Part 5

The effects of unguarded interments have, however, as will subsequently be noticed, been observed with greater care on the continent, and the proximity of wells to burial-grounds has been reported to be injurious. Thus it is stated in a collection of reports concerning the cemeteries of the town of Versailles, that the water of the wells which lie _below_ the church-yard of St. Louis could not be used on account of its stench. In consequence of various investigations in France, a law was passed, prohibiting the opening of wells within 100 metres of any place of burial; but this distance is now stated to be insufficient for deep wells, which have been found on examination to be polluted at a distance of from 150 to 200 metres. In some parts of Germany, the opening of wells nearer than 300 feet has been prohibited.

§ 15. Where the one deleterious cause is less complicated with others, as in open plains after the burial of the dead in fields of battle, the effects are perceived in the offensiveness of the surface emanations, and also in the pollution of the water, followed by disease, which compels the survivors to change their encampments.

The fact is thus adduced in the evidence of Dr. Copeland:—

“It is fully ascertained and well recognized that the alluvial soil, or whatever soil that receives the exuviæ of animal matter, or the bodies of dead animals, will become rich in general; it will abound in animal matter; and the water that percolates through the soil thus enriched will thus become injurious to the health of the individuals using it: that has been proved on many occasions, and especially in warm climates, and several remarkable facts illustrative of it occurred in the peninsular campaigns. It was found, for instance, at Ciudad Rodrigo, where, as Sir J. Macgregor states in his account of the health of the army, there were 20,000 dead bodies put into the ground within the space of two or three months, that this circumstance appeared to influence the health of the troops, inasmuch as for some months afterwards all those exposed to the emanations from the soil, as well as obliged to drink the water from the sunk wells, were affected by malignant and low fevers and dysentery, or fevers frequently putting on a dysenteric character.”

§ 16. In the metropolis, on spaces of ground which do not exceed 203 acres, closely surrounded by the abodes of the living, layer upon layer, each consisting of a population numerically equivalent to a large army of 20,000 adults, and nearly 30,000 youths and children, is every year imperfectly interred. Within the period of the existence of the present generation, upwards of a million of dead must have been interred in those same spaces.

§ 17. A layer of bodies is stated to be about seven years in decaying in the metropolis: to the extent that this is so, the decay must be by the conversion of the remains into a gas, and its escape, as a miasma, of many times the bulk of the body that has disappeared.

§ 18. In some of the populous parishes, where, from the nature of the soil, the decomposition has not been so rapid as the interments, the place of burial has risen in height; and the height of many of them must have greatly increased but for surreptitious modes of diminishing it by removal, which, it must be confessed, has diminished the sanitary evil, though by the creation of another and most serious evil, in the mental pain and apprehensions of the survivors and feelings of abhorrence of the population, caused by the suspicion and knowledge of the disrespect and desecration of the remains of the persons interred.

§ 19. The claims to exemption in favour of burial-grounds which it is stated are not overcrowded would perhaps be most favourably considered by the examination of the practice of interment in the new cemeteries, where the proportion of interments to the space is much less.

§ 20. I have visited and questioned persons connected with several of these cemeteries in town and country, and I have caused the practice of interments in others of them to be examined by more competent persons. The inquiry brought forward instances of the bursting of some leaden coffins and the escape of mephitic vapour in the catacombs; the tapping of others to prevent similar casualties; injuries sustained by grave-diggers from the escapes of miasma on the re-opening of graves, and an instance was stated to me by the architect of one cemetery, of two labourers having been injured, apparently by digging amidst some impure water which drained from some graves. No precedent examination of the evils affecting the public health, that are incident to the practice of interment, appears to have been made, no precedent scientific or impartial investigation appears to have been thought necessary by the joint-stock companies, or by the Committees of the House of Commons, at whose instance privileges were conferred upon the shareholders: no new precautionary measures or improvements, such as are in use abroad, appear consequently to have been introduced in them; the practice of burial has in general been simply removed to better looking, and in general, better situated places. The conclusion, however, from the examination of these places (which will subsequently be reverted to) is, that if most of the cemeteries themselves were in the midst of the population, they would, even in their present state, often contribute to the combination of causes of ill health in the metropolis, and several of the larger towns.

§ 21. It has been considered that all danger from interments in towns would be obviated if no burials were allowed except at a depth of five feet. But bodies buried much deeper are found to decay; and so certain as a body has wasted or disappeared is the fact that a deleterious gas has escaped. In the towns where the grave-yards and streets are paved, the morbific matter must be diffused more widely through the subsoil, and escape with the drainage. If the interments be so deep as to impede escapes at the surface, there is only the greater danger of escape by deep drainage and the pollution of springs.

