The Northern Daily Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1857-05-30 00:00:00

THE WEST DERBY GUARDI4NS.

THE ""RATTLE HIS BONGS OVER THE EiTO*Ei"

INVEiTIG

The pressure on our space, in consequence of the lee g by
rep"rt of the soeetal meeting of the Liver. ooh T iwii
IC.,u ;di on the Pike Water question, p ecluded .he po Ni-
t-airy of noticing the proceeologa ,if !hi.. board at its twin'
weekly meeting held •,n Wedne.,clay 14,4 Af.er the ustrat
routine baseness had been dis=posed of the foltivriog Cr we
the general board was react, relative to :he cha-ges made
by Dr. Nevins, against the board :
Pun Lief deaid, Whitehall (.i W) \lay 25, 1857.
Sir,—.l am directed by the Poor Law Board to infer,. yin
the they have teceivtd from their in-p•ctor, Nlr. Manwaring
a !sport on the inquey which he rec•-nily held as to tip
sufficiency of the metrical arrangements in the W,•s D r y
Union Worklion-e, and into the allegations on :he tottj et
col:rained in a letter which Dr. Nevins addressed to the edit,,,
of the NORTHERN ! IMES.
The board have carefully considered Mr. ‘tanwaring'•
report, and the evidence by which it is arc ,rnpiried, and e
appears to !hem that Dr. Nevins has who:ly failed to tor' -
stantiate the charge preferred by him egain,t the Bead • f
Guardians of systematic neglect of the sack poor, or, in his ow
words, "of d :ermined neglect of its duty towersla the sick
whom it sent into the workhouse this winter " The set,
foundation for this charge (to tar as the evidence taken befit, e
the inspector shows) appeals to he the fact of the eu ttd an-
having only conseeted to provide De N.eritts, as m d ea,
officer of the etaikhouse, with a dispensieg assist:in f.n ii
month, at a salary of 30s per week, instead of complying with
his request for assis.ance of a more general and perm 'nett
charac er.
On referrieg to your letter of the Sch Joinarv, 18.57, ti e
board fled that, in caosequence of the trio-ail own en- of sic'.
c: sea thin in the workhouse, the guardians re eiv,d 'hr th.
medic-al offiiter should he authorised to e• gag an assistant fro
four we. k., at a salary not exceedilig 31/4 p., we k.
On the 28 li Jinn ont the guardians further resolved " th at
D.. Nevins be allowed 30s per week, for fair weeks frern the
expirat;on of the present time, of allowance to that officer Peer
remunetating an ass se ant in the dispeuing of mediti les at ,hr
workhouse." Ihi th.• 25th February following the en odiatte
to-olved " that D . Nevins, the medical oific-r of ilia work.
hop-e, he allowed 30, per week, for fou•• weeks frets tint d.y,
for remunerating an assistant in the dispensing of nit•dieines "
The ass stance of a dispenser appears to have been afforded
so Dr• Nevins during the previeus wit or, when there was ail
unusual number of sick do the workhouse, and on this oe.casion
the arrangement did not, as the board believed, g ye rise to
any complaint en the part. of Dr. N . Vine, while it se ma to
have met the temporary erne vier Dr. Nevins ~ a-r.,,
however, that he was unable to proeure the ass stance of a
di-penser for ft.ue weeks, a a salary of 30s per week; and that
he, therefore, employed as h.s assistant, at his own exoense,
the medical gentleman whom he had previously cogged u.(l r
the first resivtrion of the guardians. B riot diosaiistied wi he
the determination of the guardians no: to provide assioeore
of a permanent and general charac er, Dr. Nevin, the,. wrote
and publieied a circular latter, datel tha 9 , of
March last, which he addresaed to the ex. °pip
guardians of the Uition, co nplain'ng of sue:. &WWI.
mination, and al-o of the crowled state of the siek-
wards in th • worlrhtinse, and concurrently he wrote (14 ,rtic'e
which appeared in the Nowt-Ha:am Times. ca'culated.
to impresethl a., aders with. the 6 lief eh,, the g vsrdians
to,re I tally reg ,rdiess of he ciaints ‘f huntansty and of
their duty towards the sick inmates, and also to excite
public odium og lin& the gu irdi ins.
Q. the 28th of March, Dr. Nevins wrote a letter to the
guardians, in which he admits that he was the au'hor of the
attiele rt•terred to. In this letter, which was made public
he again charges the guardians with neglect of the sick inmates,
and uses laeguage towards them, which the Board cannot but
consider is totally irreconcilable with that propriety weich is
requisite in rallying on the necessary intercourse be ween rms,
sta•olit.g in the respective relations of him,,elf and the B :ard
of Guirdians,

The Board must repeat, that the charge of ne.ileet thus made,
his in their opinion, been shown to he unfouttd.-d. It is
certainly true that Mr. Manwarinq w,o•e to the guardian., in
February last, p toting out. the over-crow led state of the rick
w:.rds in the wolkitou6e, hut it is to he ohse, ved, that Dr.
Nevins during the inquiry, distinctly stated his opinion that t tr
wards were not too full of inmates. Without reference how-
ever, to the hu!h, or otherwise, of Itho accusations tn ,de by
Dr. Nevin., the board think ho has conduced himself in a
manner which rases a grave question, whether he should be
permitted to retain his otfic,..

