Letter from Mr Taylor, Assistant Returning Officer of the Whitechapel Union, to Dr Southwood Smith; written at the request of the latter, for Lord Ashley's use, after their personal inspection of Bethnal Green and Whitechapel.

289 Bethnal Green Road, Feb. 5, 1842.

My dear Doctor,—Lord Ashley, the Honorable Mr Ashley, and yourself visited the following places with me. I have arranged them in the form of a table: in one column is the name of the street, and, opposite, a brief notice of its condition, with an occasional remark by which his Lordship may recognise it.

Apologising for the length of time that has elapsed since I promised to forward this account to you, I remain, dear Doctor, Your Obedient Servant,

T. Taylor.

First Visit.

Back of Chester Place. Open ditch and several pigsties.

Pitt Street. A wretched road, no drainage. Hon. Mr Ashley spoke to one of the inhabitants respecting the state of the road.

Burnham Square. Houses built on undrained ground.

Grosvenor Street, Bonner Street. Undrained houses on one side not supplied with water (all the houses on this estate, to the amount of about 200 or more, in the same condition, the inhabitants having to go to a distant pump or beg of their neighbours, who have had it laid on at their own expense, and who for giving it are liable to punishment). Bonner Street has an open ditch in front of part of it.

Pleasant Place. Road a perfect quagmire.

Green Street. Stagnant water on southern side and also on part of the northern.

Baker Street, Digby Street. Houses back to back, consisting of two rooms, each one above the other. Privies close to windows of lower rooms. Baker's night-yard is in this street.

James Street. Another night-yard.

Bethnal Green Road (eastern end). No drainage, many of the houses having 10 inches to 2 feet of water in the cellars, which are from 3 feet to 3 feet 8 inches only below the level of the road.

Sanderson's Gardens. Houses on each side below the level of the pathway, which has a gutter in the middle. (Lord Ashley spoke to one of the inhabitants of this place.)

Pitt Street, Bethnal Green Road. A narrow street with only surface drainage. (Fever was very prevalent here.)

Cambden Gardens. Houses built on the soil, many of them not being larger than an 8-feet cube, are inhabited.

Lamb's Fields. An acre at least of complete marsh and three open ditches—one on the north, another in the middle, and the third to the eastern side close to the backs of the houses in North Street.

London Street. Undrained.

Rupia Lane. Two open ditches.

Ann's Place. Open sewer in front of some of the houses.

Houses at the back of Ann's Place. The open sewer from Ann's Place passes beneath one of the houses and then is again open to the houses at the back, but is boarded in so that Lord Ashley had to mount a boundary stone to obtain the view of it.

A group of streets to the north of Slacky Road. All the houses stained with damp to a height varying from 1 to 2 or more feet.

Warmer Place. An open sewer in front of the houses giving off bubbles of gas very freely.

Wellington Pond. A large piece of water into which the above sewer drains—gives off constantly innumerable bubbles of gas, and the stench is sometimes abominable. Persons who have accidentally fallen into it, though taken out immediately, have all died.

A thoroughfare leading from bottom of Pollards Row to Wellington Row. The lucifer match manufactory faces this road, into which we all went. An open ditch in the most filthy condition.

Squirries Street. Green stagnant water on each side.

Wellington Row. Lower rooms all damp. An open ditch in front. Western end soft mud, into which the wheels of a waggon sank 14 or 15 inches as it passed.

North Street and some of the houses at the back. Lord Ashley saw the landlord of some of them.

Waterloo Town (several streets). All undrained, but part of Manchester Street and Albion Street. Many variations of level of several feet at a distance of a few yards only, as Manchester Place, Derbyshire Street, Sale Street. Many of the houses back to back and consisting of five ground-floor rooms only.

Second Visit.

George Street. A centre gutter full of stagnant water.

Old Bethnal Green Road. Has had a sewer made recently, but houses do not communicate with it.

Clare Street, Felix Street, Centre Street, Cambridge Circus, Minerva Street, Matilda Street, Hope Street, Temple Street, Charles Street, Charlotte Street, Durham Street. All built on undrained ground, and the houses affected with damp.

Court opposite to Cambridge Road. One privy to several houses, and mosses growing on the damp brick of the houses to the height of 4 or 5 feet from the ground.

Nova Scotia Gardens. Several feet below the road in many parts, the drainage of which it receives. (Here lived the burkers of the Italian boy.)

Virginia Row, York Street, and the streets to the east. Undrained, having stagnant water in them.

Rose Court. Most wretched hovels.

Typen Street. (Where the child was burnt.)

Satchwell Rents. The privies form part of the ground-floor of these houses. Lord Ashley inspected the first house; no yards.

Mount Street. Level of the houses very uneven; many below the level of the road. The undrained portion of this street suffered from fever to an awful extent, while the high and drained part had scarcely a case.

Courts out of Mount Street. Dung-heap in one. Lord Ashley saw the landlord of another and spoke to him.

Collingwood Street. Houses on one side much lower than on the other; very badly drained, and not a healthy-looking person or child in the street.