The Sanitary Evolution of London

CHAPTER VI

1891–1901

In 1891 the census once more gave authoritative figures as to the population of the metropolis of London. The population had increased from 3,830,297 to 4,228,317.

The increase had been in a somewhat lower ratio than the population of England and Wales as a whole, and the fact was notable inasmuch as it was the first time that such a phenomenon had presented itself, London having been found in every preceding intercensal period to have gained more or less in its proportions as compared with the country at large.

The movements of population had followed very much the same lines as in the previous decade. In the central parts—under the pressure of the great economic forces—the population had increased. In the outer parts it had increased, but “the wide belt of suburbs was beginning to show some signs of repletion.”

Immigration into London had greatly diminished in the decade. Fewer immigrants had come from the various counties of England and Wales, and the proportion of the inhabitants of London who had been born elsewhere had fallen from 308 persons per 1,000 in 1881 to 283 in 1891.

Thus the influx of country people, mostly in the prime of life, and the admixture of fresh country blood into the urban population of London was undergoing diminution—a circumstance which, in the long run, would materially influence the physique of the people.

Three important facts came into view with the figures set out in the census, giving food for thoughtful minds as regarded the future of London.

The first was that the rate of increase of the population had again slackened off. The flood tide of population was not now flowing so fast.

The second was that the population was being affected by migration. The natural increase of the population had been 510,384, the actual increase 396,199—so that London had lost by the excess of emigration over immigration more than 114,000 persons. This was the first time such an event had happened.

London’s boundaries, however, were very arbitrary and haphazard, and this emigration was probably only to places immediately outside London for residence at night, whilst work was performed in London during the day—as illustrated by the “City” and the Strand, where huge differences existed between the day and night populations. The figures showed, however, a movement of population which was bound to have an effect upon the sanitary condition of the people.

A third and portentous fact, ascertained correctly by aid of the census figures, was the decline of the birth-rate in London. This had fallen remarkably since 1881. It was then 34·7 per 1,000 living. It was now 31·9.

Deducible from the census figures, reliable calculations could also be made as to the death-rate in the metropolis.

In 1891 it was practically the same as in 1881, being 21·4 per 1,000. It might be inferred that these latter figures did not afford much testimony to the effects of sanitary administration and labours, but the pause in the steady decline was only a temporary one.

The authoritative and accurate records thus afforded decennially by the census are invaluable in tracing some of the most important developments in the sanitary evolution of London.

Another very noteworthy change was also brought into prominence by the census. This was the continued rapid growth of the population immediately outside the boundaries of the County of London.

Between 1871 and 1881 it had increased 312,000. Between 1881 and 1891 it had increased by 469,000, and now in 1891 it stood at 1,405,000, having more than doubled since 1871.

A passage in the report of the Medical Officer of Health for Islington in 1895 illustrates this so far as his own district was concerned:—

“The fact cannot be burked that many of the better classes have gone further into the country to live, induced to do so by the increased facilities for travelling that railways have provided…. The same facilities have also checked the influx of people to the same extent as formerly, so that now in northern London people are flocking to Hornsea and Hampstead and thereaway.”

The fact was that the metropolis had burst its boundaries, and just as it had grown up around the “City” so now the “outer ring,” as it was called, was growing up around it.

How little reliance could be placed on the intercensal estimates of Medical Officers of Health as to the number of inhabitants and the death-rate, is illustrated by the following passage from the report of the Medical Officer of Health for Islington in 1891:—

“There was an error amounting to nearly 50,000 in the estimated population of the parish in 1891; consequently all statistics based on the estimated figures during the decade 1881–91 are more or less erroneous.”

Also “the mortality returns were not kept in such a manner as to lead to accuracy, for while all deaths of non-residents were excluded, the deaths of residents dying outside the district in similar institutions were not included.

“It is impossible to make an accurate statement as to the correct meaning of the mortality returns—the returns are erroneous.”

A similar miscalculation was made by the Vestry of St. George, Hanover Square. In their report for 1890–1 they stated that they had no reason to believe that the population was much different from what it was in 1871 and 1881. The census, however, showed that it had fallen over 11,000.

In each successive census the number of inhabited houses in London was enumerated. In this one the number was 547,120—being an increase of nearly 60,000; but not much instruction was to be obtained from such general figures beyond the fact that houses were becoming more and more densely packed.

The substitution of blocks of dwellings for small houses had also made considerable progress during the intercensal period.[174]

The same reasons as to the diminution of the number of houses in the central parts of London continued to be given by Medical Officers of Health.

In St. George-in-the-East it had been brought about “by the extension of warehouses and the demolition of insanitary property.” In St. Martin-in-the-Fields it was “due to many former residents having removed to the country, and to the demolition of so many houses for improvements.” In the Strand to the fact that the district was becoming like all the central parts of London, “a business, as distinguished from a residential district.” The Vestry of St. James’ reported that “buildings formerly occupied as dwellings were being replaced by warehouses and business premises commanding a higher rent. As the centre of trade extends, this condition of things must be expected to continue, just as the increasing volume of trade has converted the City of London at night from a populous place to little more than a city of caretakers,” and they drew attention to the “enormous number of people engaged in business in the parish during the day time who resided elsewhere.”

On the south side of the river the same story was told. The Medical Officer of Health for Lambeth remarking in his report that—

“The displacement of population from the central districts of Lambeth, and the settlement of population in those districts which are situated in the outer ring, or on the circumference of the inner, is a part of a greater movement which affects the whole metropolitan area.”

The census of 1891 is specially memorable by the fact that for the first time a mass of most valuable information was obtained which was wholly new, and which threw a blaze of light upon the condition of the housing of the population of London.

For the first time full details were obtained and published as to the numbers of the people living in tenements of less than five rooms and the numbers and character of the tenements they lived in.

A tenement was defined as “any house or part of a house separately occupied either by the owner or by a tenant.”

These tenements were classified into those of one room, two rooms, three rooms, and four rooms; and the number of persons inhabiting each of these classes of tenements was given.

The nearest approach to information of this sort had been given by Mr. Marchant Williams in 1884, but it was only for a particular area in London. The information now given related to the whole of London.

The total number of tenements in London in 1891 was stated to be 937,606.