"# be hoard are of opinion that this shou'd very much depend,
on the lettings of Ihe guardian,,, whom he has aggrieved, and
who=e proper authority, and teepee ful treatment by their
officers, this boari are at all times desirous of vind:ca'ing.
If, after what has passed, the gusrd.ans think that D-.
Nevins, by the way in which he has act d. has placed himself
in such a podtine, as to make it impo-sible for them satithr.
torily to continue to act with him as their medical offi,er, the
hoard will feel bound o require his rosigaation. Bat
strong tts knotty bas been borne to Dr. Nevins general t ffl-
eiency and carefulnets as medical officer, the board trust that
the guardians will be satisfied wiAt the expression of their
opinion tvarained in this letter ; and with the expectation that
Dr. Nevins will for the fu ure confine any complaint he ha=
to make as to defective medical arrangements to the proper
channels, and wi'l recognise the neeessi,y of treating ,he
guardians wi h the courtesy due to the position they occupy as
his employers

`the board take this opportunity of adverting to two or throe
points which have been brought under.their notice in the course
of this inquiry. In the first place, the board deem it necer-
sary to press upon the attention of the guardians the advisa-
bility of ail medicines, and ex,ras ordered fur the sick being
administered by the three responsible ptt;cl nurses, aid of all
cases of midwifery oceurring in 'the workhouse being attended
by the medical oflieer instead of by the nurse, Erztbeth Wood.
They also • think that the porter's honk should be kept
with s riot accuracy. the precise time of every person en-
terine or leaving the workhouse being entered therein.
When child-en horn in the workhotve are not born alive, the
board are of opinion that the fact should b~ duly recorded in
some book kept for the purpose. It further appears to the
board important that the imasc:er and matron should not be
absent front the workhouse at- the same time, and that the
master should not leave it for any length .of time without
having previously obtained the sanction of the guardians. Tine
board think it desirable that in case of the death in the work.
house of any inmate of the Roman Catholic persuasion, the
master should be directed to give notice of the fact to the
Roman Catholic clergyman of the district.
The tioari attach great importance to the Wm Ichouse Medical
Relief Book being accurately kept, and they accordingly
r.-quest iliac the guardians will instruct Dr. Nevins in future
to keep this honk correctly in every particular —I am, sir,
your obedient servant, COURTENAY, Secretary.
To W. Cleaver, Esq.,
Clerk to he Guardians of the West Oerby 110 on,
2, Elliot-street, Clayton—el:tare Lverpool.
The dismission on the subject was adjourned until next
week.

A Nitw Paoszor.—The Times city article states that the
• prospectus has been issued of the Hartlepool Colliery
. Company, with a capital of £65,000, in £5 slut, s.
TRZ ST. Jets' D'Acaz, 101 guns, screw steamship, is to
be imm diately fitted up, at Devonormt, for the parp 'se of
taking the Halifax side portion of the cable instead of the
Niagara, and that vessel will render her service in any way
in which she may be found available.
Beaus, May 25.—The roes of the House of Commons
on the dowry for the Princess Royal is is gerded wi4h satis-
faction here. Any much smaller sum would have been
looked upon as a slight. The approaching union of the
two families will not create sympa;hies for England in
Prussia ; they exact already to the fuliest extent that they
could have obtained under present circurns,ances and
when the Pruteian nation ceases to be. abused for what it
could not help, those sympathies will be still warmer and
more expansive.
Nsw BRANCH OF MiNUFACTURB —We have often
alluded to the unlimited water-power that is a'lovrad to go
unem.Aoyed at Montmorenci, and hive, with good reason,
pointed out how this suburb of Quebec is de.tined to be
the Lowell of this pert of the world. Save the sawing of
deals, nothing else has b en dine up to this tim- ; ba, J.
H. Clint, Esq., hevi.;g leased a part of Mr G. Hall's
establishment, a pail factory has been started under the
management of Mt. A. Fraser, who is agent for the sale of
the pails, and this article will be manufactured in sufficient
quantity not merely to supply Quebec, but a great part of
Lower Canada. The enterprising gentleman wile has thus
made the first practical move towards establishing the
manufacturing capacity of Montmorenci deserves to be
rewarded with success.— Toronto Colonist.
POOZ-RATZ INEQUALITIES.—Ift a petition to the Com-
mons on this subject, from St. George's-in-the-East, the
petitioners say—From various causes, Large messes of the
poor are being drawn to the eastern parishes of the
metrop-tia. In consequence of this, the ratepayers of
those districts are becoming more and more impoverished,
the poor-rates having, during the last twenty years, been
doubled in amount, and the number of paupers hive in-
creased threefold. The ratepayers of this pstish are now
paying on the average roar shillings in the pennd poor-
rate, while the richer and more favou ably situated
parishes are not paying more than one-sixth of that
amount. The greeter the amount of poverty in any dis-
trict the heavier is the rate made for the relief of the
poor, and also the greater the number of poor residing in
any parish. In the heavier rated parishes, especially in
the eastern districts, this system causes not only great
distress among the poorer classes of ratepayers, but sick-
ness, misery, and demoralisation among the poor them.
selves, to an extent that, in the belief of your petitioners,
Met be totally unknown to your honourable house.