directed to make accurate drawings of the squares in his district,
locating each building, vacant lot, etc., and distinguishing the
character and condition of each by an appropriate color. Many of these
drafts of districts are beautiful specimens of art, and as sanitary
charts enable the observer to locate infectious and contagious
diseases, and with the aid of the permanent records, to determine the
internal and external domiciliary conditions under which they occur.
I have been thus minute in specifying the details of the plan of
inspection, the qualifications of the Inspectors, and the means
employed, in order that the character of the work and the value of the
results obtained may be properly appreciated.
[Sidenote: Period of the Inspection]
Early in the month of May the work of thoroughly inspecting the
insalubrious quarters, where fever and other pestilential diseases
prevail, had been commenced, and the fact was soon ascertained that
smallpox and typhus fever were existing and spreading in almost every
crowded locality of the city. It was not until about the middle of
July that the entire corps of Inspectors was engaged. The work was
then prosecuted with vigor and without interruption to the middle of
November, when it was completed. The Inspectors met regularly every
Saturday evening to report to a committee on the part of the Council
the progress of their work, and to receive advice and instruction in
regard to all questions of a doubtful character.
On the completion of the inspection each Inspector was required to
prepare a final report embodying the general results of his labors.
These reports have all been properly collated, under the direction of
the Association, and are now passing through the press. They will soon
appear in an octavo volume of about 400 pages, largely illustrated,
with maps and diagrams. It will be the first interior view of the
sanitary and social condition of the population of New York, and will
abundantly demonstrate the fact that, though a great and prosperous
commercial centre, she does not afford happy homes to hundreds of
thousands.
[Sidenote: Distribution of Population]
Before proceeding to an analysis of this work, it will be necessary
to notice the topographical peculiarities of our city, and the
distribution of its population. New York is an island having an area
of about thirty-four square miles, inclusive of its parks. Unlike
Philadelphia, London, and most other large cities, which have a
background of hundreds of square miles upon which to extend according
to the exigencies of the population or of business, New York is limited
in its power of expansion, and must accommodate itself to its given
area. While it is true that a large business population will gather
upon the adjacent shores, it is equally true that these non-residents
will be of the better class. The laboring population will, for the most
part, remain upon the island, and must be accommodated in the city
proper, as they are compelled to live near their work.
New York has, thus far, grown without any control or supervision, until
its population is estimated at 1,000,000 of persons. Of this number, at
least one-half are of the laboring and dependant classes, compelled
to live under such conditions as they find in their homes, without any
power, either to change or improve them. Following the natural law
which governs the movements of such a population, the wealthier or
independent class spreads itself with its business arrangements over
the larger proportion of the area, and the poorer or dependent class is
crowded into the smallest possible space.
[Sidenote: Tenant-House Packing]
Already New York has covered about 8 of its 34 square miles with
the dwellings of a population not far from 1,000,000, and all its
commercial and manufacturing establishments. And the result is, as
might have been anticipated, the dependent class, numbering fully
one-half of the people, is crowded into tenant-houses which occupy an
area of not more than two square miles. Such crowding amounts literally
to packing.
For example, it is estimated that there are three contiguous blocks
of tenant-houses which contain a larger population than Fifth Avenue;
or, again, if Fifth Avenue had front and rear tenant-houses as densely
packed as tenant-houses generally are, there would be a population of
100,000 on that single avenue. A single tenant-court in the Fourth Ward
is arranged for the packing of 1,000 persons.
[Illustration: GOTHAM COURT, CHERRY STREET, 1865--LONGITUDINAL ELEVATION
_Arranged for the Packing of 1,000 Persons_]
[Illustration: SECTION OF CITY 240 BY 150 FEET, OCCUPIED BY 111
FAMILIES, AND BY STABLES, SOAP FACTORY, AND TANYARD]
A resident of the same Ward reports that: “On a piece of ground 240
feet by 150, there are 20 tenant-houses, occupied by 111 families,
5 stables, a large soap and candle factory, and a tan-yard, the
receptacle of green hides. The filth and stench of this locality are
beyond any power of description.” In general, it may be stated that the
average number of families to a house among the poor is 7, or about 35
persons.
