Report on the cholera epidemic of 1866 in England : supplement to the twenty-ninth annual report of the Registrar-General of births, deaths, and marriages in England / presented to both Houses of Parliament by command.

  • Great Britain. General Register Office.
Date:
1868
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Report on the cholera epidemic of 1866 in England : supplement to the twenty-ninth annual report of the Registrar-General of births, deaths, and marriages in England / presented to both Houses of Parliament by command. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

    203/436 (page 95)
    after Mr. Valentin had called at the Gleneral Register Office to report progress I received by a curious coincidence, the “East-end News” for August 11th, a local paper, containing letters (one dated August 7th) referring to eels found in the supply pipes of the company.* Professor Frankland made some suggestions for purifying the waters, and these were immediately forwarded privately to Mr. Greaves. His first Report and extracts from his letters were published in the Weekly Return for August 4th, with a description by me of the water supply of the East districts, to serve until Professor Frankland’s elaborate inquiry was completed. Mr. Greaves in his letter to the Times (August 2d) had stated that all the water of the company “ had been filtered this was published in the “ East-end News,” whereupon Mr. Ferguson a plumber of Bow-lane, and Mr. Russell, wrote to the Editor, stating that they had found eels in their water pipes. One, nine inches long, was dead. Others were found alive in the water butts. Mr. Russell, who found his eel about the second loeek of June, asked significantly, “ can an eel pass through a filter bed ?” On a subsequent visit to Poplar I went to the houses, saw the cut pipe from which the eels were taken : the facts were certain. These letters were published in the Weekly Return of September 1st; but no further reference was made to them, although the coincidence between Mr. Maine’s accidental mention of eels in the open reservoir and the facts in these letters was singularly striking. Eels are known to travel by land, but there can be little doubt that they had been dis- tributed with the waters of the open reservoirs. Upon the occasion of this visit I found that the panic had subsided ; and proper hygienic arrangements had been made. The Registrar, an excellent officer, was in distress ; his wife had died of cholera after a short illness. An example of a frequent fallacy in these inquiries struck me. “We never drank water, neither my wife nor myself.” What then do you drink ? “ Beer, and a tumbler of spirits and w’^ater at night.” Hot water ? “ No ; cold.” Professor Frankland came from Wales expressly for the purpose, inspected the Company’s works on 23d, and found them apparently in the same state as they were on the 9th, when they were visited for him by Mr. Valentin. Professor Frankland’s Report, dated August 25th, appeared in the Weekly Return for week ending September Ist.f The deaths from cholera in that week were 198 : they had been, four weeks ago, 1053, when their further rise was arrested. The immediate decline of the deaths following Mr. Greaves’ visit to the General Register Office was shown in the Return for the week ending August 11th. It happened strangely enough that a part of the afflicted field remained still without the advantage to be derived from the lower level sewer, and I wrote immediately to Mr. Bazalgette on the subject : in his replyJ he said “it is un- “ fortunately just the locality where our main drainage works are not complete. « * * ♦ To-morrow I shall recommend our board to erect a temporary pumping “ station at Abbey Mills, to lift the sewage of this district into the northern outfall “ sewer.” West Ham, over the Lea in Essex, is out of London, and is drained indepen- dently of the metropolitan works into the Lea : the district is partly supplied by the East London Company; and it became important to ascertain how far the epidemic extended in that direction. For this purpose I went over to Stratford- le-Bow on one day, where, after an interview with Mr. Vallance, the surgeon and regis- trar, I visited the streets where the disease had been most rife among the families of the railway ironworkers and others. Subsequently I went by the Great Eastern railway from the Shoreditch station to Lea Bridge, passing close by the open reservoirs on the left, which looked as placidly in the light as if they had never held poison that had killed thousands. This railway, with the branch to North Woolwich, gives in one view the greater part of the water field. * See letters, p. 129. f See pp. 122-126. t Seep. 117. S