Of these, 630,569 were tenements of less than five rooms. And of these—

An examination of the detailed figures revealed some astounding facts.

In the central group of parishes and districts, in the parish of St. Luke 21,937 persons, or over one-half of the population, lived in tenements of one or two rooms; in Clerkenwell, over 33,000 persons; and in Holborn, over 16,000—practically one-half.

In the eastern group, in Whitechapel, close on 33,000 people, or over 44 per cent., lived in tenements of one or two rooms. In Shoreditch, over 50,000, or 40 per cent.; in Bethnal Green, 45,000 persons, or 38·4 per cent.; in St. George-in-the-East, 43 per cent. of the population.

In the northern group, in St. Pancras 95,000, or over 40 per cent., lived in tenements of one or two rooms; and in one district of the Parish, namely Somerstown, 57 per cent. of the population were living in such tenements. In St. Marylebone over 58,000 lived in such tenements.

In the western group over 173,000 persons lived in tenements of one or two rooms.

And on the south side of the Thames, in Bermondsey close upon 24,000 lived in tenements of one or two rooms; in Camberwell, 30,000; in Lambeth, 61,000; in Newington, 31,000; in St. Saviour over 41 per cent., and in St. George-the-Martyr 26,000, or over 43 per cent.

And examining the numbers of persons living in one-room tenements, it appeared that in Chelsea one-tenth of the population lived in such tenements; in St. Marylebone somewhat less than a sixth; in Holborn a fifth; and in St. George-in-the-East between a fourth and a fifth. These figures show how large a proportion of the population began, spent, and ended their existence within the four walls of a single-room tenement.

The total result shown was that in the metropolis 1,063,000 persons, or one quarter of the population, lived in one- or two-room tenements, and 1,250,000 in three- or four-room tenements; making a total of over 2,310,000, or well over half of the population living in tenements of less than five rooms.

Of still deeper interest and import was the information obtained as to that dreadful factor in London life—“overcrowding.” An effort was now for the first time made to get reliable information upon this matter. Hitherto it was only by piecing together the statements made by some of the Medical Officers of Health as to overcrowding in their respective parishes that one could form even the crudest idea of what the sum total in London actually amounted to.

Here, at last, was material enabling accurate calculations to be made, not only of overcrowding in each separate parish or district, but in London as a whole.

The Census Commissioners laid down the principle—

“That ordinary tenements which have more than two occupants per room, bedrooms and sitting-rooms included, may be considered as unduly overcrowded.

“We may,” they wrote, “be tolerably certain that the rooms in tenements with less than five rooms will not in any but exceptional cases be of large size, and that ordinary tenements which have more than two occupants per room, bedrooms and sitting-rooms included, may safely be considered as unduly overcrowded.”

By using the information given in the tables, and excluding all one-roomed tenements with not more than two occupants, all two-roomed tenements with not more than four occupants, all three-roomed tenements with not more than six, and all four-roomed tenements with not more than eight occupants, the desired information would be obtained. And they added:—

“Each Sanitary Authority is now provided with the means of examining with much precision into the house accommodation of its district.”

Provided with the tables as to the occupants of tenements, the Medical Officer of Health for the London County Council, in his report for 1891, worked out the figures for the metropolis. The result showed that there were in London 145,513 tenements of less than five rooms apiece, in each of which there were more than two inhabitants per room, and each of which consequently was “overcrowded.”

But it is when one ascertains the number of persons living in these overcrowded tenements that one realises what the extent of overcrowding was. In round numbers, one-fifth of the entire population of London lived in these tenements. The total population was 4,200,000; the number of “overcrowded” persons was 830,000.

A few illustrations of the overcrowding in certain parishes brings the meaning of these figures home still more.

In Clerkenwell, 25,600 persons lived in overcrowded tenements; in St. Luke, 18,700 persons; in Shoreditch, 41,700; in Islington, 64,600; in Kensington, 28,700; in Lambeth, 43,600. The larger proportion of these lived in one- or two-room tenements.

Figures are dry things to read and difficult to understand. To appreciate the true meaning and import of these, and to enable one who reads them to at all realise the conditions of existence of these hundreds of thousands of people, one must recall to mind the descriptions given by many of the Medical Officers of Health of tenement-houses; of all the misery, the filth, the sickness, the physical and moral degradation of life in tenement-rooms.

These facts now for the first time revealed the full magnitude and momentous nature of the problem of the sanitary housing of the people.

The year 1891 is memorable in the history of the sanitary evolution of London for “the Public Health (London) Act, 1891,”[175] which consolidated and amended the laws then existing in connection with the public health of the metropolis.

The state of the law was recognised as very unsatisfactory, being scattered over some thirty statutes or more—a condition of things which was greatly to the disadvantage of the public health of London.

Moreover, in accordance with the extraordinary custom, London, which on account of its huge population needed sanitary legislation almost more than any other place, had been excepted from much sanitary legislation which had been in operation for many years, with the most beneficial results, in the remainder of the country. Part of this legislation was at long last extended to London. Many amendments were made, recommendations of the Royal Commission of 1884 were given effect to, new provisions introduced, and the general result was a Sanitary Code for London—imperfect still in some important respects, but a great advance on anything which London had previously possessed.

The Act came into operation on the 1st of January, 1892, and it applied to the Administrative County of London only; some few of the provisions extending to the “City.”

And for the first time the new Central Authority—the County Council—with extended powers, occupied a prominent place in this legislation.

Once more did Parliament enact the oft-ignored direction that “it shall be the duty of every sanitary authority to cause to be made from time to time inspection of their district” for detection of nuisances—a duty so shamelessly neglected—and “to put in force the powers vested in them relating to public health and local government so as to secure the proper sanitary condition of all premises in their district.”

With a view to secure fit and proper persons as Medical Officers of Health and Sanitary Inspectors, their appointment was made subject to the regulations of the Local Government Board.

