Norman's New Orleans and Environs / Containing a Brief Historical Sketch of the Territory and State of Louisiana and the City of New Orleans, from the Earliest Period to the Present Time

by Benjamin Moore Norman

THE WATER WORKS

In 1833, a company was incorporated under the title of the "Commercial Bank of New Orleans," the principal object of which was to supply the city with pure water from the Mississippi river. To effect this object, an artificial mound was constructed on the square comprised within Richard, Market, John the Baptist and Religious streets, consisting of seventy thousand cubic yards of earth, taken from the batture (deposit) of the river. The work was completed during 1834-5. The reservoir is constructed on the top of this mound. It is two hundred and fifty feet square, built of brick, and divided into four compartments, measuring each one hundred and eighteen feet in the clear. The walls and bottoms forming the reservoir, are built with brick, and plastered with hydraulic cement. A pavilion of an octagonal form has been erected on the intersection of the partition walls, supported by eight pillars. It is about fifteen feet wide and ten high, and affords quite a commanding and pleasant prospect.

The reservoir is supplied with water from the Mississippi river, by plunge pumps, worked by a condensing engine, acting expansively on Bolton and Watt's plan. These pumps were adopted as the most efficacious, on account of the great quantity of matter held in suspension by the water. They are connected to a suction pipe sixteen inches in diameter, and about eight hundred feet long; and to the main, descending into the reservoir, sixteen inches in diameter and six hundred feet long. The cylinder is twenty-five inches in diameter and six feet stroke, and is calculated to raise three millions gallons of water in twenty-four hours. The engine and pump houses are built of brick, and are situated on the lot forming the corner of Tchoupitoulas and Richard streets.

The water is distributed through cast iron pipes, capable of sustaining a pressure of water of three hundred feet head. They vary from eighteen to six inches in diameter for the mains—but the greater part of them consist of the larger sizes, which have numerous ramifications of less dimensions. There are two mains from the reservoir; one of eighteen, the other of twelve inches bore, which are gradually reduced in size as the distance becomes greater from the source, or as circumstances may require. In 1836, water was first pumped into the reservoir. It can be delivered in the upper part of the city twenty-one feet, and in the lower sections, twenty-seven feet above the level of the soil.

The daily average consumption of water, during the year 1844, was one million gallons; and, from the comparative great capacity of the reservoir, sufficient time is allowed for the water to settle, in one of the four compartments, before it is drawn for the use of the city.

Much good might be achieved by a more enlarged operation of these works. The water is capable of being made fit for all domestic purposes, thus obviating the necessity for cisterns, the birthplace of millions of moschetoes, and, possibly the source of much sickness. For the purposes of bathing it is almost indispensable; and, for forming fountains, to cleanse the streets and to purify and cool the air, it may be rendered equally a convenience, a luxury, and an embellishment.