Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1873-08-10

SANITARY REFORM-wHAT us Ira
Some how We have the impression thai
Nashville is likely to expend pretty large
sum of money according to Its population,
in the name of sanitary reform, without re-
csiying any equivalents. 1t Is our wish to
treat all parties, interests and opinions, fair
| " on this really life and death question.
This Journal Of the Sth instant contains an
instructive letter written by s, K Self Of
Midway, Greene county, Tenn, under date
of Aug. 4, in which he says in substance
that square mile there had population
of S. persons, of whom twelve died of
cholera in 3 few days. Greene county in
East Tennessee is very healthy district.
Why should Midway in that county lose
fifteen per cent of its inhabitants by chole-
"a in short time? Mr.. S. says:
aThe enclosed drawing represents small
section of limestone country, includlng
branch heretofore known as the Seven
| Springs, but now is known as Cholera
| Branch. The citizens of Midway all use
cistern water. My work hands had been
using water out of freestone spring, but
| from some Cause unknown, the colored boz
| and Mr.. Hahn's family drank ont of Chol-
era Branch, in which 1t is said some clothes
| had been thrown from those that had died. (
Two days after they had thus drank the i've
were dead"
The reader will see that five of the twelve
cholera patients that died, drank water that
came from "seven limestone springs" from
which they had before been in the habit OF
drinking, as thousands snd millions do With
impunity. The water as it came from the
ground did not before kill people who drank
it as these died. But when soiled clothing
with living cholera germs on the same, was
placed in this branch, these germs doubtless
multiplied a million fold. 1t is incredible
that the few morbife atoms, dead or alive,
on these garments could contaminate the
whole stream Of water from seven springs
for days, without large multiplication OF
these poisonous atoms in the water. They
were pot largely diluted, as any mineral or
chemical poison would have been in q stream
of running water. They were the seeds Of
an alkaline plant growing in alkaline lime
stone water, and placed there by thought
less persons. Now, we are panied to be-
lieve that Nashville has some thousands of
equally thoughtless citizens, who are ready
to expend large sums of money to trans
form the Cumberland into true cholera
river.
What is sanitary reform? Who can an
swer this question trutbfully and plainly?
In our view it is not something that money
will purchase ready made, as one can buy a
wagon or sewer. Liverpool is one of the
richest cities in the world according to pop
ulation, and probably has expended more
money for sewers than any other city of
the same area. The British Quarterly Re
uies0 for July just receivedl contains sn
ably written and extended article on ''The
Public HEALTH" from which the following
is copied: @The great city ofLiyerpool,
which has population of upwards of half
million, and rainfall OF nearly 80 inches,
has, to its honor, taken the lead in expend-
ing large sum Cd the water supply and |
drainage of the borough. A constant sup
ply of water, at a Ugh pressure, has been
acquired, and the subterraneous drainage |
of the town is probably exceedingly COM |
plete. But on the one hand it drains into |
the Mercer, while on the otherhsnd, It adds |
to the floating impurities Of the atmosphere |
by the discharge of upcast shafts of sewer |
ventilation. Its death rate still marks tie |
high proportion of % per 1000; and as to
the death rate of children, out of every FIVE |
who are born, two Gle the first year."
We wish it was in our power to make |
every reader appreciate the full meaning Of |
the above sanitary facts; then money ex-
pended in Liverpool would be valuable in
Tennessee. We tell the reader in plain
words that to expend large sum of public
money to construct sewers, and poison both
the atmosphere and water of city with
cholera germs, and other seeds of pestilence,
and kill two hundred children out of every
five hundred born, before they are a year
old, not the sanitary reform adv coated by
this journal. The writer of the psper on
"public health" in the British ReUielC comes
near seeing the subject in its true light, and
recommending the appropriate remedy;
but he, unfortunately, fails to discover the
vitality of contagion, and the wants of the
case. Liverpool, London, Paris and New
York are in the same mental darkness.
The leading idea in the mind Of the writer
in the Rerieay is that human exerements
and all filth in sewers must be largely d.
luted in rain or river water, and used 70.
field and garden crops. City
raised farmers and engineers are better
calculated to expend city funds by costly
pumping water out Of rivers, as in
Nashville, making cutters, sewers, canals,
and fancy irrigation, than to prevent disease
Or cultivate the soil at profit. Time and
again we have called public attention to
the fact that no excrementitious matter
from man or beast in a city or village should
be diluted with water, unless one aims to
multiply organisms of pestilence. Without
moisture they are as dead and harmless as
dried ehestnuts. As an item of sanitary re-
fern, attention is called to the fact that the
arge quantity of fresh hog manure SO lib
orally distributed over the streets and side
walks of Nashville, produces no sickness
when dry; hut when it is damp enough for
mould and mildew to grow upon it, the case
q different. 1t was the dung-heaps and
pools in Greeneville, Jonesboro, and other
places in rural districts that served as nice
not-beds for propagating cholera. 1t might
Djure the lucrative business of doctors,
lpothecaries and undertakers to take hogs
Ind their droppings out of our pie s.
ATTEST streets. If any thing new is
lone in sanitary way, It
5 likely to be 10 pump more
water out Ct the river, stir up more food for
disease in streets, priVies, bitches and sew ,