The Act greatly strengthened the law both as to the prevention and definition of nuisances. It provided for the immediate abatement of a nuisance, not only where actually proved to be injurious or prejudicial to health, but also where it was dangerous to health. It gave to any person the right to give information of nuisances to the sanitary authority instead of that right being limited to the person affected by the nuisance; and it extended to a Sanitary Authority the power to take proceedings for the abatement of nuisances arising in the district of another authority should the nuisance injuriously affect the inhabitants of their own district. It transferred from the police to the local authority the enforcement of the provisions of the law against smoke nuisances. It dealt with the removal of refuse. It extended the previous laws as to the adulteration of food and drugs, and the inspection of articles intended for the food of man. It enacted that a newly-erected dwelling-house must not be occupied until a certificate had been obtained of the Sanitary Authority to the effect that a proper and sufficient supply of water exists; and made the provisions as to the occupation of underground rooms as dwellings more stringent and effective.

The notification and prevention of the infectious and epidemic diseases, the provision of hospitals, ambulances, and many other branches of the great subject—the health of the public—were legislated upon. Additional duties were imposed on the Sanitary Authority in the matter of disinfection; the practical result of which was that the whole cost of disinfecting houses, and cleansing and disinfecting bedding, clothing, &c., was thrown upon the rates. In several matters the option given in previous legislation to local authorities to administer the law was taken away, and the duty made imperative. Parliament evidently had realised the hostility of many of the Vestries to administering some of the principal provisions of sanitary law, and the word “shall” figured much more frequently than ever before.

The hitherto optional provision of mortuaries by the sanitary authorities was made compulsory, the need for suitable and convenient places for the reception of the dead during the time that bodies are awaiting burial having long been felt, particularly in the poorer districts, where bodies awaiting burial were of necessity frequently kept in living rooms under conditions dangerous to health, especially where the case was an infectious one.

Among these “shalls” was that most important of all health subjects—overcrowding—and the condition of the tenement-houses of London. In this matter the local authorities had through a quarter of a century been tried in the balance and found wanting, and it was enacted (Sec. 94):—

“Every Sanitary Authority shall make and enforce such bye-laws as are requisite for the following matters (that is to say): (a) for fixing the number of persons who may inhabit a house, or part of a house, which is let in lodgings; (b) for the registration of houses so let or occupied; (c) for the inspection of such houses; … (d) for enforcing drainage for such houses, and for promoting cleanliness and ventilation in such houses; (e) for the cleansing and lime-washing at stated times of the premises; (f) for the taking of precautions in case of any infectious disease.”

In another matter, which the Vestries had long opposed, their hostility was overborne. They were now required to appoint “an adequate number of fit and proper persons as sanitary inspectors,” and, in case of their failure to do so, the Local Government Board was enabled, on the complaint of the Council, to order the appointment of a proper number.

The new Central Authority, directly representative of the whole of London, was not constituted the chief sanitary authority for London, nor even a sanitary authority. It was given power to make bye-laws for the prevention of nuisances of various sorts in London, except as regarded the “City,” to license cow-houses, and slaughter-houses, to appoint Inspectors to inspect them, and also dairies and milkshops, and it could extend the number of infectious diseases to be notified.

But most important of all was the power given to the County Council (by Section 100), which enacted, on it being proved to the satisfaction of the Council, that any Sanitary Authority (except the Commissioners of Sewers of the City) had made default in doing their duty under this Act with respect to the removal of any nuisance, the institution of any proceedings, or the enforcement of any bye-laws, the Council might institute any proceedings and do any act which the Authority might have instituted and done, such Authority being made liable to pay the Council’s expenses in so doing.

And, furthermore, Section 101 provided that “when complaint is made by the Council to the Local Government Board that a Sanitary Authority have made default in executing and enforcing any provision which it is their duty to execute or enforce under the Act, or of any bye-law made in pursuance thereof, the Local Government Board, if satisfied after due inquiry that the Sanitary Authority have been guilty of the alleged default, and that the complaint cannot be remedied under the other provisions of this Act, shall make an order limiting the time for the performance of the duty of such authority in the matter of such complaint. If such duty is not performed by the time limited in the order, the order may be enforced by writ of mandamus, or the Local Government Board may appoint the Council to perform such duty,” and the expenses were to be paid by the Sanitary Authority in default.

“It seems to me right and proper,” said Mr. Ritchie in introducing the Bill, “that in regard to the great question of public health in London the County Council ought to be charged with the performance of duty, which in the opinion of the Local Government Board after inquiry, has not been adequately and properly performed by the local authority.”

These sections were strongly opposed by some of the prominent Vestries, being held to be “degrading and destructive of local self-government by completely subordinating the local to the central authority.”

The self-government which many people like is the being able to do exactly as they themselves like, regardless of everybody else’s likes and rights. And it is the same with many local government authorities. Their idea of self-government too often is to govern for their own objects, and their own interests, regardless of the infinitely greater interests and rights of the great community around them; and when it is brought home to them that they are only a small integral part of a great community, that their sphere of self-government can only be a very limited one, and that they cannot be allowed either by action or neglect to injure the community, they resent it with no little outcry.

The principle of self-government, however, was not one to which appeal could be made, for it had been dragged through the mire by too many of the local authorities. Once the unity of London assumed definite shapes, as it did in the new Central Authority representing the whole of London, Vestry self-government, except upon certain lines and within certain limitations, was doomed; for it would have to make way for a far larger system of self-government—the self-government of London by Londoners.

Moreover, prolonged experience had proved that the Vestries could not be relied on to enforce the laws, and it was manifest that some effective provision must be devised for preventing them perpetually thwarting the intentions and defeating the imperative enactments of Parliament designed for the welfare of the community at large.

It was unfortunate, however, for the sanitary welfare of great masses of the people of London that the principle thus recognised and adopted by Parliament was not given fuller effect to than it was, for it is the only principle upon which any really sound system of public health administration for London can be based.

A few years later the principle was reaffirmed by Parliament.

During the summer of 1892 the appearance of cholera on the west coast of Europe—particularly Hamburg—exposed London to the importation of cases of this disease. The unsatisfactory position of the Council with regard to London administration for the prevention of epidemic disease was at once made evident.

In order to remove doubts as to the Council’s responsibilities as to the administration of the law relating to epidemic diseases, a provision defining the Council’s position was included in the Council’s General Powers Bill, which was passed by Parliament in 1893. This provision was to the following effect:—

“The Local Government Board may assign to the Council any powers and duties under the epidemic regulations made in pursuance of Section 134 of the Public Health Act, 1875, which they may deem it desirable should be exercised and performed by the Council.

