Hints from the Health Department. Leaflet from the archive of the Society of Medical Officers of Health. Credit: Wellcome Collection, London
[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for St James's, Westminster]
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and allowed the additional provision to be inserted in the
Bill. The Bill containing the provisions has become law,
consequently the Trust now exists only for the purpose of
applying its surplus funds as directed by the Acts relating
thereto. The Vestry have approved of the sum of £ 1,000,
the bulk of the surplus funds, being devoted towards the
fund for the repair and alteration of the Parish Church.
Few persons of note were buried in this ground, the best
known, perhaps, being Lord George Gordon, the hero of the
No-popery riots of 1780, who died in Newgate in 1793, and
George Morland, the painter, who died in 1806. No stone
marks the resting-place of the former, but Morland lies in
the middle of a small plot on the left side of the path leading
to the chapel.
With reference to the Gordon riots, it may not be uninteresting
to remark that the keys of Newgate were discovered
some years afterwards in the garden of St. James's Square,
and that the Bavarian Chapel, in Warwick Street, was
demolished by the rioters.
PUBLIC BATHS AND WASH-HOUSES.
The Vestry of St. James's were among the earliest Local
Authorities to adopt the Act to encourage the erection of
Public Baths and Wash-houses. The Act was passed in
1846, and on the 10th December in the same year it was
adopted in this Parish. Seven Commissioners, the maximum
number allowed by law, were appointed to carry the
Act into execution. Some delay arose in the selection of a
site for the Baths and Wash-houses, in consequence of the
difficulty of obtaining land, owing to the whole area of the
Parish being built upon, and the absence of any compulsory
power of purchase of land for such a purpose. Eventually,
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