In many ways they did their work well; local sewerage and house drainage were effectually carried out; the refuse of the great city was regularly removed; the paving, and lighting, and cleansing of the streets were greatly improved.
But in many parts of London, and by many Vestries and District Boards, the larger, graver problems with which they were confronted were scarcely dealt with at all. Powers entrusted to them by Parliament were not used, vitally important duties imposed upon them by Parliament were ignored or neglected. Had this been pure incapacity it would have been deplorable, but upon many of the Vestries were men who either were themselves interested in continuing existing evils and abuses, or whose friends were, and so laws which should have removed or mitigated the evils were not administered.
And the result was the non-prevention of diseases which led to deaths, and the continuance of miseries (consequent on disease) which might have been warded off, and the sowing of the seeds of evils of which we are still reaping the crop.
As years went by the pressure of public opinion upon them became more insistent, and their administration improved, but even to the end many of them grievously failed to fulfil the responsibilities of their position.
One class of workers under them must, however, be excluded from such blame, namely, the Medical Officers of Health.
It is not too much to say that the greater part of the sanitary progress which was made all through the period of Vestry rule was directly due to the unceasing labour, the courageous efforts, the insistence of many of these officers. Their recommendations were often ignored, their requests constantly denied, their opinions made light of; but in spite of such discouragement they persevered. And not alone did they bravely stand between disease and the people, but they were ever striving to drive it back, and to destroy its prolific sources and its power; ever urging upon their employers the necessity for action to relieve the people from the worst of the evils they were suffering under.
The description given in 1856 by one of them that their work was “a war of the community against individuals for the public good” had been proved to be absolutely true.
And in that war, of them generally, it is to be said that there were no sturdier fighters on the side of the community than they proved to be.
In 1885 Dr. J. Liddle, “a pioneer of reform,” died after thirty years of “unflinching adherence to duty” as Medical Officer of Health for Whitechapel.