“If the Local Government Board are of opinion that any sanitary authority in whose default the Council has power to proceed and act under the Public Health (London) Act, 1891, is making or is likely to make default in the execution of the said regulations, they may by order assign to the Council, for such time as may be specified in the order, such powers and duties of the sanitary authority under the regulations as they may think fit.”

Parliament thus once more emphasised the policy of the local sanitary authorities being subordinated to the Central Authority.

The new Central Authority—representative of the people of London—gave early evidence of vitality and energy. The heir had come into his property, with high ideals as to its government, and as to the welfare of the people. A new power had suddenly been brought into London life—an unknown but vigorous force. A capable staff was at once organised, and a Medical Officer and Assistant Medical Officer of Health appointed. Inquiries and investigations into the various matters most concerning the welfare of the citizens of London were at once undertaken, and conclusions arrived at, and action taken, with a thoroughness and a rapidity hitherto unknown in the administration of London affairs.

Bye-laws were made to regulate and unify the administration of sanitary laws by local authorities.

Several of the water companies were induced to give a constant supply of water to an increased extent.

And great efforts were made to utilise the powers conferred upon the Council by the recently passed Acts—the Housing of the Working Classes Act of 1890, and the Public Health (London) Act of 1891.

It was at once felt that the problem which first faced the Council was the housing of the people, and the Council determined to attack it on every side.

In the belief that facilities of communication between the working centres of London and residences in healthier localities would help considerably to alleviate some of the worst effects of overcrowding, and towards the successful treatment of the great housing problem, action was taken to turn the Cheap Trains Act of 1883 to greater account, and to secure greater numbers of workmen’s trains and more moderate fares; so as to enable workmen to travel cheaply between more distant homes and their places of employment.

That Act, which gave a large remission in the amount of passenger duty paid by railway companies, if the companies would provide a service of workmen’s trains, and would convey workmen at less than the usual fares, had so far not been made much use of.

On investigation it was found that the facilities afforded to workmen, particularly on certain railways, were very inadequate. There were no workmen’s trains at all on one important line—on another only one such train was run, whilst on several others the number of trains run was very small.

Representations were made to the Board of Trade and negotiations carried on with the Railway Companies, and by degrees a considerable extension of the facilities for the conveyance of workmen was secured.

The Council gave its immediate and more anxious attention to those breeding-places and forcing-pits of disease and misery, the insanitary areas in London.

The Housing Act of 1890 (by Part I.) constituted the Council the authority for preparing and carrying into effect schemes for the clearance and improvement of insanitary areas which were of such size, and situation, and character, as to render their clearance and reconstruction of general importance to the County.

The tremendous task of dealing with them was rendered more difficult and costly by the obligation imposed by Parliament of providing housing accommodation for the persons displaced; for in the lack of easy means of communication with the outer parts of London it was held to be necessary to re-house the greater number of them in the same locality.

The Metropolitan Board of Works had simply acquired and cleared the properties, and disposed of the sites to companies or individuals, placing on them the obligation to erect houses for the working classes. Now, however, the Council determined itself to erect, let, and maintain, the necessary dwellings. The chief reason for the change was the difficulty experienced in finding companies or persons who were willing to undertake the erection of dwellings on some of the sites.

The Council had to complete several schemes which it inherited in an unfinished condition from the Metropolitan Board of Works, but it at once initiated many itself, and carried them through to a successful conclusion.

And as one after another of the insanitary areas was investigated, so again and again was revealed to public view the appalling condition in which thousands of people—in the very heart of London—dragged out an existence more bestial than human; horrors piled on horrors—a state of things all the more awful because it had been existing for an indefinite number of years—levying annually the heaviest of tolls on those who came within its deadly sphere, and scattering its poison abroad among the community at large.

There was the Clare Market (Strand) Scheme, some 3½ acres—3½ acres of human wretchedness and disease and misery and filth. In one sub-area there were upwards of 800 persons to the acre. Here the death-rate was 41·32 per 1,000 in 1894; in another sub-area, the death-rate had been 50·52 per 1,000 in 1893; the death-rate for the whole area having been 39·03 in 1894. And in addition to this was the unknown sick-rate. There was the Webber Row Scheme in St. George-the-Martyr, Southwark—close upon 5 acres in extent, with a death-rate of 30·5 per 1,000. There were the Roby Street and Baltic Street areas in St. Luke, areas which “have about the worst reputation of any in London.”

The largest scheme which the Council undertook was that known as “the Boundary Street Area” in Bethnal Green. Here some fifteen acres of old, dilapidated, crowded dwellings—dwellings so insanitary that the death-rate in them was over 40 per 1,000—were swept away, entailing the displacement of 5,719 persons; and the ground so cleared was laid out with wider streets, and a large open space and excellent buildings were erected thereon to contain 5,524 persons without crowding. The Prince of Wales once more testified his deep interest in the welfare of the poorer classes of London by opening the new buildings—a ceremony which took place on the 3rd of March, 1900—and delivering an impressive speech.

A summary of the work accomplished by the Council up to this time showed that the Council had provided, or was engaged in providing, accommodation for 35,950 persons at a total outlay of close upon £2,000,000, an amount of building operations which, if conducted at one spot, would have resulted in the formation of a town of nearly 36,000 inhabitants.[176]

The cost of this work was enormously heavy, owing to the fact that the arbitrator could and did award commercial value for the land; but, as was pointed out by the Medical Officer of Health for the London County Council[177]:—

“The primary object of Part I. of the Act is not to provide artizans’ dwellings, but to secure the removal from the midst of the community of houses which are unfit for habitation, and the faults of which are in large degree due to bad arrangement. Where houses are thus situated, and are in a number of ownerships, rearrangement can only be carried out by vesting the property in one ownership, that of a public authority, who can then, by the making of new streets and by complete rearrangement of the area, ensure that the conditions which in future will exist are such as are needed for the health of the inhabitants. The chief value of the Act is, therefore, not so much the provision of house accommodation which is fit for habitation, as the abolition of houses which are dangerous to health. Part I. is not, therefore, in itself so much a Housing Act as an Act for the removal of nuisances on a large scale.”

