The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1841-03-05 00:00:00

HEALTH OF LARGE TOWNS

This important subject has, of late, occupied a considera-
ble share of public attention, and it is gratifying to see the
legislature taking the matter into consideration. As Liver-
pool yields to none in this particular, we are authorised in
publishing the following letter upon the subject, written by
Mr. Sam. Potter, and addressed to a member of the council.
The document is truly valuable, as the facts therein stated
are the result of practical experience, whilst visiting in
capacity of surgeon to the North Dispensary.

—Having been a close observer, for several years pa

• - .
of the injurious effect which the impure atmosphere, in close
courts and cellars, has upon the poorer classes of the inha-
bitants of this large town, it gives me unfeigned pleasure to
see the attention of the council brought to the subject,

through your philanthropic exertions, with a view to the pre

vention of so lamentable a source of disease and mortality
Permit me, therefore, to offer such information as I hay

been enabled to obtain during my official connexion with thl
above charity, as well as since the termination of tha

period

Inasmuch as the amount of disease is commensurate with
the density of the population, and the difficulty of its eradi-
cation to the want of proper ventilation, I have invariably
found, that, in those parts of the town this circumstanced,
when disease once enters a habitation, it becomes generated
by the impurity of the atmosphere, and soon spreads to the
surrounding dwellings; and, were there but the means of
introducing pure currents of air into the abodes of the

sufferers, it would not only afford more reasonable hope of
recovery, but arrest the progress of disease through the
family and neighbourhood.
From the statistical returns of the Dispensaries it will be
seen, that these is a greater amount of sickness at the north
than the south end of the town ; and, as my observations
have been chiefly confined to the farmer, I shall give a brie)

summary of the prevailing diseases, and divide the sectit
into four districts, for the sake of arrangement.
The Northwest part of the town abounds with chest at
rheumatic affections. This is more especially the case in the
streets adjoining the river, commencing from Chapel-street
and extending in a line to Carlton-street. Many of these
streets are thickly populated by the Welsh and Irish, and,
from their low situation and proximity to the river, the hu-
midity of the atmosphere is a fertile source of the diseases be-
fore alluded to. As we proceed from Oldhall-street to Vaux-
hall-road, and the streets situated between these thorough-
fares, the number of courts and cellars increases, and fever
becomes more frequent. The worst instances occur in the
neighbourhood of Smithfield, and, ext&ding in a line north-
wards, in Charter and Chisenhale-streets
The North and Northeast Districts.
inhabited by English, and the streets being more open and
elevated above the level of the river, and, consequently, drier,
fever is, generally, trifling, of a mild character, and, for the
most part, confined to children. There is, however, one ex-
ception in Back Portland-street. This street is very narrow,
and the houses closely built, and, from the dense masses of
low Irish, fever prevails in some one part incessantly. The
streets situated between Burlington-street and the North
Dispensary, bounded on one side by Vauxhall-road, and on
the other by Bevington-hill and Marybone, form a complete
labyrinth of narrow streets, courts, and alleys. To give one
or two examples : Ford-street, Oriel-street, and Cherry-
lane. The courts here are so numerous, and in such a filthy
condition, that disease never disappears : fever spreads with
fearful rapidity, speedily assuming a typhoid type. Instances
might be adduced where eighteen individuals have been seized
with it in succession, and as many as fourteen of the number,
living in a crowded court, have, in a short time, fallen vic-
tims to the dire scourge.
The worst portion of the town, which I may call the South
District of this division, seems to be the seat of disease to
the most alarMing extent. Poverty and vice, too, its usual
concomitants, here reign in the most aggravated form. The
streets in the vicinity of Dale-street, Orange, Preston, and
Peter-streets, and Spitalfields exhibit every thing favourable
to the spread of contagion, too manifest to pass unnoticed
even by the most casual observer. From the cellar to the
garret they are crowded with human beings, whose condition,
both physically and morally, is barely a remove from savage
life. Some of these abodes scarcely admit a ray of light, and
it has been my painful duty to enter such receptacles of
misery, with the floor half covered with water, where the only
article of furniture was a wooden stool, and some straw and
shavings in one corner for a bed. Extending our ohyserva-
dons, still further proofs can be adduced where disease is
fostered, owing to the crowded localities preventinga due

The former, chiefly