| AdminHistory | From 1855 until the creation of the Metropolitan Borough of Stepney in 1900, the Whitechapel District Board of Works was the main unit of local government that managed the public health and sanitary conditions for the following contiguous areas:
- Parish of St Mary Whitechapel
- Parish of Christchurch
- Parish of St Botolph Without Aldgate
- Parish of Holy Trinity, Minories
- The Precinct of St Katherine
- The Hamlet of Mile End New Town
- The Liberty of Norton Folgate
- The Old Artillery Ground
- The District of Tower
Area: 406 acres (including 23 acres of water)
Population: 74,261 (1891); 78,676 (1896)
Rateable value (year ending 31 March 1901) £447,959:
- Whitechapel: £232,516
- Spitalfields: £98,096
- Aldgate: £57,394
- Mile End New Town: £37,468
- Norton Folgate: £13,352
- Old Artillery Ground: £9,133
Origins and purpose
For hundreds of years prior to 1855, parish vestries had met to discharge the business of both ecclesiastical and secular local government. The vestries were essentially committees of prominent householders and church officials, and were so-called because meetings took place in the church vestry or sacristy (the room where the priest prepares for a service and where vestments and articles of worship are stored). This early form of local government in London and across the country was a fusion of ecclesiastical and civil functions which had evolved as the most practical means to meet the needs of the inhabitants as they arose.
A generalised system of local government, separate to ecclesiastical concerns, slowly took shape during the course of the nineteenth century. The first concerted attempt to rationalise administration in London came in the form of the 1855 Metropolis Management Act. This Act retained the ancient parish unit as a basis for government, but provided for the election of a new type of vestry by the ratepayers of each parish. In the less densely populated parishes of London such as the nine areas noted above, these vestries - technically known as 'Schedule B Vestries' from that part of the 1855 Act in which they were listed - were invested with no authority apart from the power to elect representatives to a District Board. The Board was endowed with municipal powers under the 1855 Act. Whitechapel was one of the 12 newly created District Boards across central London to govern and manage certain defined aspects of local affairs.
Under the terms of the 1855 Act, the Schedule B vestries elected a total of 619 members to serve on the London District Boards; more specifically, the nine constituent bodies of the Whitechapel Board elected 58 members as follows:
- St Mary: 27 members
- Christchurch: 12 members
- St Botolph: 6 members
- Holy Trinity: 1 member
- Precinct of St Katherine: 1 member
- Mile End New Town: 6 members
- Norton Folgate: 3 members
- Old Artillery Ground: 1 member
- Tower: 1 member
This framework of local government in London remained unchanged until the Local Government Act was passed in 1894. This act together with a number of other so-called 'Adoptive Acts', such as Baths and Washhouses Acts, Burial Acts and Public Libraries Acts, enabled the District Boards to increase their powers. They could apply to the Local Government Board to take over the appointment, duties and liabilities of the overseers of the poor, and the powers of the Baths and Wash-houses Commissioners, Public Library Commissioners, Burial Boards and other local bodies. Despite these opportunities it appears that the Whitechapel District Board opted not to acquire any of these additional powers; an Electrical Department was, however, established in 1898.
In its early years, the Board's chief officials were its:
- Treasurer
- Medical Officer of Health
- Surveyor
- Analyst
- Two officials who combined the roles of Sanitary Inspectors, Inspectors of Nuisances and Street Lamps, and Inspectors under the Sale of Food and Drugs Act
A clerk to the surveyor, housekeeper and messenger provided the necessary administrative support. By the time of its abolition in 1900 the Establishment of the Whitechapel Board had grown to four departments - the Clerk's, Sanitary, Surveyor's and Electrical - employing a total of 26 officers.
Activities
The Whitechapel District Board of Works was a sanitary authority, charged with keeping its defined area as healthy as possible. The Board had control and management of streets, roads and footpaths, and had to ensure that they were paved, cleansed, watered and lighted; the emptying of dustbins, removal of all refuse and the prevention of 'nuisances' caused by noxious trades also fell within the Board's remit.