But another reflection also suggests itself, namely, why should the ratepayers of London have been obliged to pay these high sums for property which, by the culpable neglect of the owners and their predecessors, had been allowed to sink into a condition not alone exceptionally dangerous to the lives of its inhabitants, but a constant danger to neighbouring districts—even to London itself. Surely in common fairness, those who had let it fall into such a state should have paid the penalty therefor, and not the public of London, who had had no part in bringing the property into such an evil condition.

Part II. of the Act was mostly a consolidation of Torrens’ Acts, 1868 and 1882, with amendments. It enabled the Vestries or District Boards to take proceedings before a magistrate for the clearing and demolition of single houses unfit for human habitation, and obstructive buildings, and empowered them and the County Council to undertake schemes for the improvement of areas too small to be dealt with by the Council.

The owner might elect to retain the site after the demolition of the building, and in that case received compensation for the building only. If the Vestry or District Board acquired the site the same procedure as to compensation had to be followed as under Part I.

A few schemes were undertaken by Vestries under this Part of the Act, the Council making a contribution to the cost, and a few by the Council. Thus in St. George-in-the-East, from November, 1890, to the end of 1894, 224 houses were “represented” as unfit for habitation—gruesome pictures of dirt, dilapidation, and insanitation of every form and variety, and this, too, after nearly forty years of sanitary work by the Vestry. Many were closed by order of the magistrate, some by the owner, some pulled down, some repaired and re-let.

Part III. of the Act embodied the idea, originally started by Lord Shaftesbury in 1851, as to the erection of labouring classes’ lodging-houses by the local authorities, and grafted several amendments thereon.

Power was given for the acquisition by the Council of land for the purpose of erecting lodging-houses thereon. Such land, however, was to be within the Council’s jurisdiction. Under this part of the Act the Council erected a common lodging-house in Parker Street for the accommodation of over 300 persons. It also acquired several sites, including the Millbank estate, upon which it proceeded to build houses; and one of 38 acres at Lower Tooting for the erection of cottages thereon.

Altogether the work performed under the Act was considerable, and the housing for the accommodation of the working classes made sensible progress, the sites sold by the Metropolitan Board of Works to trusts, and public companies, and private persons, having been built upon and covered with artizans’ dwellings.

Private building was proceeding at considerable pace, and in many parts of London the ground was becoming more overcrowded than ever with houses.

The older parts of London were being rapidly re-built, and open spaces at the rear of buildings were being gradually covered by buildings.

Of St. Pancras the Medical Officer of Health wrote (1896):—

“… There is a prospect that in course of time the whole of the open space about buildings may disappear…. Old houses possessing yards, areas, open spaces, in some form at the front or back or both, are being re-built in such a manner as to entirely cover the whole ground area two or three storeys up—leaving not a particle of open space.”

The restrictions imposed by the Building Acts were of the most illusory character, and as the Acts were mostly future in their operation, and not retrospective, their effect was also limited. Any “owner” was entitled to re-build on “old foundations,” no matter how crowded the houses were on the spot, so new buildings were usually only a resurrection in huger and more perpetual and objectionable form of the evils which ought, as far as possible, to have been eradicated.

During the year 1894 the London Building Law was consolidated and amended. The Act recognised, for the first time in London, the principle that, in addition to the height of the building being proportionate to the width of the street on which it abuts, the amount of open space about the rear of a building should also be proportionate to its height, and hence the future crowding of buildings on area was put under limitation.

But how small was the limitation, how small the concessions exacted from “owners” in this matter, and how miserably late they came in the history of London building operations.

The tendency of house construction in London was to ever larger size, to greater height. To how great an extent this had been carried on in the “City” was described by the Medical Officer of Health in 1894:—

“It would be a fair and moderate estimate to put the superficial area (of the City) at four square miles instead of one. We have only to point to the construction of business premises—the piling of one floor over another for many storeys high, each floor being occupied by separate occupiers, forming in itself a distinct tenancy, having all the rights and privileges of an independent building, and claiming as much attention from every branch of our municipal system as if it stood alone…. We have, in fact, to deal with about 28,000 separate tenancies, with a day population of 301,384.”

In some of the more well-to-do parts of the metropolis great blocks of buildings were built and let out in flats, most of them with the minimum of light and air prescribed by narrow laws.

In other districts of London considerable numbers of small houses were removed, and large blocks of artizans’ dwellings erected in their stead. Thus, in the parish of St. Luke, nearly one-fifth of the entire population resided in the ten blocks of artizans’ dwellings which existed there.

In the earlier stages of the reform of the housing of London such buildings had been acclaimed as great improvements, as indeed they were. The later opinions of Medical Officers of Health were not so laudatory. Thus, in 1891, the Medical Officer of Health for Whitechapel, after stating that there were in his district 27 buildings having 3,127 apartments containing 12,279 persons, added that he was “not enlisted amongst the enthusiasts of this method of providing for the housing of the working classes.” In 1896 he wrote: “All model dwellings are not equally models of good sanitary houses.” And in 1897:—

“The increased population are housed in huge barrack buildings which sometimes are constructed so as to allow light and air to permeate the rooms and sometimes not. The effect of this modern invention is to increase the density of population to a damaging degree….

“That the direct influence of these barrack buildings upon the health of their occupants—more especially the children—is adverse, I have not the slightest doubt.”

The Vestry of Shoreditch reported in 1892–3:—

“‘Model Artizans’ Dwellings’ do not appear to have been quite what their title implied. At Norfolk Buildings, Shoreditch, on the Medical Officer of Health causing them to be examined for a certificate for exemption from the inhabited house duty, the whole system of drainage was found to be in a most defective and dangerous state. A number of cases of typhoid, diphtheria, and other infectious illness had occurred on the premises.”

And a couple of years later the Chief Sanitary Inspector submitted to his Vestry a report on some so-called “model dwellings”: “These blocks of buildings, 50 feet high, are packed together so as to exclude light and air, and four rooms occupy the site of two: evil conditions which the architect and owner were not only privileged to create, but also, and very practically, in so doing were they privileged to condemn unborn generations of people, whose necessities condemn them to live in these tenements, to endure the evils of their creation.”

The Medical Officer of Health for St. James’ wrote:—

“Block dwellings in such an area as St. James’ do not provide the conditions in which healthy children can be reared, nor in which there can be a family life comparable with that possible in the open suburbs of London.”

