“In 1874, there were 95 deaths and only 82 births. The deaths are exclusive of those people who have been removed from the neighbourhood and gone elsewhere to die, either in the hospital or the workhouse, where a great many people at the present time do go to die.”
Of the overcrowded rooms he says:—
“Here legions of crimes and legions of vices unite, fostering diseases of body, weakened intellect, and utter destruction of the soul; leading inevitably to a career of wickedness and sin.”
Confirmatory of the Medical Officer of Health’s description, was that given in a memorial to the Metropolitan Board by 118 persons: “The Clergy, Medical Men, Bankers, Residents, Professional men, and Traders of the parish of St. Martin-in-the-Fields, in support of a scheme of improvement.”
“Bedfordbury, with its swarming, ill-built, badly ventilated, rotten, inappropriate, unsavoury tenements, has seemed to us a very forcing pit of immorality.”
“In it there are 797 people living on one acre of land.”
“There is a very large number of interests to be paid for. There is first the freeholder; then there is the first lessee; then there are numbers of under-lessees, and all the trades of those little shops, and they ought all to get something.”
And another area was the “Great Wild Street Scheme,” in the parish of St. Giles’-in-the-Fields.[136]
“This area has long been a hot-bed of disease. It contains about 5½ acres, and 227 houses stand upon it inhabited by 3,897 persons.
| Great Wild Street | 58 | houses containing | 926 | persons. | |
| Drury Lane | 31 | „ „ | 425 | „ | |
| Princes’ Street | 14 | „ „ | 315 | „ | |
| Wild Court | 14 | „ „ | 346 | „ |