REPORT ON THE SANITARY CONDITION OF THE LABOURING POPULATION OF GREAT BRITAIN. A SUPPLEMENTARY REPORT ON THE RESULTS OF A SPECIAL INQUIRY INTO THE PRACTICE OF INTERMENT IN TOWNS. MADE AT THE REQUEST OF HER MAJESTY’S PRINCIPAL SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT, BY EDWIN CHADWICK, ESQ. BARRISTER AT LAW. _Presented to both Houses of Parliament, by Command of Her Majesty._ LONDON: PRINTED BY W. CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET, FOR HER MAJESTY’S STATIONERY OFFICE. 1843. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CONTENTS. PAGE Sources of information on which the Report is founded, § 1 1 Grounds of exception to the admitted necessities of the abolition of intra-mural interment examined, § 1 2 The evidence as to the innocuousness of emanations from human remains: negative evidence, § 2 4 The facts in respect to such alleged innocuousness incompletely stated, § 3 7 Positive evidence of the propagation of acute disease from putrid emanations, §§ 5 and 6 10 Specific disease communicated from human remains—positive instances of, §§ 8 and 10 14 Distinct effects produced by emanations from bodies in a state of decay and from bodies in a state of putrefaction, § 10 21 Summary of the evidence in respect to the sanitary question as to the essentially injurious nature of such emanations, &c., § 11 23 Difficulty of tracing distinctly the specific effects of emanations from burial-grounds in crowded towns, amidst complications of other emanations, § 13 23 Tainting of wells by emanations from burial-grounds, § 14 24 Danger of injurious escapes of putrid emanations not obviated by deep burial, § 21 28 General conclusions that all interments in churches or in towns are essentially of an injurious and dangerous tendency, § 23 30 _Injuries to the Health of Survivors occasioned by the delay of Interments._ The greatest proportion of deaths occur in the single rooms in which families live and sleep, § 25 31