5—
The London Water Companies

Several histories of London government in the nineteenth century take up the question of public takeover of the water supply. Most useful for political aspects is Asok Mukhopadyay, Politics of Water Supply: The Case of Victorian London (Calcutta: World, 1981). See also David Owen, The Government of Victorian London, 1855–1889: The Metropolitan Board of Works, the Vestries, and the City Corporation edited by Roy MacLeod with contributions from David Reeder, Donald Olsen, and Francis Sheppard (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1982) and Ken Young and Patricia L Garside, Metropolitan London: Politics and Urban Change, 1837–1981 (Edward Arnold, 1982). A description of the variety of official reports on London's waters is 'Reports on the Examination of Thames Water,' JRSA 31 (1882–3): 74–6, 87–90. There were numerous quasi-historical accounts of the London water works during the period, many of them published in connection with attempts at public takeover. See G Phillips Bevan, The London Water Supply: Its Past, Present, and Future (Edward Stanford, 1884), Francis Bolton, London Water Supply, including a History and Description of the London Water Works, Statistical Tables, and Maps , new ed. entirely revised and enlarged with a short exposition of the law relating to water companies generally . . . by Philip A Scratchely (Clowes and Sons, 1888), 'A Civil Engineer', The London Water Supply, being an examination of the alleged Advantages of the Schemes of the Metropolitan Board of Works and of the inevitable Increase of Rates

which would be required thereby (Spon 1878), and W Scott Tebb, Metropolitan Water Supply (n p, [1907]).

On early expressions of concern for the quality of public water supplies, see Lucas, Essay on Waters , Thomas Percival, Experiments and Observations on Water: particularly on the Hard Pump Water of Manchester (J Johnson, 1769), and William Lambe, An Investigation of the Properties of Thames Water (Butcher, 1828). Good secondary sources on the 1828 controversy are D Lipschutz, 'The Water Question in London, 1827–1831,' Bull Hist Med 42 (1968): 510–26, and A Hardy, 'Water and the Search for Public Health in London in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries,' Medical History 28 (1984): 250–82. See also 'The Thames Water Question,' Westminster Review 12 (1830): 31–42, W T Brande, 'The Supply of Water to the Metropolis,' Q J of Science, Literature and the Arts 5 (1830): 350–6, Michael Ryan, Remarks on the Supply of Water to the Metropolis, with an Account of the Natural History of Water in its simple and combined states: and of the chemical composition and medical uses of all known mineral waters (Longmans, 1828), and [Charles Wall], 'Metropolis Water Supply,' Fraser's Magazine 10 (1834): 561–72. Relevant parliamentary papers are the reports and evidence of the Royal Commission on Metropolitan Water Supply (1828), the Select Committee on Metropolis Water (1834), and the Select Committee (Lords) on the Supply of Water to the Metropolis (1840).

The controversies in the early '50s are well described in the two main biographies of Edwin Chadwick: S E Finer, The Life and Times of Sir Edwin Chadwick (Methuen, 1952) and R A Lewis, Edwin Chadwick and the Public Health Movement, 1832–1854 (Longmans, Green, 1952). Also see Chadwick's famous Report on the Sanitary Condition of the Labouring Population of Great Britain ed with an introduction by M W Flinn (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1965) for the marginality of his concern with water quality. Important primary sources are [W H Wills] 'The Troubled Water Question,' Household Words 1 (1850): 49–52, Thos Graham, W A Miller, and A W Hofmann, 'Chemical Report on the Supply of Water to the Metropolis,' J Chem Soc 4 (1851): 375–413, [F O Ward], 'Metropolitan Water Supply,' Quarterly Review 87 (1850): 468–502, Samuel Homersham, 'Review of the Report by the General Board of Health on the Supply of Water to the Metropolis, contained in a report to the directors of the London (Watford) Spring Water Company' (Weale, 1850), Edwin Lankester, 'Drinking Waters of the

Metropolis,' Proc R I 2 (1854–8): 466–70, [Charles Kingsley], 'The Water Supply of London,' North British Review 15 (1851): 228–53, [W O'Brien], 'The Supply of Water to the Metropolis,' Edinburgh Review 91 (1849-50): 377–408, W T Brande, 'Analysis of the Well-Water at the Royal Mint with Some Remarks on the Waters of the London Wells,' J Chem Soc 2 (1850): 342–52, [N Beardmore], 'Water Supply,' Westminster Review 54 (1851): 185–96, G R Burnell, 'On the Present Condition of the Water Supply of London,' JRSA 9 (1860–1): 169–77, and William Ranger, Henry Austin, and Alfred Dickens, 'Report on the Examination of the Thames,' in Reports to the General Board of Health (PP 1856). Many of the citations in the 'Microscopic Approaches' section below also deal with the controversies of the '50s. Relevant parliamentary papers include the reports and evidence of the General Board of Health's Report on the Epidemic Cholera of 1848 and 1849 (1850), and its Report on the Supply of Water to the Metropolis (1850), the Select Committee on the Metropolis Water Bill (1851), the Select Committee on the Metropolis Water Bills (1852), the report of the GBH Medical Council on Scientific Inquiries in Relation to the Cholera Epidemic of 1854 (1854–5), and the Reports to the General Board of Health, under the Provisions of the Metropolis Water Act (1856).

The alternatives considered in the late '60s are considered in J F Bateman, 'On the Present State of our Knowledge of the Supply of Water to Towns,' 25th Report of the BAAS (Glasgow 1855) (1856, reports 62–77. The most important parliamentary paper is the Report of the Royal Commission on Water Supply (1868–9). Other relevant parliamentary papers include the reports and evidence of the first and second reports of the first (1865) Royal Commission on Rivers Pollution (1866 and 1867), of select committees on the Thames Navigation Bill (1866), on the River Lea Conservancy Bill (1867–8), and on the East London Water Bills (1867). Citations in sections 7 and 9 below also deal with the controversies of the '60s.

Later reports of interest include the investigation of the eel epidemic: A deC Scott and W H Power, 'Eels in Water Mains being a Report on an Inquiry into the Quality of the Water supplied by the East London Waterworks,' in 17th Annual Report of the Local Government Board, Report of the Medical Officer for 1887 , pp 121–38. Archives of the Local Government Board's regulation of the water companies are in the Public Record Office as PRO MH 29. Finally the Royal Society holds documents relating to the formation, at the request of the London County Council, of its Water Research

Committee (Royal Society of London, Water Research Committee, Minutes, and Letters and Papers, 1891–6).

Parliamentary papers relevant to the controversy in the '80s and early '90s include the reports and evidence of the Select Committee on Rivers Pollution (River Lee) (1886), and the Royal Commission on Metropolitan Water Supply (1893–4).