The Medical Officer of Health for St. Olave gave a description of Barnham Buildings:—

“Many of the rooms, &c., on the ground and first floor are generally very dark, and the buildings have not been maintained in a sanitary condition, notwithstanding the hundreds of notices that have been served the past five years. The average death-rate of the past five years of the unhealthy tenements was at least 49·6 per 1,000 and of the remainder at least 29·1.”

The Medical Officer of Health for St. Marylebone gave an interesting explanation of the condition of this class of houses:—

“The following is a list of applications, under the Customs and Inland Revenue Act, 1891, from which it will be gathered that it is quite exceptional for a block of artizans’ dwellings of even recent construction to be in a tolerable sanitary condition. The reason for this anomalous state of things is, that in the building of these dwellings the Sanitary Authority seems to have no power; a dwelling must be occupied before it comes under supervision.”

In spite of these and many other drawbacks, however, many of these buildings afforded accommodation far superior to that which had previously existed on the spots where they were erected, and provided residence for large numbers of people who otherwise might have been doomed to living in the worst class of tenement-house.

Closely connected with the Public Health Act of 1891 was another Act passed in the same year—“The Factory and Workshop Act.”

The Select Committee of the House of Lords on the Sweating System had finished their inquiry and reported in 1890. The evidence given before it was, as regarded factories, workshops, and workplaces, very much a repetition of that which for thirty-five years had been detailed by Medical Officers of Health as regarded the dwellings of the people, but now obtaining greater publicity attracted more attention.

Overcrowding and insanitation of almost every conceivable kind pursued large numbers of the unfortunate workers from their overcrowded and insanitary tenements to their overcrowded and insanitary workplaces, and with the same disastrous results. And as regarded domestic workshops the conditions were even worse, workers spending their days and nights often in the one room—sometimes with extra workers brought in.

Want of light and air and overcrowding in workshops and factories are quite as serious matters as they are in inhabited houses.

The Select Committee, in their conclusions and recommendations, said:—

“The sanitary conditions under which the work is conducted are not only injurious to the health of the persons employed, but are dangerous to the public, especially in the case of the trades concerned in making clothes, as infectious diseases are spread by the sale of garments made in rooms inhabited by persons suffering from smallpox and other diseases. Three or four gas jets may be flaring in the room, a coke fire burning in the wretched fireplace, sinks untrapped, closets without water, and altogether the sanitary condition abominable.”

“A witness told us that in a double room, perhaps nine by fifteen feet, a man, his wife, and six children slept, and in the same room ten men were usually employed, so that at night eighteen persons would be in that one room.”

“In nine cases out of ten the windows are broken and filled up with canvas; ventilation is impossible and light insufficient—the workshops are miserable dens. We are of opinion that all workplaces included in the above description should be required to be kept in a cleanly state, to be lime-washed or washed throughout at stated intervals, to be kept free from noxious effluvia, and not to be overcrowded—in other words, to be treated for sanitary purposes as factories are treated under the factory law.”

Lord Kenry, Chairman of the Committee, in his draft report, said:—

“It has been shown that the dwellings or shops in which the sweated class live and work are too often places in which all the conditions of health, comfort, and decency are violated or ignored…. Sanitary inspection is totally inadequate, and the local bodies have seldom done their duty effectually. At the East End of London generally the sanitary state of homes and shops could not possibly be much worse than it is.”

And Mr. Lakeman (Government Inspector under the Factories and Workshops Act) said, in reference to workshops: “I think that the evidence given your Lordships upon the insanitary state of those places is not at all too black.”

Once more the necessity of inspection was insisted upon. “On no point,” wrote the Chairman, “was the unanimity of witnesses more emphatic than with reference to the necessity of more efficient sanitary inspection, not only of workshops, but of the dwellings of the poor.”

And just as it was as regarded tenement-houses, inspection here was lamentably deficient, if not absolutely non-existent.

“The inspection at present carried on is totally inadequate, and nothing was more clearly proved before us than the fact that satisfactory results cannot be looked for from the system as it now stands.”[178]

“Even when an unmistakable cause of unhealthiness is discovered, and steps are taken to remove it, the process of applying the remedy is slow and uncertain. The Local Board meets once a week or fortnight … the landlord is allowed a fortnight to carry out the work; three weeks may elapse before the inspector can go and see it, then perhaps nothing has been done; the summons, &c., takes time. In any case much valuable time is lost, and smallpox or fever is allowed to pursue its ravages with the source of the disease daily aggravated in intensity.

“At present the inspectors under the Factory and Workshop Act of 1878 have no power to deal with any nuisance which lies within the district over which the local authorities preside. On the other hand, the local inspector cannot interfere should he discover any breach of the Factory Act.”

The Home Secretary, in moving the second reading of the Bill, explained its scope. He said:—

“The design and object of this Bill is to bring all workshops and all factories up to the same sanitary level, and to require the same conditions as to ventilation, overcrowding, lime-washing, and cleanliness to be applied to all kinds of workshops in which men alone, or women, children, and young persons are employed. The Bill does not deal with ‘domestic workshops.’ The President of the Local Government Board will introduce a Bill dealing with the public health, and the House may rest content with leaving what is called ‘the domestic workshop’—that is to say, the working-man’s home in which he works with the members of his family—subject to the provisions of the law of public health alone. It is obvious that in the domestic workshop you have not got the presence of the employer and the employé. You have the members of the same family … and it seems to me that we may allow him and his family to work in a place which is sufficiently good so far as sanitary conditions are concerned for him and his family to live in. Now that we are extending the sanitary provisions of the Factory Act to all workshops throughout the country, of whatever kind they may be except the domestic workshop, so that every cobbler’s shop, every blacksmith’s shop, every tailor’s shop, will come under the provisions of the sanitary law, it seems to me foolish not to take advantage of the existing machinery provided by the local authorities, and the enforcement of the sanitary provisions, so far as workshops are concerned, is by this Bill given to the local authorities.”

The passing of the Factory and Workshops Act (1891) and of the Public Health (London) Act of 1891 made the sanitary authorities primarily responsible for enforcing many new provisions. Those authorities were charged with the duty of securing the maintenance of the “workshops” in a sanitary condition, of preventing overcrowding in them, and of enforcing cleanliness, ventilation, lime-washing, and freedom from effluvia, and securing the provision of sufficient sanitary accommodation.

