Dr. H. F. Parson's report to the local government board on the sanitary condition of the Sutton bridge urban sanitary district.

  • Parsons, H. F.
Date:
1880
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Dr. H. F. Parson's report to the local government board on the sanitary condition of the Sutton bridge urban sanitary district. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service. The original may be consulted at London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service.

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    Dr. H. F. Parsons’ Report to the Local Government Board on the Sanitary Condition of the Sutton Bridge Urban Sanitary District. George Buchanan, Medical Department, March 9, 18S0. The present inspection, which was made in November 1879, was ordered by the Board to ascertain the sanitary condition of the Sutton Bridge Urban District; local complaints having been repeatedly made that the Sanitary Authority had systematically neglected the duties imposed upon them by the Public Health Act for the protection of the public health, and especially that they had not provided the district with proper sewers. General Description.—Sutton Bridge, which is situated in Lincolnshire, on the borders of Norfolk, is a part of the parish of Long Sutton in the Holbeach U nion, but for ecclesiastical and sanitary purposes is in a district of its own. It is a place of comparatively recent date, owing its existence to the rapid changes which in this part of England geological agencies and human ingenuity have effected in the relations of the land and water. Within the memory of persons now living there was at this spot only a group of outlying houses in the parish of Long Sutton, situated on the shore of an arm of the sea, a mile and a half wide, called Sutton or Cross Keys Wash, into which the river Nene emptied itself. Across this estuary there was at low water a track, interrupted by creeks and inlets, by which persons travelling between Long Sutton and Lynn were conducted by a guide on- horseback. About the year 1830 a turnpike road was constructed between these two towns, which crossed the Wash at this point, and an embankment was thrown up, which served the double purpose of carrying the road and reclaiming from the sea the portion of the Wash south of it. The river Nene was confined within a narrow channel embanked at either side, and in order to carry the land traffic over it without interfering with the navigation, a swivel bridge was built. In 1S50, the bridge, having been purchased by a railway company, was rebuilt so as to be available for both road and railway traffic, and facilities being afforded by the railway for the conveyance of merchandise inland, many ships came to unload their cargo at this point, instead of proceeding up the river to Wisbeach, seven miles higher. Hence the hamlet, formerly called Sutton Wash, as it grew into a town, took the name of Sutton Bridge. Sutton Bridge is now some three and a half miles from the mouth of the river, successive portions of the shallow sea called the Wash having been first silted up by the river and tide, and then embanked and reclaimed. The river Nene here is thus confined between raised banks in a straight narrow artificial channel, in which the tide runs with great rapidity, rising and falling 18 feet at neap tides, and 26 feet at spring tides. The water is turbid, and at high water, salt. The surface of the country is on a dead level, and at high water the river rises several feet above it. The soil for at least 50 feet in depth consists of a fine light sandy silt, some- what ferruginous in places, containing occasionally recent marine shells and rounded waterworn lumps of clay; it is here and there loamy in texture, but without any clayey beds impervious to water. Hence there are no springs, but the subsoil, at a depth varying with the season and the distance from the river, is found charged with water. At the part of the district farthest from the river, the subsoil water, or “ sock,” as it is locally termed, is met with at a depth of from two to four feet below the surface, according to the dryness or wetness of the season, whereas near the river its level is several feet lower. The explanation appears to be that in each tide-period high water lasts for a much shorter time than low water; that is to say, if we take a point midway between high-water mark and low-water mark, the level of the river will be below this point for a considerably greater space of time in each day P 144. 100.—3/80. Wt. 12914. E. & S.