Mr. Spear's report to the Local Government Board on sanitary administration in the Bridgend registration district, Glamorganshire, with special reference to the arrangements existing in the district for the discharge of the duties of Medical Officer of Health / [John Spear].

  • Spear, John.
Date:
[1889]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Mr. Spear's report to the Local Government Board on sanitary administration in the Bridgend registration district, Glamorganshire, with special reference to the arrangements existing in the district for the discharge of the duties of Medical Officer of Health / [John Spear]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    intended to serve the populous locality of Old Castle, is laid so shallow that several small branch streets cannot be connected. The private drainage of the town is generally much in need of attention. Drains, I am told, are often found constructed of brick or stone and leaky. They are generally unventi¬ lated, and water-closets are not provided with water for flushing purposes. For the branch streets at Old Castle referred to above (South Street, St. Mary Street, part of Chapel Street, and Madox Place), as well as for a considerable collection of houses at Green Street and New Town, to which no sewers have been extended, cesspools have to be depended upon. It can only be a very email palliative measure to provide, as the authority have done, for the frequent removal of ashes and house refuse, when the more obnoxious sewage is in so many places stored for prolonged periods in leaky cesspools and privy pits in the immediate vicinity of dwellings ; or, at best, discharged into drains and sewers of the character described. Moreover, the receptacle for the sewage discharged is the bed of the Ogwr river; and two of the public culverts and several private drains empty themselves within a few yards of the point where the river enters the town. In wet seasons, when the river is full, no complaint arises, and the sewage is carried to the sea some four miles below without being further heard of; but in summer, when the sewage has often to trickle over bare stones, or forms here and there stagnant pools, the nuisance from this cause is said to be most serious. A large proportion of the house property of Bridgend is old and of an inferior kind. Many of the cottages are excessively small and confined, ill-ventilated, damp, and dirty. In certain cases attempts to improve the ventilation have been made under the authority’s order, and some two years ago one row of houses was closed as unfit for habitation. There are others at Old Castle, and a row of six on New Castle Hill, that require now to be similarly dealt with. In these small, ill-ventilated cottages, over¬ crowding is occasionally observed. Building byelaws, based upon the Board’s model, were obtained in 1883, and in the small amount of building that is going on attention is apparently paid to their due enforcement. I found, however, one new house occupied by a family, including several children, before completion, and long before it could be considered in any proper sense habitable. The authority have made considerable improvement of late in the paving of several of the public streets. Many of the smaller private streets, however, and a large proportion of the house yards, are in this respect greatly neglected. The water supply of some nine-tenths of the town is in the hands of a private company. Water is obtained at present from springs in the lias limestone about three miles to the south, that is below, Bridgend, at a point where discontinuance of pumping is occasionally necessitated by the invasion of high spring tides. The water is stated to afford satisfactory results on analysis, and is distributed on the constant service principle. The company have likewise powers of distribution over some parts of the rural sanitary district, including St. Brides and Southerndown, and have, I understand, offered to supply the latter place, where water is much required. It is believed that a new source of supply will be obtained eventually from the northern water-sheds, in which case other parts of the rural district, where water is now much needed, would come more practicably within the range of the company’s service. In addition to the company’s mains, there is in Bridgend, at the foot of Station Street, a public fountain, supplied through pipes with water from an adjacent hill, to which a number of the inhabitants on this side of the town resort; and again there are a certain number of houses, beyond convenient reach of the public fountain, practically unprovided. This is the case with a row of twelve in North Street, the inhabitants of which, notwithstanding that the authority commenced action some two years ago against the owners on this account, are still left to obtain water from a polluted stream. The provision made in the district for dealing with infectious diseases is altogether inadequate. No hospital is provided, while attempts to isolate sufferers in their own homes are, in the small cottages of the district, necessarily futile. Neither is there any disinfecting apparatus. The action
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