Added to this was the sanitary supervision of the places of “outworkers.”[179]

It would appear, however, that only in exceptional instances was any systematic attempt made in 1892 to carry out the new duties imposed by the Legislature upon the Vestries and District Boards.

In several instances the Medical Officers of Health drew attention to the impossibility of undertaking workshop inspection with their existing staff. Thus the Medical Officer of Health of Hackney:—

“Inquiry has revealed the presence of something like 2,000 workshops and dwellings of outworkers which, under this Act and Order, should be inspected to ascertain the presence or otherwise of any insanitary condition. With the present staff it is impossible that this can be attempted.”

In St. Marylebone the Medical Officer of Health stated, in 1894, that the number of workshops and workplaces in his parish amounted to 3,550. And in 1895 he wrote: “The workplaces are so numerous in the parish that it is not practicable for them all to be inspected regularly with the present staff.”

“Increased duties,” wrote the Medical Officer of Health for Fulham in 1893, “having been placed on the sanitary staff by the ‘Factory and Workshop Act’ of 1891, relating to outworkers; but with the existing number of inspectors it is not possible to attend to them thoroughly, so that the Act in Fulham is almost ‘a dead letter.’”

“In Islington,” reported the Medical Officer of Health in 1895, “neither the factories nor workshops in the district, nor the smoke nuisances receive any attention worth mentioning, and so far as this district is concerned they may be said to have been entirely neglected.

“I look upon the inspection of factories and workshops as one of the greatest necessities of the present day, not only from a health point of view, but also from the social aspect.”

The manifest solution of this difficulty was the appointment of additional inspectors, but the local authorities had a sort of horror of such appointments, though by this time they must have known that the benefit to workers and to the community generally would have been very great.

A report in 1892 of the Medical Officer of Health of St. George-the-Martyr shows the grievous need there was for inspection of one very important class of workshop:—

“I have inspected sixty-three retail bakehouses within the parish, and found them (with few exceptions) to be in a filthy and unwholesome state, dangerous alike to the health of the journeyman baker, who makes the bread, and to the public who eat it. Twenty-one were completely underground…. In times of heavy rainfall sewage forces itself through the draintraps of these cellars, soiling the sacks containing flour, and fouling the atmosphere.”

Parliament again legislated about factories and workshops in 1895.

Under the Act a minimum space was required in each room of a factory or workshop of 250 cubic feet for each person employed. For the prevention of the infection of clothing, the occupier of a factory, &c., was prohibited from causing wearing apparel to be made or cleaned in a dwelling-house having an inmate suffering from scarlet fever or smallpox. An important step was also taken in extending the provisions of the Factory Acts to laundries, of which there were a great number in London, and where the workers stood in great need of improved conditions of work, and of public supervision.

Lamentable as were the results of the non-protection of the workers in workshops, still more lamentable and disastrous were they as regarded the 2,310,000 dwellers in the 630,569 tenements of less than five rooms. Up to 1889 regulations under the Sanitary Acts of 1866 and 1874 had been adopted in 31 of the 40 London sanitary districts. In only nine of these was any considerable use made of them. Had these regulations been put into force a great amount of overcrowding would have been prevented and the houses kept in a fairly clean and sanitary condition.

In the whole of London, with its 547,000 houses, only 7,713 tenement-houses were on the register in 1897, of which more than a half were in four parishes, namely: 1,500 in Kensington, 1,190 in Westminster, 840 in Hampstead, and 610 in St. Giles’; leaving 3,573 in the whole of the rest of London—a mere fraction of the tenement-houses of London.

In Bethnal Green (1894), “76·1 per cent. of the population lived in tenements of less than five rooms. No houses had been registered.”

In Lambeth over one-half of the population lived in tenements of less than five rooms, and of these nearly one-third lived under conditions of overcrowding. There was one Sanitary Inspector to about 60,000 people. The inadequacy of the staff had been pressed upon the Vestry by the Medical Officer of Health from time to time for a number of years.

Considerable ingenuity was in many cases exercised by the opponents of the regulation of tenements in the working of the bye-laws which resulted practically in rendering them inoperative. In some cases all houses were to be exempted where the rent was higher than certain specified weekly sums. The result was that the “owners” promptly raised the rent above these sums, and so secured their exemption, at the same time getting an increased rent. In others, the bye-laws gave the Vestry power to decide what houses should be registered, and thus enabled the Vestry to evade the necessity of registering any at all. In others, notices were to be given to the “owner” before a house was registered—the notice was not sent. And so, in one way or another, the imperative “shall” of Parliament was evaded by the largest proportion of the Vestries and District Boards.

As regarded the Vestries and District Boards who made a show of putting the regulations in force, the Medical Officers explained that, owing to the inadequacy of the staff of Sanitary Inspectors, it was “impossible” to inspect the houses regularly.

In other parishes and districts the number registered and inspected was but a fraction of the houses which ought to have been registered. In Bow (in Poplar) where none were registered, the Medical Officer of Health wrote in 1891: “I should say 4,000 houses require registration.” In St. Mary, Newington: “At least 80 per cent. of the houses are occupied by members of more than one family.” But as yet none were registered. And this same Medical Officer of Health pointed out how in his parish—“The indisposition that has hitherto been shown on the part of the Vestry to put into force the bye-laws for houses let in lodgings has led to great license in house-farming and house-crowding.”

Where really put into operation the regulations had an excellent effect. Thus the District Board of St. Giles’ said: “The advantage of these regulations has been very great.”

And in Paddington the Medical Officer of Health stated: “The work done … has had an excellent effect.”

Of some streets where houses were registered (1897–8)—“The whitewashing and cleansing has without doubt had a good effect. The streets have been freer from infectious diseases than they have been for several years past.”

The advantages of the regulations in the administration of the health laws were time after time pointed out and insisted upon by many Medical Officers of Health.

The Medical Officer of Health for Westminster, where nearly 1,000 houses were registered, wrote (1899):—

“The great advantage in legal procedure lies in the fact that a breach of them is a finable offence with a further daily penalty after written notice, and is not a nuisance subject to abatement within a certain time.