[Sidenote: Avoidable and Inevitable Disease]
It is necessary also to make a single explanation, to render more
apparent the bearing of the facts developed. For the purposes of
sanitary inquiry, the causes of disease are divided into those which
are inevitable, and those which are avoidable or removable, and hence
it follows that diseases and deaths are divided into those which are
inevitable and those which are preventable. For example: Of unavoidable
causes of disease, we have vicissitudes of weather, accidents, old age,
physical degenerations, etc.
Of avoidable or removable causes of disease we have those conditions
around or within our dwellings or places of business or resort, errors
in our mode of living, etc., which vitiate health, or rather tend to
diseases, and yet which can be removed or changed by human agency. For
example, a country residence may be most favorably located for health,
and yet decaying vegetable matter in the cellar, or a cesspool so
situated as to allow the gaseous emanations to be diffused through the
house, will expose all the inmates to fevers, diarrhoea and dysentery.
These would be preventable diseases, and all the deaths therefrom would
be preventable, and hence unnecessary deaths. In like manner in cities,
all diseases and deaths due to causes which human agencies can remove
are preventable. And it is a melancholy fact that fifty per cent of the
mortality of cities is estimated to be due to such causes, and is hence
unnecessary.
In reviewing the result of this inspection, I shall call your attention
only to the more patent causes of disease found existing, and to the
preventable diseases discovered, and their relation to these causes.
In this evidence you will find ample proof that radical reforms are
required in the health organizations of New York.
[Sidenote: Filthy Streets]
I will first notice the causes of disease which exist external to our
dwellings, and which are the most readily susceptible of remedy. The
first that attracts attention in New York is the condition of the
streets. No one can doubt that if the streets in a thickly populated
part of a town are made the common receptacle of the refuse of
families, that in its rapid decomposition a vast amount of poisonous
gases must escape, which will impregnate the entire district, penetrate
the dwellings, and render the atmosphere in the neighborhood in
a high degree injurious to the public health. In confirmation of
this statement, I will quote the City Inspector, who, in a former
communication to the Common Council, says:
“As an evidence of the effect of this state of things upon the health
of the community, I would state that the mortality of the city, from
the first of March, has been largely on the increase, until it has
now reached a point of fearful magnitude. For the week ending April
27th, there were reported to this department one hundred and forty
more deaths than occurred during the same week of the previous year.
Were this increase of mortality the result of an existing pestilence
or epidemic among us, the public would become justly alarmed as to the
future; but although no actual pestilence, as such, exists, it is by no
means certain that we are not preparing the way for some fatal scourge
by the no longer to be endured filthy condition of our city.”
The universal testimony of the sanitary inspectors is that in all
portions of the city occupied by the poorer classes, the streets are in
the same filthy condition as that described by the City Inspector, and,
that street filth is one of the most fruitful causes of disease.
[Sidenote: Street Filth and Disease]
Says the Inspector of the Eighth Ward: “Laurens, Wooster, Clark, and
Sullivan are in a most filthy condition, giving off insalubrious
emanations on which depend the many cases of fever, cholera infantum,
dysentery, and pulmonary diseases. I have observed that near where
other streets cross the above-named streets there is a greater
proportionate amount of sickness; and this fact I have shown by special
reports of typhus and typhoid fever in Grand and Broome, and dysentery
in Spring.”
The Inspector of the Sixth Ward says: “Domestic garbage and filth
of every kind is thrown into the streets, covering their surface,
filling the gutters, obstructing the sewer culverts, and sending forth
perennial emanations which must generate pestiferous disease. In winter
the filth and garbage, etc., accumulate in the streets, to the depth
sometimes of two or three feet. The garbage boxes are a perpetual
source of nuisance in the streets, filth and offal being thrown all
around them, pools of filthy water in many instances remaining in the
gutters, and having their source in the garbage boxes.”
