Well there is no other topic this month other than the drought. Drastic shortage of rain has meant the rivers have just about dried up, grass has turned brown, crops have stopped growing. I can remember the summers of both 1975 and 1976 which were hot and dry, but this year the temperatures seem to have exceeded those of the sultry 1970s. Memories of cheese-cloth shirts and maxi-dresses and days spent down by the waterfall in Richmond. Happy days. The rain water barrels which collect water from the roof quickly ran dry, so a daily chore has been bucketing water out of the bath and keeping it until the cool of the evening to water the garden. When guests came to stay for a weekend they were also presented with two buckets to empty their bath. It certainly does make you monitor how much water a household uses. I have managed to reduce the amount of water a shower over the bath takes from about five and a half gallons down to two, just by not turning the water on to full force. Washing up is now in the washing up bowl and not in a dish washer machine, and I just wish I could save water from the washing machine. But, no I don't want to go back to having a twin-tub when you washed several loads in the same water. During the first week of July, before we knew how serious this drought was going to be, we took a ride down Lunedale and up Baldersdale to look at the reservoirs. It was a hot day, even though the sky was overcast, and not a drop of rain fell. Each of these dales has a series of reservoirs and in each case the top one was low, but the next was still quite full. They are probably very different now at the end of such a hot, dry month. Selset reservoir in Lunedale Grassholme reservoir, just below Selset in Lunedale Balderhead reservoir in Baldersdale showing the topography of the watershed. Blackton reservoir and Hury reservoir in the far distance in Baldersdale. An impressive sight, all this water being collected and stored. Skilled civil engineers found the right places to build the dams and then construct the pipework to get the water to the population. Most of this water is heading for Teeside. We never think about where our water comes from, or why we need it. It is just there at the turn of a tap, clean, filtered, ready to drink. How clean was this water ? This painting is called "Thirsty" and is by Middleton Alexander Jameson 1851 - 1919 and is at Brampton Museum, see the ArtUk website. How many households shared this water supply ? How far did they have to carry their pails of water ? This is a rather more romantic scene at a village pump, with the buckets waiting to be filled. It is called "The Gossips" and is by Frank George Jackson 1831 - 1905 and is in Leamington Spa Art Gallery. A reminder that a daily chore was first collecting the water and carrying it to the house, never mind emptying the bath afterwards. Water is essential not just to quench thirst, but for public health. My great grandfather incurred the wrath of Sanitary Inspectors and was suspected of causing disease in Barnard Castle. The rapid growth of towns in the nineteenth century, with inadequate water supplies and ignorance of how diseases spread, led to dreadful mortality rates. In 1838 Dr Thomas Southwood Smith wrote a report that linked disease with filthy conditions, but no one knew how they were linked, only that "In the sewer district there is a remarkable absence of fever, and in the fever district there is a remarkable absence of sewers". During the 1840s there were petitions to Parliament to do something about the lack of sewers, but they did nothing. Edwin Chadwick's "Report on the Sanitary Conditions of the Labouring Population of Great Britain" which he published in 1842, did stimulate some call for public responsibility. He drew evidence of housing conditions from across the country, not just industrial towns, but also ancient towns where houses were crowded together "for the sake of fortification". This included Barnard Castle. Cholera arrived in Britain in 1831 via the port of Sunderland. The first victim was a child called Isabella Hazard aged 12 years, who became ill at midnight and was dead by 4 a.m. From there it spread across the country, no one understanding the link between disease and dirty water. It was not until the involvement of Dr John Snow in London in the outbreak of 1854 that the cause was discovered. He plotted the houses where there had been outbreaks of Cholera and removed the handle of a particular pump which halted the disease in that neighbourhood. John Snow was a Yorkshire man, born in York he served an apprenticeship to a surgeon - apothecary in Newcastle upon Tyne before taking a job in Pateley Bridge in the Yorkshire Dales, and finally going to London to study and become a member of the Royal College of Surgeons. Here he is in the 1851 census in London. These three men made a huge difference to the public health of the population. From the left Dr Thomas Southwood Smith 1781 - 1861, then Edwin Chadwick 1800 - 1890, he of the Victorian Comb-Over, and then Dr John Snow 1813 - 1858. Barnard Castle had suffered an outbreak of cholera in 1849 and 143 people died. The Chadwick Report on the Sanitary Condition of the Labouring Poor of 1842 published an