[Report 1913] / Medical Officer of Health, Shrewsbury Borough.

  • Shrewsbury (England). Borough Council.
Date:
1913
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: [Report 1913] / Medical Officer of Health, Shrewsbury Borough. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    12/156 (page 12)
    The area of the Borough, excluding water, extends to 3,470 acres, and the density of the population, or the number of persons living in the district per acre of land, is 8.5. This figure scarcely expresses the condition of things, as some of the Wards have large tracts of open land unbuilt upon, while others have houses crowded together with little open space and little circulation of air. A better idea of the density of the population is obtained from the following table, in which the acreage, the population at last census, and the density of population in four geographical com¬ binations of Wards are indicated :— District. I. II. III. IV. Wards. Quarry, Stone, and Castle. Welsh Abbe3^, Belle Vue, Kingsland & Coleham. Coton Hill, Castle F’ds, & Dither- ington. Acres 164 381 2151 774 Population 5,325 3,846 10,575 9,643 Persons per acre ... 32.4 10.9 4.9 12.4 Bven these figures scarcely indicate the true condition of things except, perhaps, with regard to the first District, since in the Welsh Ward, in the Abbey and Coleham Wards, and in the Castle Fields Ward there are areas which might be called slum areas where the houses are built thickly on the land. The number of families or separate occupiers in the Borough amounts to 6,612, which gives an average of 4.4 persons per house, according to the Census population for 1911. Shrewsbur3^ is a market and industrial town. It is the natural centre of the trade of a large agricultural district, a large number of main roads converging in the town, besides being an important railway centre. Industrial works are neither large nor numerous. There are large maltings, three breweries, a tan-3mrd, an agricultural implement factory, an iron foundr3% a tobacco and cigar factor3%