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66
2. That the Authorities before mentioned requiring the use of the site, having given
notice to the Council to remove the said Fire Escape and Watchbox therefrom, the
Council have decided to discontinue, and, in fact, have already discontinued the
Escape Station in question.
3. That the nearest station where a horsed Escape is kept is distant one and a quarter
miles from Bickley How, and that the rule of the Council has hitherto been, not to
abandon any Fire Escape Station distant more than a mile from a Fire Station
where a horsed Escape is kept.
4. That a fire not having occurred in the locality for some years is no guarantee that a
fire will never occur therein.
5. That the locality in question is peculiar, inasmuch as at times it is quite an island,
to approach which on the north side two bridges have to be crossed, and on the
south side one.
6. That these bridges can remain open for twenty minutes at a time when vessels or
barges are passing through the locks, and therefore it is obvious that this fact might
be the means of detaining the horsed Escape from arriving at a fire in the locality
in time to save life.
7. That the neighbourhood is surrounded with large stacks of timber in the docks and
by wharves and works of an inflammable nature, among which latter may be mentioned
the Timber Pickling Works.
8. That some of the said wharves are stored with large quantities of inflammable goods,
and were a fire to break out it might assume large proportions and greatly endanger
the lives of residents in the locality, which is thickly populated, principally by
persons of the working class.
9. That the want of a site need not stand in the way of the Council reinstating the
Escape, as the Rev. Selby Hele, the Yicar of Holy Trinity Church, is willing to
permit the Escape to be located permanently in Trinty Church yard.
10. That your Memorialists feel that the action of the Council in the matter is greatly endangering
the lives of parishioners living in the locality in question, and they must
offer their strenuous opposition to it.