Mr W.H. Power's report to the Local Government Board upon infectious disease prevalence in the Atherton Sub-district, Leigh, Lancashire.

  • Power, William Henry, Sir, 1842-1916.
Date:
[1877]
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Mr W.H. Power's report to the Local Government Board upon infectious disease prevalence in the Atherton Sub-district, Leigh, Lancashire. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service. The original may be consulted at London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service.

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    Mr. W. H. Power’s Report to the Local Government Board upon Infectious Disease Prevalence in the Atherton Sub-district, Edward C. Seaton, M.D., Medical Department, July 16, 1877. This inquiry was ordered in view of a persistently high mortality from scarlatina in the Atherton sub-district, and with reference also to undue prevalence therein of “ fever.” The registration sub-district of Atherton comprises 4,916 acres, situate towards the southern border of the Lancashire coalfield. It is mainly on the coal-measures; a small portion only (that about Leigh town) being upon various beds of the Permian system. The soil is clay, loam, marl, shale, and sandstone, and the surface, generally, has a slope from north to south. The difference of level between the limits in the above directions of the sub-district is about 150 feet. The population of the sub-district has been and is rapidly increasing; an increase brought about by local industries, which are almost wholly coal and cotton. In 1851 the sub-district population numbered 10,052 persons in 1,950 houses; in 1861, 11,936 persons in 2,476 houses; and in 1871,13,939 persons in 2,832 houses. In 1876, the sub-district had an estimated population of 18,831 persons in 3,766 houses. This population, essentially a town population, is wholly comprised in two townships, Tyldesley-with-Shackerley and Atherton, each of which constitutes an Urban Sanitary District. Tyldesley Local Board District.—Acres, 2,490. Tyldesley-with-Shackerley township occupies the south-eastern portion of the registration sub-district, and comprises Tyldesley town, with a present population estimated at 6,700, and several outlying groups of dwellings, with a population of 1,951. 1851. 1861. 1871. 1876. Population. Houses. Population. Houses. Population. Houses. Population. Houses. 5,397 987 6,029 1,254 6,408 1,351 8,651 1,750 Leigh, Lancashire. The Town occupies 95 acres, and is built on the summit and slopes, mainly on the northern slope, of a sandstone ridge, having a general direction and dip from east to west. The surface soil of the ridge is loamy earth ; that of its slopes, clay to the northward, loam and shale to the south. In this latter direction a low lying area just outside the town is moss land. Streets.—Through the operations of the Local Board, streets generally have been well laid out. Almost all are well paved, and their side walks are flagged. Also, they are efficiently scavenged. Private roads and back yards are less satisfactory. Such roads are either not paved at all or are less efficiently paved than those under the control of the Sanitary Authority. Back yards are sometimes (through the wisdom of particular owners) flagged or asphalted; more commonly they are wholly, or in part, cobble-paved; not unfrequently they are not paved at all. And here it may be said that in Tyldesley the facilities for cleanliness afforded by proper paving of back yards seemed to exercise a marked influence on the condition in which such yards were kept. Dwellings in the older part of the town are somewhat crowded together, and back premises are often shut in by other dwellings or by outhouses. Here, too, houses are not unfrequently without back doors or back windows; sometimes they have been built back to back. But the great fault of all but newer houses in the place is want of proper provision for ventilation. Windows are not made to open, or are capable of being opened in a small part only of their area. Especially is this true of windows of lower rooms; notably of back rooms. Upper room windows do not in this respect offend so frequently, they open commonly by a sliding sash. In addition windows of old dwellings are often insufficient in area. In regard of newer houses, byelaws regulating window space, and the area of window capable of being opened have been and are generally enforced. Dwellings of the nature of cellar dwellings exist in the town, but they are not numerous, and some of them have been (as indeed have other dwellings unfit for human habitation) closed by the Sanitary Authority. The closure of the remainder is contemplated. 41997. A