Dr. Reid detected the escape of deleterious miasma from graves of more than 20 feet deep. He states—

In some churchyards I have noticed the ground to be absolutely saturated with carbonic acid gas, so that whenever a deep grave was dug it was filled in some hours afterwards with such an amount of carbonic acid gas that the workmen could not descend without danger. Deaths have, indeed, occurred occasionally in some churchyards from this cause, and in a series of experiments made in one of the churchyards at Manchester, where deep graves are made, each capable of receiving from 20 to 30 bodies, I found in general that a grave covered on the top at night was more or less loaded with carbonic acid in the morning, and that it was essential, accordingly, to ventilate these grave-pits before it was safe to descend.

This I effected on some occasions by means of a small chauffer placed at the top, and at one end of the grave a tube or hose being let down from it to the bottom of the grave. The fire was sustained by the admission of a small portion of fresh air at the top, and the air from the bottom of the grave was gradually removed as the upper stratum was heated by the fire around which it was conveyed; and when it had been once emptied in this manner a small fire was found sufficient to sustain a perpetual renewal of air, and prevent the men at work in the grave-pits from being subject to the extreme oppression to which they are otherwise liable, even when there may be no immediate danger. A mechanical power might be used for the same purpose; and chemical agents, as a quantity of newly slaked lime, are frequently employed, as they absorb the carbonic acid. From different circumstances that have since occurred, it appears to me probable that numerous examples of strata or superficial soil containing carbonic acid may be more frequently met with than is generally suspected, and that while in churchyards the presence of large quantities of carbonic acid may be frequently anticipated, its presence must not always be attributed solely to the result of the decomposition of the human body.

The amount of carbonic acid that collects within a given time in a deep grave-pit intended to receive 20 or 30 bodies, is much influenced by the nature of the ground in which it is dug. In the case referred to, the porous texture of the earth allowed a comparatively free aerial communication below the surface of the ground throughout its whole extent. It was, in reality, loaded with carbonic acid in the same manner as other places are loaded with water; it was only necessary to sink a pit, and a well of carbonic acid was formed, into which a constant stream of the same gas continued perpetually to filter from the adjacent earth, according to the extent to which it was removed. From whatever source, however, the carbonic acid may arise, it is not the less prone to mingle with the surrounding air, and where the level of the floor of the church is below the level of the churchyard, there the carbonic acid is prone to accumulate, as, though it may be ultimately dispersed by diffusion, it may be considered as flowing in the same manner in the first instance as water, where the quantity is considerable.

Again, where the drainage of the district in which the church may be placed is of an inferior description, and liable to be impeded periodically by the state of the tide, as in the vicinity of the Houses of Parliament, where all the drains are closed at high water, the atmosphere is frequently of the most inferior quality. I am fully satisfied, for instance, not only from my own observation, but from different statements that have reached me, and also from the observations of parties who have repeatedly examined the subject at my request, that the state of the burying-ground around St. Margaret’s church is prejudicial to the air supplied at the Houses of Parliament, and also to the whole neighbourhood. One of them, indeed, stated to me lately that he had avoided the churchyard for the last six months, in consequence of the effects he experienced the last time he visited it. These offensive emanations have been noticed at all hours of the night and morning; and even during the day the smell of the churchyard has been considered to have reached the vaults in the House of Commons, and traced to sewers in its immediate vicinity. When the barometer is low, the surface of the ground slightly moist, the tide full, and the temperature considerable—all which circumstances tend to favour the evolution of effluvia both from the grave-pits and the drains—the most injurious influence upon the air is observed. In some places not far from this churchyard fresh meat is frequently tainted in a single night, on the ground-floor, in situations where at a higher level it may be kept without injury for a much longer period. In some cases, in private houses as well as at the Houses of Parliament, I have had to make use of ventilating shafts, or of preparations of chlorine, to neutralize the offensive and deleterious effects which the exhalations produced, while, on other occasions, their injurious influence has been abundantly manifested by the change induced in individuals subjected to their influence on removing to another atmosphere. No grievance, perhaps, entails greater physical evils upon any district than the conjoined influence of bad drainage and crowded churchyards; and until the drainage of air from drains shall be secured by the process adverted to in another part of this work, or some equivalent measures, they cannot be regarded as free from a very important defect.

