers of Health. Credit: Wellcome Collection, London
St Giles (Camden) 1857
[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for St. Giles District]
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*7. Church Lane „ 12½ „ „ „ 143 „
*8. Northern DruryLane „ 14 „ „ „ 204 „
*9. Short's Gardens „ 14½„ „ „ 229 „
10. Dudley Street „ 13 „ „ „ 293 „
This last locality, comprising the group of houses between High Street, St. Andrew's
Streets, and Crown Street, was out of question the worst in the mortality of the year.
Of the 502 deaths adopted as the true number for North St. Giles, 293 are referred
to these 13 acres; that is in a fourth part of the sub-district, containing certainly less
than half of the inhabitants, three-fifths of the deaths occurred.
Let us next enquire what are the districts which furnish the large excess
among children, which we have seen to be one of the characters of St. Giles mortality.
The figures of the same Table VIII. lead to the following arrangement of the ten localities, as to their infantile mortality:—
| 1. | Russell Square locality, 42 acres, 18 deaths under five, or 28.6 p.c. | ||||||
| 2, 3. | Bedford Square „ | 25 | „ | 27 „ | „ | 40. „ | v Of the whole mortality. |
| Coram Street „ | 28 | „ | 47 „ | „ | 37. „ | ||
| 4, 5. | ( Lincoln's Inn Fields ,, | 13 | „ | 27 „ | „ | 49. „ | |
| ( Bloomsbury Square „ | 27 | „ | 55 „ | „ | 42. „ | ||
| 6, 7, 8. | Church Lane ,, | 124 | „ | 64 „ | „ | 44. „ | |
| Northern Drury Lane „ | 14 | „ | 99 „ | „ | 48. „ | ||
| Southern ,, | 14 | „ | 70 „ | „ | 57. „ | ||
| 9. | Short's Gardens „ | 14½ | „ | 128 „ | „ | 55. „ | |
| 10. | Dudley Street „ | 13 | „ | 155 „ | „ | 52.9„ | |
Ihis arrangement has been made on certain assumptions as to the proportion
of children in the population assigned to each locality, and I have confidence in its representing
fairly the facts of the year.
The sequence is very nearly that of the mortality at all ages, except that the
streets around Lincoln's Inn Fields, and about Great Wild Street, (South Drury Lane),
appear to have an especial fatality for children over adults, though in actual numbers
the extent of this fatality is vastly less than is witnessed in the Short's Gardens and
Dudley Street localities.
Continuing to derive our data from the same table, we examine the localities
where the class of zymotic disease was most fatal, and where it was that individual
diseases of the class prevailed in 1857.
The order of fatality in the ten localities, in regard of their total zymotic
disease, was as follows:—
1. Russell Square locality, 42 acres, 12 deaths, 19'1 p.c. of whole mortality
2. Coram Street „ 28 „ 17 „ 13*4 „
3. Bedford Square „ 25 ,, 13 „ 19'4 ,,
Lincoln's Inn Fields „ 13 „ 14 » 25-5 „
I Bloomsbury Square „ 27 „ 33 „ 25*8 „
* These are the Districts in which all the common lodging houses are found. The
number of deaths referable to each of these Districts, in consequence of their possessing these
houses rather than an equal number of other houses, is to be estimated at about Six in the year.