On the physical causes of the high rate of mortality in Liverpool / [W.H. Duncan].

  • Duncan, W. H. (William Henry), 1805-1863
Date:
1843
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the physical causes of the high rate of mortality in Liverpool / [W.H. Duncan]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    10/78 (page 10)
    may not be acquainted with the character and construction of the Courts in which so many of their townsmen re¬ side, I may state shortly that they consist usually of two rows of houses placed opposite to each other, with an in- 0 tervening space of from 9 to 15 feet, and having two to six or eight houses in each row. The court communicates with the street by a passage or archway about 3 feet wide, —in the older courts, built up overhead ; and, the farther end being also in many instances closed by a high wall or by the back or side of an adjoining building, the court forms in fact a cut de sac with a narrow opening. Such an ar¬ rangement almost bids defiance to the entrance of air, and renders its free circulation through the court a matter of impossibility. When other circumstances, to be afterwards mentioned, are taken into account, such as the dense population and abominably filthy state of many of the courts, it is easy to understand in what way the construc¬ tion of these dwellings may contribute to swell the mor¬ tality of Liverpool.—The Houses themselves are three stories high, contain three rooms of about ten or eleven feet square, and being built back to back with the houses of adjoining courts, there is of course no thorough draught. An enumeration of the court and cellar population of the Borough was made two years ago, under the authority of the Town-Council, when it appeared that there were, in the Parish of Liverpool,— Courts. Houses. Inhabitants. 1982 . . containing . . 10,692 . . and . . 55,534. That is to say, more than one-fourth of the whole parochial population, or more than one-third of the working classes, were resident in courts. With regard to the character of these courts, it appears from the report of the Corporation surveyors, that— 629, or nearly one-third, were closed at both ends; 875, or less than one-half, were open at one end; and only 478, or less than one-fourth, open at both ends.