Dr. Airy's report to the local government board on the sanitary state of the Pembroke Urban Sanitary District.

  • Airy, Hubert.
Date:
1879
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Dr. Airy's report to the local government board on the sanitary state of the Pembroke Urban Sanitary District. 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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    Dr. Airy’s Report to the Local Government Board on the Sanitary State of the Pembroke Urban Sanitary District. George Buchanan, ■ Assistant Medical Officer, January 15, 1879. The Pembroke Urban Sanitary District is the Municipal Borough of Pembroke, and the Sanitary Authority is the Town Council, The population of the borough in 1861 was 15,071, and in 1871 had fallen to 13,704. The borough is divided, for municipal purposes, into two wards. Pater (or Pembroke Dock) and Pembroke, which in 1871 had a population of 9,534 and 4,170 respectively. This division is employed also in sanitary administration. Sanitary questions relating to either ward in particular are referred, in the first instance, to a committee of members of the Town Council belong- ing to that ward. The Town Council, consisting of 24 members, meet once a month. For the whole sanitary district there is one Medical Officer of Health (Mr. D. P. Saer), and one Inspector of Nuisances (Mr. K, W. Ladd), who is also Borough Surveyor. The Pembroke Urban District lies on the south side of Milford Haven, and has an irregular coast-line about seven miles in extent, but little more than two miles measured across in a straight line between its extremities, projecting into the haven in the pro- montory of Hobb’s Point and Pembroke Dock, and re-entering on either side of that promontory along two of the sinuous creeks or “ pills ” (as they are locally termed) which are a characteristic feature of Milford Haven. The more southerly of these two creeks runs up to the town of Pembroke and makes it a tidal port, which is within the jurisdiction of the Milford Port Sanitary Authority. This creek, with the valley which continues it inland, makes a marked separation of the district into two portions, which correspond roughly to the two wards of the borough, the southern portion to the Pem- broke ward, the northern to that of Pembroke Dock. Geological strata.—This part of Pembrokeshire is remarkable for the repeated alterna- tions of the geological strata of which it is formed, and for their highly contorted character. Between St. Govan’s Head and the upper reaches of Milford Haven the alternation of carboniferous limestone with old red sandstone recurs four times, and the strata are found strongly tilted or even vertical. The strike of the strata, which corresponds with the direction of the ridges of the hills and the troughs of the valleys, ranges nearly east and west. The town and castle of Pembroke stand on a narrow ridge of limestone on the south side of Pembroke Creek. The strata here dip steep to the north. On the north side of the creek the rock is old red sandstone with its strata nearly vertical, forming a high ridge, at the western extremity of which, but on the northern slope of the ridge, nearly two miles distant from Pembroke, stands the town of Pembroke Dock. These two towns of Pembroke and Pembroke Dock, which are thus seen to differ in respect of the geological formations on which they stand, differ also very widely in almost every other respect, in age, in industry, and in sanitary condition. The ancient town of Pembroke, once enclosed with its Norman castle by fortified walls, is the com- mercial centre of an agricultural district. Pembroke Dock has grown up in more modern times around the Government Dockyard which gives it its best-known name. It is difficult to find any point of resemblance between them or any local interest common to the two. It will be necessary to consider them separately in this Report. Mortality.— Unfortunately there are no facilities for ascertaining separately the mor- tality in these two parts of the Pembroke (listrict in past years previous to the appointment of the present Medical Officer of Health. The statistics published by the Registrar-General in the Quarterly Returns relate to the sub-districts into which the registration districts are divided. The Pembroke Registration District is divided into three sub-districts : Tenby, Pembroke, and Roose. The borough of Pembroke lies partly in the Tenby sub-district and partly in the Pembroke sub-district; the boundary between the two passes through the town of Pembroke. The sub-district returns, therefore, will not aid us to obtain estimates of the mortality in Pembroke and Pembroke Dock separately. The greater part of Pembroke and the whole of Pembroke Dock lie in the Pembroke sub-district. Indeed the borough of Pembroke furnishes four-fifths of the population of this sub- district, We may, therefore, find a rough index to the mortality of the borough in the mortality of the Pembroke sub-district. Taking the population of the sub-district as stationary since 1871 (though in the previous decennium it had fallen off by one-