The Inspector of the Seventh Ward says: “The whole most easterly
portion of the district, the streets and gutters are very filthy with
mud, ashes, garbage, etc.”
The Inspector of the Thirteenth Ward says: “The streets are generally
in a filthy and unwholesome condition; especially in front of the
tenant-houses, from which the garbage and slops are, to a great
extent, thrown into the streets, where they putrefy, rendering the air
offensive to the smell and deleterious to health. The refuse of the
bedrooms of those sick with typhoid and scarlet fevers and smallpox is
frequently thrown into the streets, there to contaminate the air, and,
no doubt, aid in the spread of those pestilential diseases.”
Says the Inspector of the Ninth Ward: “The effect of dirty streets
upon the public health is too well known, and too often insisted upon,
to need any exposition in this report. The largest number of cases of
cholera infantum, cholera morbus, and kindred disease, is always found
in localities where the streets are dirtiest.”
The Inspector of the Seventeenth Ward writes: “The two following
localities present the appearance of dung-hills rather than the
thoroughfares in a civilized city, viz.: Sixth Street, between Bowery
and Second Avenue, and Eleventh Street, between First and Second
Avenues.”
[Sidenote: Animals Dead]
The Inspector of the Eleventh Ward says: “As a rule, the streets are
extremely dirty and offensive, and the gutters obstructed with filth.
The filth of the streets is composed of house-slops, refuse vegetables,
decayed fruit, store and shop sweepings, ashes, dead animals, and
even human excrements. These putrifying organic substances are ground
together by the constantly passing vehicles. When dried by the summer’s
heat, they are driven by the wind in every direction in the form of
dust. When remaining moist or liquid in the form of “slush,” they emit
deleterious and very offensive exhalations. The reeking stench of the
gutters, the street filth, and domestic garbage of this quarter of
the city, constantly imperil the health of its inhabitants. It is a
well-recognized cause of diarrhoeal diseases and fevers.”
The Inspector of the Eighteenth Ward reports: “The streets in the
eastern part of the district, east of First Avenue especially, have,
for the past six months, been in a most inexcusably filthy condition.
The pavement here is uneven, there are deep gutters at either side of
the streets, filled with foul slops, in which float or are sunk every
form of decaying animal and vegetable matter. Occasionally, at remote
and irregular intervals, carts come round, these stagnant pools are
dredged, so to speak, and their black and decayed solid contents raked
out. If there be anything on earth that is ‘rank and smells to heaven,’
these gutters do on such occasions, especially in the summer months.
The streets in this part of the city are the principal depositories
of garbage. In some instances heaped up at the sides of the streets,
in others thrown about promiscuously, the event in either case is the
same, if it be allowed to remain day after day, as it usually is. After
having passed through every stage of decay, after having corrupted
the surrounding air with its pestilential smell, it gradually becomes
dessicated and converted into dust by the summer sun and the constantly
passing vehicles. And now every horse that passes stirs it up, every
vehicle leaves a cloud of it behind; it is lifted into the air with
every wind and carried in every direction.
“Those who are directly responsible for this state of things suffer
no more than the cleanly and thrifty who are so unfortunate as to
live anywhere the wind, blowing from this quarter, reaches them. And
what a _pulvis compositum_ is it to breathe into the lungs! As we
pass by, our mouths become full of it, we draw it in with our breath.
It is swallowed into the stomach, it penetrates our dress and clings
until it has covered our perspiring skin. Surely no dumping-ground, no
sewer, no vault, contains more filth or in greater variety than did
the air in certain parts of our city during the long season of drought
the past summer. And wherever the wind blows, the foul corruption is
carried; by a process as sure and universal as the diffusion of gases,
is it conveyed throughout the city. Such, often, is the air drawn into
the lungs with every respiration, of the poor sufferer stifled with
consumption or burning with fever. No barrier can shut it out, no
social distinction can save us from it; no domestic cleanliness, no
private sanitary measures can substitute a pure atmosphere for a foul
one.”
But I need not multiply these quotations. It will suffice to state that
during the week ending August 5th, a special inspection of all the
streets was made and they were found to be reeking, and, indeed, almost
impassable, with filth. And to-day they are in, if possible, a still
worse condition than ever before.