“If the conditions imposed by the bye-laws are carried out, no doubt one of the best methods for preventing overcrowding is thus achieved.”

The advantage of this quicker procedure was manifest, for, under the other Public Health or Sanitary Acts, the whole process of dealing with, or getting a nuisance abated, took “a long time—a very long time,” but the advantages did not appeal to people who did not want to use them.

Thus there was a most grievous neglect of duty on the part of the great majority of the Vestries and District Boards, with the inevitable result of the most disastrous consequences to the working and poorer classes all over London.

It must have appeared strange, in view of this glaring and scandalous neglect of duty by the Vestries in enforcing the regulations, that the London County Council as the Central Authority did not use the powers which they were supposed to possess of acting in the default of the local authorities, or of making representation to the Local Government Board of the neglect of those authorities.

The explanation was, that in the administration of this, absolutely the most important of all branches of the housing problem of London, the London County Council, had been left entirely out—had not even been given a voice in the framing of the bye-laws or regulations, and therefore had no legal power to act. Regulations or bye-laws, drafted by the Local Government Board as “models” for adoption by the local authorities, suggested “exemptions” to what Parliament had directed—though there was not a single word in the 94th Section or in any part of the Act to justify such a suggestion—or suggested phrases in them which actually placed the enforcement or non-enforcement of the Act in the discretion of those authorities, this, too, though Parliament had made the explicit imperative enactment that these local authorities should make and enforce regulations.

Most of the Vestries made bye-laws under Section 94 of the Act, nearly all containing exemption or elusive clauses as suggested; some even avowedly reserving to themselves the option of registering or not registering houses, as they thought fit.

The London County Council was not in a position to act in their default, as these authorities could shelter themselves under the option contained in the terms of the regulations, and a representation to the Local Government Board would have been useless, as the same defence would be effectively made by the local authorities if called to account.

Thus, the deliberate enactment of Parliament was frustrated; the Act was prevented being a remedy for overcrowding, or even a protection against it, and except in a few parishes or districts where the great advantages of the Act were appreciated, all the dreadful evils of overcrowding were given free play, and allowed to flourish on as gigantic a scale as ever.

The effects of the inaction of the Vestries and District Boards were unfortunately not confined to the moment. A legacy of suffering, of misery, and physical deterioration was left to subsequent generations. Once more might hundreds of thousands of voices of the victims and sufferers have cried out: “While you remain inactive, death and disease do not.”[180]

A special census of the population of London was taken on March 29, 1896, which showed that the population had increased to 4,443,018 persons, being an increase of 200,900; and the number of inhabited houses from 547,120 to 553,119.

As years had gone by, and the necessity and importance of sanitation had become more widely recognised, and as London had grown in size and increased in population, the duties of the Vestries had grown heavier, and the tendency of legislation was to broaden the basis of their action.

The mileage of public streets to be paved, lighted, cleansed, and watered, had multiplied two, three, and four times since 1855; the number of houses in many districts had more than doubled; the drainage work had increased proportionally; the scavenging and removing of refuse also. Nominal duties had become real ones, and new duties had been added—the disinfection of infected houses and infected clothes, the inspection of food, the working of the Food and Drugs Act—these, with numerous smaller matters, meant a very considerable amount of work, expense, and responsibility.

But all these were what one of the Vestries in their Report described as “well-worn grooves of familiar routine.” In addition thereto, and now more than ever of primary importance, was the great duty of inspection—inspection of houses, and of rooms in houses, and of workshops, and often the consequent proceedings for the abatement of nuisances, or the punishment of offenders.

“House-to-house inspection,” wrote the Medical Officer of Health for Islington in 1893, “is the only efficient remedy for extensive sanitary evils. It is the life and soul of sanitary work.”

House-to-house inspection of their districts was the most necessary of all sanitary work—as it was the means by which most sanitary defects and malpractices were detected—but it was the first to be sacrificed under the increased pressure of work, and the last for which adequate provision was made.

“A house-to-house inspection has been attempted more than once,” wrote the Medical Officer of Health for Islington in 1893, “but it has never yet been brought to a complete and satisfactory finish.”

In fact the main breakdown of the Vestry administration in London was their antipathy to inspection, and their refusal to appoint a sufficient number of inspectors.

“The subject of overcrowding alone,” wrote one Medical Officer of Health, “if properly attended to, would pretty well occupy the whole of the time of the present staff.”

The complaints of the Medical Officers of Health were frequent and insistent on the inadequacy of the inspectorate. Thus the Medical Officer of Health for Fulham wrote:—

“The Vestry must clearly understand that the present staff of Sanitary Inspectors is quite inadequate to properly perform the duties devolving upon the Sanitary Authority. There is only one Sanitary Inspector to every 35,000 inhabitants. Should the Vestry persist in their refusal to employ an adequate staff, the inference will be unavoidable that they are unwilling that the Acts—for the faithful administration of which, in the interests of the public health, they as Sanitary Authority are responsible—should be properly carried out.”

Interesting light is often to be found in the reports sometimes of the Vestries, and oftener of the Medical Officers of Health, upon various aspects of the great housing problem.

Sometimes a sentence enables so much else to be understood. Thus, in 1892, a Medical Officer of Health wrote:—

“Many persons think the Public Health Act an innovation on their privileges.”

Describing the insanitary condition of 230 houses in Provost Street, Shoreditch, the Sanitary Inspector wrote in 1892:—

“The difficulty of dealing with these houses has been greatly increased by the circumstance that the leases will expire in a very few years. There was, therefore, a very natural objection on the part of many of the leaseholders to execute substantial works, of which the freeholder would in a few years reap the benefit, and without contributing anything to the expense of the improvements.”

This “very natural objection” entailed, of necessity, sickness and death upon a considerable number of persons.

The Vestry of St. Pancras wrote in 1893:—

“The primary cause of houses and buildings becoming insanitary is the neglect of freeholders to compel lessees to comply with the terms and conditions of their leases. If the Vestry were empowered (where freeholders are negligent) to compel freeholders to cause lessees to carry into effect the covenants of the leases, the houses inhabited by the poorer classes would not become so wretchedly dilapidated and a scandal, but might be maintained in a fairly habitable condition.”

The Medical Officer of Health for Bethnal Green exonerated some property owners, whilst fixing the blame on others.