Mr. John Spear's report to the Local Government Board upon a re-inspection of the Ebbw Vale and Abertillery urban sanitary districts, and of the Bedwelty rural district, Monmouthshire / [John Spear].

  • Spear, John.
Date:
[1885]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Mr. John Spear's report to the Local Government Board upon a re-inspection of the Ebbw Vale and Abertillery urban sanitary districts, and of the Bedwelty rural district, Monmouthshire / [John Spear]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    The prevalence of typhoid fever during 1882 was one chief subject of my former inquiry in this district. In the following year (1883) an even more serious outbreak of this disease occurred, and in 1884, although no fatal case was recorded, some 23 attacks came under notice. Speaking of the outbreak of 1883, one estimate put the number of cases that occurred as high as 500, and 191 actually came under the treatment of Dr. Williams, the Medical Officer of Health. So far as sporadic cases were concerned, the disease was widely diffused, but the epidemic outburst was confined to the village of Abertillery, and, as in the outbreak of 1882, to those localities where not only gross sewage nuisances prevailed, but where the water-supply was drawn from highly dangerous sources. Thus the first serious outbreak occurred in August at Rhew Park. At the time, owing to the entire absence of sewers, and of any proper privy-accommodation, sewage nuisances had accumulated around the ill-ventilated dwellings; and water, as is still the case, was derived from “ runners,” or small rills, exposed to excremental pollution. At this place eleven families were invaded by the disease. A little later, a family at “ Mount Pleasant,” on friendly and visiting terms with some of the sufferers at Rhew Park, was infected, and then :again another family in the same row of houses. Amongst other defects here_ defects sufficiently grave to render the houses unfit for habitation—excrement is cast into a privy-pit over the floor of which washes a mountain rill that just below supplies water, habitually for washing purposes, and occasionally it is admitted for drinking, to a considerable district. This district was afterwards deeply infected. In Byewaters Row six households were invaded; in James Street, ten; in Mitre Street, fourteen ; and in Cwm Street, twelve. The above-mentioned rill is not the only water-supply resorted to here, but the others are probably also contaminated, although less obviously, from the sewage nuisances accumulating around Mount Pleasant on the higher ground. “ Cobbler’s Tump,” a locality adjacent, suffered scarcely less severely. No sewerage is provided, and water for all purposes is derived.from “ runners ” which immediately before have washed over steep, and periodically manured, grass slopes. At the time of my visit, this water was trickling, just before its collection, through excremental filth.* The measures that were recommended to the Authority by the Board after my last inspection were as follows :—1, The sewerage of the more populous localities ; 2, The improvement of privv-accommodation ; 3, The regular and systematic emptying of privies and the removal of refuse ; 4, The extension of the water mains to localities not having a proper water supply ; 5, The enforcement of the provisions of the Public Health Act as regards houses unfit for habitation, and as to the removal of nuisances generally ; 6, The strict enforcement of the building byelaws ; 7, The provision of a hospital for infectious diseases, and of a disinfecting-chamber, and mortuary. Sewerage a?icl Privy-accommodation, fyc.—The attention of the Authority, since the date of these recommendations, has mainly been confined to sewerage improvements, and these have only been progressing slowly; they are paid for out of current rates, and the latter, as already stated, are very low. Six streets have been sewered by the construction of 1,250 yards of main sewer, 129 house connexions have been made, and 49 privy-pits have been converted into water-closets or pan-closets. Elsewhere, in places not affected by these new sewerage works, the prevalence of filth nuisances is very serious. A large number of houses are without any sort of privy accommodation, and with only roughly constructed, and often stagnant, surface channels, oven if this, for the removal of slop-water. In other cases, either the old offensive privy-pit is in use, or privies are built over, and slop water is emptied into, highway culverts. The latter become thus mere sewers, although rudely constructed, and pro¬ vided with none of the proper appliances for the prevention of the escape of offensive gases in the neighbourhood of dwellings. Although the Authority have as yet provided sewers for only so inconsiderable a part of this district, no alternative provision has been made by them for the removal of excrement. Ashes and house-refuse are removed in the central village periodically by the public scavengers, and elsewhere at irregular and too infrequent intervals, but the emptying of privies is left to owners or occupiers of property to arrange for. The new sewers are laid at such a gradient that natural flushing will probably be secured ; ventilation, however, is hardly sufficiently provided for. The complete dis- * It was said that a sample of this water recently taken for analysis had been pronounced fit for drinking purposes, but it is obvious that one or even several analyses of a constantly running stream, such as is here described, cannot afford evidence comparable in value to that derived from a simple inspection of the source of supply.