The drainage of air from drains is, indeed, desirable under any circumstances; but when the usual contaminations of the drain are increased by the emanations from a loaded churchyard, it becomes doubly imperative to introduce such measures; and if any one should desire to trace the progress of reaction by which the grave-yards are continually tending to free themselves of their contents, a very brief inquiry will give him abundant evidence on this point. My attention was first directed to this matter in London ten years ago, when a glass of water handed to me at an hotel, in another district, presented a peculiar film on its surface, which led me to set it aside; and after numerous inquiries, I was fully satisfied that the appearance which had attracted my attention arose from the coffins in a churchyard immediately adjoining the well where the water had been drawn. Defective as our information is as to the precise qualities of the various products from drains, church-yards, and other similar places, I think I have seen enough to satisfy me that in all such situations the fluids of the living system imbibe materials which, though they do not always produce great severity of disease, speedily induce a morbid condition, which, while it renders the body more prone to attacks of fever, is more especially indicated by the facility with which all the fluids pass to a state of putrefaction, and the rapidity with which the slightest wound or cut is apt to pass into a sore.

Mr. Leigh, surgeon and lecturer of chemistry at Manchester, confirms the researches made by Dr. Reid in that town, and observes on this subject—

But the decomposition of animal bodies is remarkably modified by external circumstances where the bodies are immersed in or surrounded by water, and particularly, if the water undergo frequent change, the solid tissues become converted into adipocire, a fatty spermaceti-like substance, not very prone to decomposition, and this change is effected without much gaseous exhalation. Under such circumstances nothing injurious could arise, but under ordinary conditions slow decomposition would take place, with the usual products of the decomposition of animal matters, and here the nature of the soil becomes of much interest. If the burial-ground be in damp dense compact clay, with much water, the water will collect round the body, and there will be a disposition to the formation of adipocire, whilst the clay will effectually prevent the escape of gaseous matter. If on the other hand the bodies be laid in sand or gravel, decomposition will readily take place, the gases will easily permeate the superjacent soil and escape into the atmosphere, and this with a facility which may be judged of when the fact is stated, that under a pressure of only three-fourths of an inch of water, coal gas will escape by any leakage in the conduit pipes through a stratum of sand or gravel of three feet in thickness in an exceedingly short space of time. The three feet of soil seems to oppose scarcely any resistance to its passage to the surface; but if the joints of the pipes be enveloped by a thin layer of clay, the escape is effectually prevented.

If bodies were interred eight or ten feet deep in sandy or gravelly soils, I am convinced little would be gained by it; the gases would find a ready exit from almost any practicable depth.

§ 22. He also expresses an opinion concurrent with that of other physiologists, that the effects of these escapes in an otherwise salubrious locality, soon attract notice, but their influence in obedience to the laws of gaseous diffusion, developed by Dalton and Graham, is not the less when scattered over a town, because in a multitude of scents they escape observation. In open rural districts these gases soon intermix with the circumambient air, and become so vastly diluted that their injurious tendency is less potent.

Other physical facts which it is necessary to develope in respect to the practice of interment may be the most conveniently considered in a subsequent portion of this report, where it is necessary to adduce the information possessed, as to the sites of places of burial, and the sanitary precautions necessary in respect to them.

§ 23. From what has already been adduced, it may here be stated as a conclusion,

That inasmuch as there appear to be no cases in which the emanations from human remains in an advanced stage of decomposition are not of a deleterious nature, so there is no case in which the liability to danger should be incurred either by interment (or by entombment in vaults, which is the most dangerous) amidst the dwellings of the living, it being established as a general conclusion in respect to the physical circumstances of interment, from which no adequate grounds of exception have been established;—

That all interments in towns, where bodies decompose, contribute to the mass of atmospheric impurity which is injurious to the public health.

_Injuries to the Health of Survivors occasioned by the delay of Interments._

In order to understand the state of feeling of the labouring classes, and the general influence upon them, and even the effects on their health, of the practice of interment, it will be necessary to submit for consideration those circumstances which immediately precede the interment, namely, the most common circumstances of the death.

§ 24. In a large proportion of cases in the metropolis, and in some of the manufacturing districts, one room serves for one family of the labouring classes: it is their bed-room, their kitchen, their washhouse, their sitting room, their dining room; and, when they do not follow any out-door occupation, it is frequently their work room and their shop. In this one room they are born, and live, and sleep, and die amidst, the other inmates.