Over time, other responsibilities included dealing with 'unhealthy' dwellings and monitoring food standards (which included food analysis). By the time of its abolition in 1900, the duties,powers and functions of the Board were:
- Buildings - powers under the London Building Acts were almost entirely under the control of the London County Council (LCC) (created in 1888). However, the Board could initiate
proceedings where buildings had been erected beyond the general line of frontage without the LCC's consent
- Drainage - the Board had virtually complete power with regard to the construction and maintenance of local sewers and drains
- Housing - Part II of the 1890 Housing of the Working Classes Act conferred upon the Board the right of building inspection and the power to take proceedings before a magistrate
seeking the closure and demolition of houses deemed unfit for human habitation; the 1890 Act also enabled the Board to purchase and demolish buildings which were an obstruction
to the improvement of adjacent premises
- Public health - the Board possessed almost all powers under the 1891 Public Health (London) Act, including:
- The appointment of medical officers of health and sanitary inspectors
- The monitoring and enforcement of bye-laws relating to nuisances (defined as including 'offensive' ditches, cesspools, overflowing drains, the inappropriate keeping of animals,
ill-maintained factories, workshops and slaughterhouses and polluting chimneys)
- The building of hospitals and provision of related medical services
- The cleansing and maintenance of factories and premises of employment so as to ensure the health of employees
- Inspection of slaughterhouses, shops and premises found selling unsound or adulterated food, milk, drugs and other substances
- Proceedings in cases of buildings and premises deemed 'unfit for human habitation'
- Removal of refuse, cleansing of dustbins and streets, and the appointment of 'scavengers' (waste pickers) for the purpose
- Provision of mortuaries for the reception of dead bodies before interment
- Streets - the Board possessed all powers with regard to making, maintaining, lighting, watering, cleansing and regulating the streets. However, the Board required the sanction of the
LCC for the temporary closing of streets for repairs, and for their naming. The LCC renamed and ordered the numbering of streets, the Board then carrying out their instructions
- Rates and borrowing - until 1894, the expenses of the Whitechapel Board of Works were met entirely by levying local rates on residents. The 1894 Equalisation of Rates Act was
passed with the intention of standardising the rates for sanitary and other purposes throughout London; the rate was limited to 6d in the £, with the result of extreme inequalities
between rich and poor districts
The Board discharged its responsibilities through a committee system; seven Board committees were meeting in the 1890s:
- Finance Committee (met til 1897)
- Works Committee
- Special Committee(s) (met til 1898)
- Electric Lighting Committee
- Sanitary and Public Health Committee
- General Purposes Committee (met til to 1897)
- Dust Committee (met til 1897)
In 1900 the Board was succeeded by Stepney Metropolitan Borough (collection reference L/SMB).
Between 1855 and 1900, Whitechapel saw some important developments and events. It is important to realise that the Whitechapel Board of Works was not involved with most of the following, but among some of the key personalities and major events to have occurred were:
- 1856: destruction by fire of the first Pavilion Theatre at 191-93 Whitechapel Road
- 1858: opening of the New Royal Pavilion Theatre - it came to be known as the 'Drury Lane of the East'
- 1865: the firm of Mears & Stainbank occupy Whitechapel Bell Foundry
- 7 August 1878: formation of the Salvation Army at 272 Whitechapel Road
- 1878-1888: Dr Robert Billing (a future suffragan bishop to the Bishop of London) serves as rector of Spitalfields
- 1870s and 1880s: first waves of Jewish immigration to Whitechapel - early Jewish members of the Whitechapel District Board of Works were Martin Bamberger and Samuel Froomberg
(St Mary, elected 1881); Emanuel Woolf (St Mary, elected 1891); Jonas Woolf (St Mary, elected 1892); Isidore Abrahams, Samuel David Isaacs and Samuel Moses (St Mary, elected
1893); and Philip Jacob Solomon (Old Artillery Ground, elected 1893)
- 1882: opening of St Mary Matfellon Whitechapel to replace the church destroyed by fire in 1880
- 1885-1900: international banker Sir Samuel Montagu (1st Baron Swaythling) serves as Liberal MP for Whitechapel
- 1888: the notorious Whitechapel murders thrust the area into international prominence
- 26 October 1892: Whitechapel Public Library opened with a small museum attached - a collection of curiosities from the South Sea Islands acquired by the 'Sailors' Chaplain' Dan
Greatorex (for a while Board member for St Mary) form the centrepiece of the museum
- 30 June 1894: Tower Bridge opened by the Prince of Wales
- 1894: Kate Marion Hall (1861-1918) appointed curator of the Whitechapel Museum; she was the first professionally employed female curator in England and instigated a series of free
public lectures at the Museum: among the notable speakers were the geologist Frederick William Rudler, the leading Egyptologist Professor Sir William Flinders Petrie, the zoologists Sir Peter
Chalmers Mitchell and William Evans Hoyle, and the anthropologist Professor Alfred Cort Haddon
- 1897: Constance E. Osman, the first and only woman to sit as a member of the Whitechapel District Board of Works, elected for Christchurch
- 1899: local electricity supply inaugurated by the Board
Addresses
The main offices of the Whitechapel District Board of Works were at 15 Great Alie Street; the building was inherited and used by the successor Metropolitan Borough of Stepney as its municipal offices until September 1921, but no longer exists.
Sources
- F. G. Brewer, A Century of London Government: The Creation of the Boroughs (London: Ernest Benn Ltd, 1934)
- [East London] Handbook and Almanac for 1896
- Albert Bassett Hopkins, The Boroughs of the Metropolis (London: Bemrose and Sons, 1900)
- William A. Robson, The Government and Misgovernment of London (London: Allen and Unwin, 1939
- Frederick Whelen, London Government (London: Grant Richards, 1898) |