A number of documents and objects from the Victorian era have been made available for public analysis online.  The one chosen to remark upon here is a report to the General Board of Health in England on the town of Haworth, made in 1850 by inspector Benjamin Babbage.  To many, as this was to me initially, the report may appear to be a tedious and unimportant read.  However, reviewing it provides an insight into what it was like to live poor and the lack of awareness of the importance of cleanliness in 19^th-century England, with its descriptions of unhealthy conditions.  Additionally, and more pertinent to this class perhaps, it informs the reader of the surroundings Jane Eyre author Charlotte Bronte grew up in, as this was the town in which she spent much of her life until her death.

The general description of Haworth will be provided first.  Babbage begins by simply describing the layout, weather, government, and economy of the town.  He then notes that Haworth appears far worse off than the surrounding towns in terms of health, based upon both direct observations of his and calculations determining the rate and expense of deaths in the town. Death rate is 19-30.6 per thousand people, higher than surrounding towns in which it is 17.6 per thousand.  63 people die annually here, while only 44 die in those other towns.  It is noted that a good sum is lost due to this loss of potential employment.  The average age of death is 25.8 years old, which is mentioned to be “…about the same as in…three of the most unhealthy of the London districts,”and 41.6% of children die before 6. 

His direct observations show why this is.  There is only one bathroom for every 4.5 houses on average, with around 5 people per house, and in some cases one bathroom was shared by 12 houses.  These bathrooms were right on, and drained into, the street.  Large numbers of workers often slept in the same rooms, allowing for easy spread of disease.  Sometimes leakage from the bathrooms would seep into houses, and bathrooms and pigstys were often right under windows.  One main water supply was right near a bathroom, and in most of the water supplies, the water was hard, and sometimes it was reported even cows wouldn’t drink from one of the wells.  Typhus is rampant.  And the sole graveyard is nearly full with 1,344 burials there in the past 10 years , and the inspector recalls a case of a full graveyard in another town draining off disgusting water. 

Babbage then goes on to propose ways to help the town. He argues for its inclusion in a new Public Health Act primarily.  To fix the water supply, he suggests extracting water from the nearby wild-lands or cleaner springs far off.  He also states that a new burial ground should be added and that all butchering of cattle should be confined to one slaughterhouse so the remains, which also end up in the streets, aren’t found everywhere.

Thus, we get an idea of what life was like for the poor and, most importantly to our studies, Charlotte Bronte and her family in Haworth.  Note that among the names mentioned as being involved in the petition for inspection is Rev. Patrick Bronte, Charlotte’s father. This raises questions of her potential philanthropy and how much of Jane’s experiences as an orphan early in the book and a beggar later after escaping Thornfield may be based around what Charlotte has seen.  In the book she, as Jane, takes the stance that the poor can be just as intelligent as the wealthy when given educational opportunities, as shown with Jane’s experience as a schoolteacher in the poor town of Morton.  Thus, we see some of Charlotte’s inspiration for sequences in Jane Eyre and get an insight into the author’s daily life with this report.

Cody, David. Charlotte Bronte: A Brief Biography. Hartwick College. 1987. http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/bronte/cbronte/brontbio.html

Babbage, Benjamin Herschel. Report to the General Board of Health, on a Preliminary Inquiry into the Sewerage, Drainage, and Supply, of Water, and the Sanitary Condition of the Inhabitants of the Hamlet of HAWORTH, in the West Riding of the County of York. Notting Hill. May 3, 1850.