Report to the General Board of Health on a preliminary inquiry into the sewerage, drainage, and supply of water, and the sanitary condition of the inhabitants of the borough of Newport / by George Thomas Clark, Superintending Inspector.

  • George Thomas Clark
Date:
1850
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Report to the General Board of Health on a preliminary inquiry into the sewerage, drainage, and supply of water, and the sanitary condition of the inhabitants of the borough of Newport / by George Thomas Clark, Superintending Inspector. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    8/50 (page 6)
    taken of these to bring ballast, bv degrees, from the shipping, and thus to raise the whole surface six to eight feet. A few houses were built before this was done, and these are par- ticularly low and damp, and are seats of fever. Latterly every new house near the river has been built upon this layer of ballast, which, being usually shingle, is naturally dry, and affords great facilities for a good drainage. 14. Great credit is due to the Tredegar Company for their Xjersistence in this arrangement. They also, as the rheens become filled up with ballast, lay down culverts of large diameter to take their place. 15. Government and Local Acts.—The borough includes the town of Newport and part of the parishes of St. Woollos and Christchurch, and is governed by 6 aldermen and 18 coun- cillors, out of which body the mayor is annually chosen. In the corporation is vested the management of the police and other ordinary municipal duties. 16. The Improvement Commissioners are constituted under an Act of 7 Geo. IV., c. 6 (1826), and before the boundaries were fixed by the Municipal Act; their jurisdiction is confined to the old borough, which includes rather above one-third of the area of the present borough and about one-half of the inhabit- ants. The number of these Commissioners is unlimited, and there are 30 at present. The Corporation annually select 12 out of their own body, and the remainder are appointed by the Act or elected by the ratepayers, and hold office for life. The qualification is the occupation, under certain limitations, of an estate of inheritance of 50/. per annum, or the possession of actual property worth 1,500/. The Commissioners are found in practice to be too numerous ; so large a number divides the responsibility. The work is really carried on by 8 or 10 of the more diligent., subject to certain hurtful interferences. 17. The duties vested in these Commissioners are lighting, paving, maintaining roads, cleansing, &c. In the event of a house owner refusing to lay a drain, the Commissioners may lay it; but by a singular blunder in the Act, they are also, in such a case, to pay the expense. 18. They have no power to enter courts, or to cause foot pavement to be laid, although they may repair it when laid. The petitioners state, with respect to this Act,— “ That although for a portion of the borough there is a Local Act for paving, lighting, and cleansing the town, its powers are very ineffective for all sanitary purposes. “ That a large ])ortion of the borough, chiefly consisting of the dwell- ings of the poor, is not included in the provisions, of the said Act; and that in this portion the buildings have been very rapidly erected, and many new streets formed without regard to any system of drainage or surface cleansing.”