Place, pollution and public health: municipal responses for sanitation in Birmingham 1840s-1920s

Abstract

This thesis explores the municipal responses to poor sanitation and river pollution in Birmingham between the 1840s and the 1920s. It assesses the impact and effectiveness of those responses on the health of England’s second largest city and re-examines the contemporary view of the city’s governance and the alleged association of sanitation reform and ‘municipal socialism’ linked to one of the city’s political figures, Joseph Chamberlain. This history of sanitation, set within its political, social and economic contexts, examines the development of utilities for water supply and sewage treatment in Birmingham and offers the first thorough academic analysis of the broader municipal policy towards public health in the city during that period. It also explores the development of municipal systems and public health administration, as well as medical theory and practice, and is therefore a history of the urban environment that overlaps with the social history of medicine. To examine the interrelationship and importance of place, people and policy this study adopts a microhistorical approach to appraise a single local authority, particular committees, specialised roles and individuals. Attention is given not only to those who governed, but also to people who worked within those systems. Close analysis of place-specific primary sources, some never used before and produced by those involved, has facilitated a fuller contextualisation of municipal responses and reveals the nature and effectiveness of local government systems dealing with public health. The research findings reveal not a sanitary revolution but rather a lengthy foundational period of local government development and investment in sanitary infrastructure before Birmingham had the capability to address poor sanitation for all citizens. While this foundational period did not have an immediate positive impact on the health of the city’s poorest between 1870 and 1904, it nevertheless throws new light on the living conditions in the courts of back-to-back housing and adds significantly to an understanding of the impact of waste management systems. This challenges the image of Birmingham closely linked to Chamberlain and his impact on sanitation and municipal socialism in the 1870s and 1880s; an image this thesis argues is far from justified. The findings can feed into debates surrounding urban sanitation, infrastructure investment and its effects on mortality, and underscores the importance of place-specific contextualisation. The impact of Birmingham’s first two Medical Officers of Health is also considered within place-specific, medical and contemporary understandings of disease contexts, with a reassessment of their impact on infant mortality in the city. This thesis adds significantly to an understanding of Birmingham’s municipal history and extends the historiography for the beginnings of the water industry in England and Wales and the history of public health in Britain