Three reports relating to the Hastings water : with an appendix of letters, &c. / Ordered to be printed by the Hastings Local Board of Health.

  • Taylor, Alfred Swaine, 1806-1880.
Date:
1859
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Three reports relating to the Hastings water : with an appendix of letters, &c. / Ordered to be printed by the Hastings Local Board of Health. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

    11/60
    BY THE COMMITTEE. xi* * * § he sought for lead in the water, and he found itand that “ he sent two specimens of water taken from leaden cisterns to Dr. R. D. Thomsom for analysis, who found them to be contaminated with a very considerable quantity of lead, sufficient to produce dangerous disease,” It was also the same gentleman who brought to Mr. Rock a sample of water containing carbonate of lead in the pro- portion of more forty-eight grains to the gallon.^ As these statements were too vague and indefinite to be of any use to us, we endeavoured at the very commence- ment of our enquiry to obtain, through the Town Clerk, from the gentleman who had originated the question, “ a precise specification of each contaminated cistern,” with the intention of “ procuring from each a specimen of the water in such a state as it was actually used by the owners.”f This information the gentleman in question (apparently on account of some private grievance,) declined to give.J We therefore took from the taps of three leaden cisterns, chosen indiscriminately, some samples of water, which were carefully sealed, and forwarded to Dr. Taylor. We also took a specimen from one of the houses in which some of the cases of sickness were believed to have oc- curred. § We endeavoured to take the samples with perfect fairness, and some of us at least fully expected that a certain amount of lead would have been discovered. However, Dr. Taylor in his very careful and elaborate Report states that the specimens of water ‘‘ contained no lead, or the quantity present was too small to be appreciated by the most delicate tests.^’ (p. xix.) * See Appendix, No. 1. p. 1. We should have liked to have known more about this sample of water. If this was one of the specimens sent to Dr.R. D. Thomson, he might well say that it “was contaminated with a very considerable quantity of lead, sufficient to produce dangerous disease.” In the well-known case of the French Royal Family at Claremont, in 1848, the water which af- fected thirteen persons, some of them very severely, contained only one grain of carbonate of lead in a gallon of water. {Lancet, 1852. vol. 2. p. 416.) f See Appendix, No. 11. p. 14. X See Appendix, Nos. 13, 19. pp. 17, 25. § See Appendix, p. 26. note f.