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.

    227/436 (page 119)
    The mortality in the five weeks has been at the rate of 37 per 1000 living annually; but in both the South and the West districts, covered by 1,400,000 people, the mortality has scarcely exceeded the average by 1 per 1000. The annual rate of mortality by cholera was 1 in Kensington and Paddington, O’3 in Chelsea, 0*4 in St. George Hanover-square, 1 in Westminster, O’5 in St. Martin-in-the- Fields, 1*5 in St. James Westminster. The mortality from cholera and diarrhoea was highest in Kensington (6) and lowest (2) in St. James Westminster, the scene formerly of the Broad-street pump mortality. The west districts are supplied chiefly by the Thames water companies, the New River supplying portions of St. James Westminster and St. Martin’s. The mortality in the Southern Districts by cholera was 3 in 1000 in St. Saviour Southwark, 2 in St. Olave, 2 in Bermondsey, 2 in St. George Southwark, 0*3 in Newington, 1 in Lambeth 2 in Wandsworth, 3 in Camberwell, 3 in Rotherhithe, 3 in Greenwich where Mr. Glaisher has observed the famous ‘‘blue mist,” and 0*2 in Lewisham. The mortality by cholera and diarrhoea was highest in St. Saviour Southwark (8), and lowest in Lewisham (1). These southern districts are gene- rally poor ; they lie low; and they were decimated by cholera in the epidemics of 1849 and 1854, wherever the impure water of the tidal Thames was distributed. Their water is now drawn above Teddington Lock from the Thames. The five north districts fared nearly as the Central Districts; the mortality by cholera was 0 • 5 in Marylebone, 0 ’ 4 in Hampstead, 1 • 2 in Pancras, 1 * 9 in Islington, and 4 ’ 9 in Hackney; the mortality by cholera and diarrhoea was lowest in Hamp- stead (3) and highest in Hackney (8). These districts are chiefly supplied by the New River, one of the Thames companies, and a portion of Hackney, it is believed, from the Lea Bridge reservoir of the East London Company. The dense Central Districts are, some of them, such as St. Luke’s, remarkable for poverty, others, such as the City of London within the walls, for their wealth. The mortality by cholera was at the rate of 1 per 1000 in St. Giles, 2 in the Strand, 0 in Holborn (which appears to return all its cases as diarrhoea), 1 in Clerkenwell, 1 in St. Luke, 7 in East London, 7 in West London, and 2 in the City district; from cholera and diarrhoea the mortality was highest in the City without the walls, 10 ; and St. Giles, 9 ; lowest in the City Vv^ithin the walls, 3. The whole of the central districts are supplied by the New River, which draws part of its supply from the Lea river and part from springs. The East London Company enters the City sub-district in St. Botolph, where a few deaths from cholera have been registered. There are seven districts in the east; the mortality by cholera in the poor district of Shoreditch was at the annual rate of 4, by cholera and diarrhoea 8 in 1000 : five of its sub-districts are supplied by the New River, one partially, and one wholly by the East London probably from Lea Bridge. In the rest of the east districts the mortality by cholera was at very different rates ; it was at the rate of 39 per 1000 in Bethnal-green, 50 in Mile-end Old Town, 60 in St. George-in- the-East, 70 in Whitechapel, including deaths in the London Hospital from other eastern districts, 70 in Poplar and Bow, and 80 in Stepney. Bethnal-green is one of the poorest districts of London, if we may judge by the annual value of the houses ; but the people of Bow and Poplar are not conspicuous for povert}\ The whole of these districts where the mortality from cholera was from thirty to forty- fold higher than it was cither in the west or the central, in the north or the south of London, were supplied with water from the Old Ford reservoirs. London is divided into thirty-seven districts ; six districts are supplied from Old Ford, and every one has been ravaged by the epidemic ; the other thirty-one districts have for six weeks in succession suffered slightly. The 37 districts are sub-divided into 135 sub-districts ; 21 are supplied with the same water, and have all suffered six weeks in succession; 115 sub-districts have suffered inconsiderably, except in St. Botolph and a few other districts, where the same water has crept in, and the mortality is partially swollen. By the doctrines of chances, it is impossible that the coincidence between this particular ivater and the high mortality should be fortuitous, in 135 cases, during six weeks in succession.