[Sidenote: Filthy Courts and Alleys]
Closely allied to the streets are courts and alleys. These cul-de-sacs
leading to, and adjoining the close and unventilated homes of the poor,
are almost universally in a more filthy condition than the adjacent
street. They are the receptacles of much of the waste of the house,
and are rarely cleaned. The air of these places during the summer is
often the most stifling and irrespirable, and yet as it descends it
enters the closely packed tenant-house and furnishes to the inmates the
elements of disease and death. Says the Inspector of the Fourth Ward:
[Illustration: A TENANT-HOUSE CUL-DE-SAC, PARK STREET, NEAR CITY HALL,
WITH 307 INMATES; PHOTOGRAPHED FROM A HOUSE-TOP IN PEARL STREET, 1865]
“Slops from rear buildings of such premises are usually emptied into
a shallow gutter cut in the flagging and extending from the yard, or
space between front and rear buildings, to the street. This is often
clogged up by semi-fluid filth, so that the alley and those parts of
the yard through which it runs are not infrequently overflown and
submerged to the depth of several inches. There are more than four
hundred families in this district whose homes can only be reached
by wading through a disgusting deposit of filthy refuse. In some
instances, a staging of plank, elevated a few inches above the surface,
is constructed through the alleys.”
[Illustration: A CUL-DE-SAC, SHOWING OVERCROWDING, NEAR SLAUGHTER-HOUSE
AND STABLES
_New York, 1865_]
[Sidenote: Cesspool Abominations]
In the court is found generally that most pestiferous of all the
sources of civic uncleanliness and unhealthiness--the privy and
cesspool. These receptacles are rarely drained into the sewers, and
consequently require for their cleanliness the frequent and faithful
attention of the scavenger. The reports of the sanitary inspectors
prove that this work is most irregularly and imperfectly done. Hundreds
of places were found where these nuisances existed within, under or
beside large tenant-houses, creating a vast amount of disease and
death. Numerous instances of this kind are detailed in these reports,
which are almost too revolting to be believed. I will quote but one or
two illustrations:
“The privies (two in one) of Nos. -- and -- West Twenty-fourth Street
need instant cleaning. They are overflowing the yard, and are very
offensive. The privy No. -- Seventh Avenue, as in the preceding two
adjoining houses, is in the yard, and adjoins the house, and is on a
line with the southerly wall of house No. -- (the adjacent house),
which has a back area; the wall of said area being part of the
foundation of the privy. At times the fluid portion of the privy oozes
through its own and the area wall.
“The privy of the rear tenant-house No. -- West Twenty-second Street
is used by 42 persons; it has five subdivisions, one for every two
families. The compartments are so small that a person can scarcely
turn round in them, and so dark that they have to be entered with an
artificial light. The cellar itself, as has been stated, is damp,
dark, and without ventilation. Under such circumstances the emanations
of the excrementious matter of 42 persons can find no escape; thus this
privy-cellar is worse than a Stygian pit.”
[Illustration: PLAN OF CELLAR]
The Inspector of the Fifth Ward says: “Very few tenements have
water-closets in the house; they have privies in the yards, which,
as a rule, are insufficient for the accommodation of the numbers
crowded into the houses; many are not connected with the sewers; are
seldom cleaned, being allowed to overflow in some cases, rendering the
neighborhood offensive with insalubrious emanations.”
The Inspector of the Fourteenth Ward states that: “The water-closets
are nearly all in the yards--but few being in the houses--and
connecting with the sewers. The greater number of these sewers are
in a filthy condition, being but seldom emptied. Many of those which
communicate with the privies are choked up by all sorts of offal being
thrown into them, thereby producing a very bad condition.”
[Sidenote: Unbelievable Vileness]
The Inspector of the Seventeenth Ward reports: “The privies of East
Eleventh Street, rear, are beneath the floored alley-way leading to the
building. Large holes in this floor allow ocular inspection from above,
and admit rain and dirt. These nuisances are almost always overflowing,
and the passage leading to them is full of fæcal matter. It would seem
impossible for human beings to create or endure such vileness. The
cellar is used by children and others as a privy; the foul air there
seems never to change.”