§ 25. Their common condition in large towns has been developed by various inquiries, more completely than by the census. As an instance, the results may be given of an inquiry lately made, at the instance and expense of Lord Sandon, by Mr. Weld, the secretary of the Statistical Society, as to the condition of the working classes resident in the inner ward of St. George’s, Hanover Square, and in the immediate vicinity of some of the most opulent residences in the metropolis. It appeared that 1465 families of the labouring classes had for their residence 2175 rooms, and 2510 beds. The distribution of rooms and beds was as follows:—

─────────────────────────┬─────────╥─────────────────────────┬───────── DWELLINGS. │Number of║ BEDS. │Number of │Families.║ │Families. ─────────────────────────┼─────────╫─────────────────────────┼───────── Single rooms for each │ 929║One bed to each family │ 623 family │ ║ │ Two rooms for each family│ 408║Two beds to each family │ 638 Three rooms for each │ 94║Three beds to each family│ 154 family │ ║ │ Four rooms for each │ 17║Four beds to each family │ 21 family │ ║ │ Five rooms for each │ 8║Five beds to each family │ 8 family │ ║ │ Six rooms for each family│ 4║Six beds to each family │ 3 Seven rooms for each │ 1║Seven beds to each family│ 1 family │ ║ │ Eight rooms for each │ 1║Dwellings without a bed │ 7 family │ ║ │ Not ascertained │ 3║Not ascertained │ 10 │ —————║ │ ————— Total │ 1,465║ Total │ 1,465 ─────────────────────────┴─────────╨─────────────────────────┴─────────

Out of 5945 persons 839 were found to be ill, and yet the season was not unhealthy. One family in 11 had a third room (and that not unoccupied) in which to place a corpse. This, however, appears to be a favourable specimen. From an examination made by a committee of the Statistical Society into the condition of the poorer classes in the borough of Marylebone, it appeared that the distribution of rooms amongst the portion of population examined showed that not more than one family in a hundred had a third room.

No. occupying part of a room, 159 families, and 196 single persons. No. occupying one room 382 families, and 56 single persons. No. occupying two rooms 61 families, and 2 single persons. No. occupying three rooms 5 families, and 7 single persons. No. occupying four rooms 1 families, and 0 single persons.

§ 26. Mr. Leonard, surgeon and medical officer of the parish of St. Martin’s-in-the-Fields, gives the following instances of the circumstances in which the poorest class of inhabitants die, which may be adduced as exemplifications of the dreadful state of circumstances in which the survivors are placed for the want of adequate accommodation for the remains immediately after death, and previous to the interment:—

There are some houses in my district that have from 45 to 60 persons of all ages under one roof, and in the event of death, the body often occupies the only bed till they raise money to pay for a coffin, which is often several days. They are crowded together in houses situate in Off-alley, the courts and alleys opening from Bedfordbury, Rose-street, Angel-court, courts and alleys opening from Drury-lane and the Strand, and even in places fitted up under the Adelphi arches; even the unventilated and damp underground kitchens are tenanted. Of course the tenants are never free from fevers and diarrhœa, and the mortality is great. The last class live, for the most part, in lodging-rooms, where shelter is obtained, with a bed or straw, for from 2_d._ to 4_d._ per night, and where this is not obtainable, the arches under the Adelphi afford a shelter. In the lodging-rooms I have seen the beds placed so close together as not to allow room to pass between them, and occupied by both sexes indiscriminately. I have known six people sleep in a room about nine feet square, with only one small window, about fifteen inches by twelve inches; and there are some sleeping-rooms in this district in which you cannot scarcely see your hand at noon-day.

How long is the dead body retained in the room beside the living?—If the person has subscribed to a club, or the friends are in circumstances to afford the expense of the funeral, it takes place, generally, on the following Sunday, if the death has occurred early in the week; but if towards the end of the week, then it is sometimes postponed till the Sunday week after, if the weather permit; in one case it was twelve days. In the other cases I have known much opposition to removal till after a subscription had been collected from the affluent neighbours; and in some instances, after keeping the body several days, I have been applied to to present the case to the relieving officer, that it might be buried by the parish. Amongst the Irish it is retained till after the wake, which “_is open to all comers_” as long as there is anything _dacent to drink or smoke_; but I must bear witness, also, to the frequent exhibition, in a large majority of the poor, of those affectionate attentions to the mortal remains of their relatives, which all are anxious to bestow, and which, notwithstanding the danger and want of accommodation, make them loth to part with them.