account on Barnard Castle given by Mr George Brown thus - - The residences of the labouring population within the Teesdale Union, especially in Barnard Castle and the more populous villages, is mostly in large houses let into tenements. At least four fifths of the weavers in Barnard Castle live in such residences and about one half of all the other labouring poor … in Barnard Castle the tenements are in Thorngate, Bridgegate and the lower parts of the town and in confined yards and alleys. The houses are many of them very large. I am told that as many as 50 or more individuals under one roof. There is generally perhaps one privy to a whole yard, embracing five or six houses. … the River Tees flows at the foot of each yard. The impurities are thus speedily carried away and the evils which might otherwise be expected from the effluvia of vegetable and other bodies in a state of decomposition are prevented… In another part of the town the houses backed onto the Castle moat and were described thus - These houses slope towards the moat of the old castle which is not sufficiently drained …. in the interior of the castle, now used as a garden, there is a stagnant pond which ought to be drained off: this pond is nearly opposite the yards which are full of residences of the poorer classes and called The Swamp. All the houses on the west side of the street have one step, and some more, down from the street. At last, in 1848, the Government set up a Board of Health which allowed boroughs to take responsibility for drains and water supplies and raise money for improvements. These are my great grandparents Peter and Margaret Gill. Margaret was from Marske in Swaledale, Peter was born near Coverham and moved via Bellerby, Hunton and Spennithorne to live in Barnard Castle. He lived in King Street, where he kept pigs. After suffering from an outbreak of cholera at the end of the 1840s the Barnard Castle Board of Health was keen on removing any "nuisances" which endangered the town. By 1875 there had been an outbreak of typhoid fever and my great grandfather's activities came under the eye of the inspector. The Teesdale Mercury reported that "the source was thought to be Peter Gill's pigs and he was ordered not to keep them in his yard". Between September and December 1875 there had been 8 cases and one had been fatal. However, my great grandfather was not to be moved on his pig-keeping activities and said that he had kept pigs there for 17 years and he was not going to stop. In 1877 the Teesdale Mercury was still reporting on the problem of Peter Gill's pigs and the public health inspector once again paid a visit. This time it was reported that the pigs were not the problem but a blocked sewer further down the street. It must have been a great relief to all when Peter and Margaret eventually got the tenancy of a farm on the Raby Estate. My great grandmother brought up nine children. Did she also have to cope with pig-killing, curing bacon and making sausages ? How many pails of water did she carry ? The cottage door by George Morland 1763 - 1804, Royal Holloway, University of London, on the ArtUk website. Just how close was this pig in the kennel to the family, and a river in the background ? Three pigs in a byre, also by George Morland, Kinloch Castle, Rum. Yet another by George Morland, Pigs in a farmyard, Museum of Croyden. George Morland obviously liked painting pigs, but all these paintings remind us of the close proximity of pigs and human habitation. A topic highlighted by Chadwick's Report. This is rather an infamous extract about Leeds, the evidence given by a surgeon - The Irish almost universally live huddled together in great numbers in a small space. I have known as many as twenty human beings lodged and fed in a dirty filthy cottage with only two rooms. Great many live in cellar dwellings. I have frequently seen a cellar dwelling lodge a family of seven to ten persons, and that in close confined yards. I have seen a cellar dwelling in one of the most densely populated districts of Leeds in which were living seven persons with one corner fenced off and a pig in it … and to this cellar there was no drain…. Not quite the picture painted by George Morland. Pigs mixed in with humans were not the only cause of diseases in towns. Think of all the horses, where were they stabled? Many towns had urban cow byres to supply fresh milk (no refrigeration, you got fresh milk twice a day), and all these horses and cows producing dung were also a cause of disease. Nigel Morgan plotted the location of urban stables and byres in industrial Preston alongside death certificates which recorded diarrhoea and found a correlation which indicated flies transmitted disease [Infant mortality, flies and horses by Nigel Morgan]. So how thankful we are for WATER ! The pioneers of public health, the civil engineers who made dams and pipes and treatment works, and as I am typing this, at LAST it is RAINING ! Richmond Falls in flood (not as they are now!)
0 Comments
|
AuthorThis is where you can share creativity with me. I believe that everyone has something creative within them, and it is a joy to find ways of being creative. Blogging is NEW to me, so here goes ..... Archives
January 2024
Categories |