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???significance. The undulations of ground from Hampstead and
???Notting Hill, to the Fleet Ditch are not easily conceived as
???they are now covered by bricks and mortar, and the centralization of the
???necessities of each had to be realized in one main scheme. The higher
???nd the middle levels as we know were somewhat quickly dealt with
???though with consummate engineering skill, but the lower levels of the
???London Basin seemed almost to baffle even this, and we were threatened
???with an intolerable nuisance all but in our very teeth, for even about the
???year 1862 so great were the difficulties in the disposal of the sewage of
???the Western District that it was purposed to bring the sewage of Kensington
and Chelsea with that of Hammersmith and Fulham to some so
???called "Deodorizing Works" at Sand's End, Fulham.
It will be remembered how successfully we resisted this inroad on
our safety.
It has required nearly 20 years and millions of money to consummate
the scheme of Bazalgette, for only during 1875 has the permanent
pumping station at Grosvenor Road been opened whereby the whole of
the Western low level sewage is now lifted and carried hence to Barking
Creek.
In the first General Report of your Board, presented May 13th, 1857,
you state that you "found many nuisances abounding; some of a
fearfully complex character." Open sewers and filthy ditches
were abounding in many places, and notwithstanding the heavy
debt charged by the late Commissioners of Sewers, they found
the district in a most unsatisfactory condition. In the Parish
of Fulham but little Sewerage work had been done, and the
many open ditches and sewers existing therein, prove that, without
???a large additional outlay, the full benefit of the Metropolis Local
Management Act " could not be realized; And in respect to Hammersmith,
not only were open sewers and ditches found in a most fearful
???state of nuisance, but also a morass of several acres in extent, having
no outlet, situate between the West London Railway and Blythe
Lane, which receives the sewerage from a large area, the noxious
exhalations from which must be regarded as highly detrimental to
health. The state of the open Brandenburgh and Stamford Brook
???wers was also exceedingly unsatisfactory."
The condition of the water supply to the Fulham District at that period
may be gathered by the following extract from my own Report of same
???date. "In many parts of the District, the supply of water to the poor
"is very deficient. In the parish of Fulham, I have found on an
"examination of 1009 houses that 758 were supplied by pumps or
"wells; that of this latter number 508 were supplied by 108 pumps
"only, that the water was laid on to 147, and that 104 were wholly
"without this necessary article."
"Of 1810 houses examined in the parish of Hammersmith, 405
"were supplied by 81 pumps, 428 had water laid on, 218 were
"entirely without, and in 26 cases the water was found to bo unfit