The Inspector of the Sixteenth Ward says: “The privies form one end of
the chief features of insalubrity. Nearly all of them are too small in
size and too few in number, and without ventilation or seat-covers.
About twelve were found locked securely, and on procuring the key
and inspecting the privy, such masses of human excrements were found
on the seats and floors as would justify the locking of the door to
protect unwary persons from injury. Occupants of rear buildings are the
principal sufferers from this insalubrity. The proximity of privies
is in some cases eight feet from the windows of rear houses; the odor
in these is, especially at night, intolerable. Instances of the kind
are to be found at Nos. --, -- and -- West Seventeenth Street, and
others. They are also too few in number; for example, No. -- West
Nineteenth Street, where in the front and rear buildings more than one
hundred persons live who have one common privy, with a single partition
dividing it, and but four seats in all. Twenty-five persons are
expected to use one seat-opening.”
The Inspector of the Twentieth Ward says: “During my inspection I
reported a number which were filled, and at the same time in such
need of repair as to hazard the lives of those who entered them. The
proximity of these places to the houses in many cases is a fact to
which I would call your attention. One instance of this kind I may
state: At a house in Fortieth Street, between Broadway and Seventh
Avenue, the privy is situated about 10 feet from the door, and there is
another on a line 10 feet from the first, and still another within 10
feet of the last mentioned, making three privies within 30 feet, and
two of these belong to houses fronting on Broadway. The offensive odor
arising from these places contaminates the air of the houses in the
vicinity. This house, in Fortieth Street, is actually unfit to live in.
At the time of my inspection the noxious gases from these privies were
strongly perceptible in every part of the house.”
The Inspector of the Seventeenth Ward reports: “The privies are in
most cases in the rear court-yard. In about two-thirds of the houses
the privies are connected with the sewer. Overflowing privies are
frequently found. Sometimes they are located in a dark place, which
in all cases must be considered an evil. Such is the case in some
houses in Rivington, Stanton, Ninth and Eldridge streets. All these
places are filthy, and exceedingly offensive and dangerous to the whole
neighborhood; in some places the foundation of the privies being rotten
and broken, and fæcal matter runs into the cellar, as in No. -- ‘Extra
Place,’ where diseases and deaths have occurred. The contents of a
privy in a court at No. -- Fifth Street have, from a similar cause,
saturated the yard of premises on the Bowery, where several children
died during the summer.”
[Sidenote: Special Nuisances]
I will at this point simply allude to special nuisances. New York has
within the narrow limits of its present occupied area of about eight
square miles, in addition to its one million of people, and all its
commercial and manufacturing establishments, a vast number of special
nuisances, which are, to a greater or less degree, detrimental to its
public health. There are nearly 200 slaughter-houses, many of which
are in the most densely populated districts. To these places droves of
cattle, hogs, and sheep are constantly driven, rendering the streets
filthy in the extreme, and from them flow blood and refuse of the most
disgusting character.
[Illustration: SLAUGHTER-PENS IN REAR OF TENANT-HOUSES IN THE ELEVENTH
WARD, 1865]
[Illustration: SIXTH STREET CATTLE MARKET, 1865]
[Illustration: REGION OF HIDE-CURING, FAT-GATHERING, FAT AND SOAP
BOILING, AND SLAUGHTER-PENS, BEHIND THE BOWERY SHOPPING HOUSES, 1865]
[Illustration: REGION OF BONE-BOILING AND SWILL-MILK NUISANCES, 1865]
In certain populous sections are fat-boiling, entrails-cleansing, and
tripe-curing establishments, which poison the air for squares around
with their stifling emanations. To these must be added hundreds of
uncleaned stables, immense manure heaps, etc., etc. But I shall not
dwell further on these subjects, and the evidence regarding them.
[Sidenote: Cellar Population--Dens of Death]