Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Glasgow, South Wales and the Irish Fever

  • Chapter
Black ’47

  • 72 Accesses

Abstract

Turning to other ports of entry, Glasgow has the most obvious parallels with Liverpool with respect to the typhus outbreak of 1847. The main difference was that the Scottish Poor Law provision for medical assistance to the poor was not the same as in England. Indeed, the new Scottish poor law introduced in 1845 did not impose a uniform pattern of provision on Scottish parishes and so generalisations are difficult to make. Specifically, Glasgow city did not have a workhouse with a medical ward as did Liverpool and also did not have a full-time medical of ficer of health. However, like English poor law authorities, Glasgow Parochial Board and the Boards of its suburbs all paid subscriptions to charitable institutions, in return for which poor people could be sent for medical treatment.’ The situation in pre-famine Glasgow with regard to charitable institutions is shown in Table 6.1 below.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 129.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Hardcover Book
USD 169.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Preview

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Notes and References

  1. A.Paterson, ‘The Poor Law in Nineteenth Century Scotland’, in D.Fraser (ed), The New Poor Law in The Nineteenth Century, (Macmillan: 1976) pp. 189–190. S. Blackden, ‘The Board of Supervision and the Scottish Parochial Medical Service, 1845–95’, Medical History, 1986, 30, pp. 145–172. M.W.Dupree, ‘Family Care and Hospital Care: the Sick Poor in Nineteenth Century Glasgow’, Social History of Medicine, 1993, 06, 02, pp. 195–211. C. Hamlin, ‘Environmental Sensibility in Edinburgh, 1839–1840: the Fetid Irrigation Controversy’. Journal of Urban History, 1994, May, pp. 329.

    Google Scholar 

  2. Dupree, op.cit, pp. 198–99.

    Google Scholar 

  3. Blackden, op.cit, pp.162–63. -

    Google Scholar 

  4. First Report (Large Towns) Local Reports, No 9, C.R.Baird, On the General and Sanitary Condition of the Working Classes and the Poor in the City of Glasgow, p. 167.

    Google Scholar 

  5. Glasgow Chronicle, 6 January 1847 `… and it is Ireland above all the rest that pours its columns of human wretchedness into all the larger towns’.

    Google Scholar 

  6. Glasgow Chronicle, 3 March 1847. Report on the Glasgow Municipal Police Board Meeting held on Monday, 1 March 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  7. Strathclyde. Meeting of the Glasgow Parochial Board held on the 5 March 1847, Assessment Report, pp. 74–75.

    Google Scholar 

  8. Strathclyde. Minutes of the Meeting of the Glasgow Parochial Board held on 26 March 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  9. ibid.

    Google Scholar 

  10. ibid.

    Google Scholar 

  11. ibid.

    Google Scholar 

  12. Glasgow Herald, 26 March 1847. Report on the Meeting of the Glasgow Municipal Police Board held on 22 March 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  13. Glasgow Herald, 2 April 1847. This edition contains a long account of the protest meeting.

    Google Scholar 

  14. Strathclyde, Minutes of the Meeting of the Glasgow Parochial Board held on 21 May 1847, p. 109.

    Google Scholar 

  15. Strathclyde, Minutes of the Glasgow Parochial Board held on 7 May 1847. See also report of the meeting in Glasgow Constitutional, 8 May 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  16. Glasgow Constitutional, 19 May 1847. Report on the Meeting of the Glasgow Municipal Police Board held on 17 May 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  17. Strathclyde, Minutes of the Meeting of the Glasgow Parochial Board held on 4 June 1847. Report of the Committee on Improvements, dated 3 June 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  18. Strathclyde. Minutes of the Meeting of the Glasgow Parochial Board held on 4 June 1847. The Improvements Board asked the Parochial Board to acquire more premises for use as a fever hospital. Minutes of the Meeting of the Glasgow Parochial Board held on 25 June 1847, p. 124. It was reported that the old fever hospital would be opened in the following week.

    Google Scholar 

  19. Glasgow Constitutional, 2 July 1847. The hospital was between Maxwell Street and Stockwell Street.

    Google Scholar 

  20. Strathclyde. Minutes of the Meeting of the Glasgow Parochial Board, Assessment Report, p. 74.

    Google Scholar 

  21. Strathclyde. Minutes of the Meeting of the Glasgow Parochial Board held on 4 June 1847. Copy of Memorial to the House of Commons, pp. 114–5.

    Google Scholar 

  22. Glasgow Courier, 20 April 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  23. Glasgow Herald, 21 May 1847. Report on the meeting of the Glasgow Municipal Police Board held on 17 May 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  24. Glasgow Constitutional, 25 May 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  25. Glasgow Herald, 28 May 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  26. Glasgow Herald, 18 June 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  27. Glasgow Herald, 7 June 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  28. Glasgow Constitutional, 5 June 1847. Report by the Chairman of Barony Medical Committee on the ‘Causes and Prevention of Fever’.

    Google Scholar 

  29. Glasgow Constitutional, 19 June 1847. Statistics from the book kept by the Inspector of Lodgings in Glasgow.

    Google Scholar 

  30. Strathclyde. Minutes of the Meeting of the Glasgow Parochial Board held on 29 July 1847. At this meeting a report was heard of the outcome of a meeting held on 19 July at the Police Hall in Glasgow, attended by the Lord Provost and representatives of the Town Council and Parochial Boards of Glasgow, Barony and Govan. The purpose was to discuss the fever crisis.

    Google Scholar 

  31. Strathclyde. Minutes of the Meeting of the Glasgow Parochial Board held on 30 November 1847, p. 204–205. This meeting was given the names of of ficials who had died between January 1847 and 30 November. The death of Dr James Short Thompson was reported to the Board meeting held on 6 December 1847, p. 221.

    Google Scholar 

  32. Strathclyde. Minutes of the Meeting of the Glasgow Parochial Board held on 5 August 1847, p. 154.

    Google Scholar 

  33. The Times, 3 June 1847. In fact The Times report was a syndicated report from the North British Mail.

    Google Scholar 

  34. Glasgow Archdiocese Archives, Scottish Catholic Directory, 1848.

    Google Scholar 

  35. Glasgow Herald, 27 September 1847. Report of the Meeting of the Glasgow Parochial Board, 24 September 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  36. Scotch Reformers Gazette, 26 February 1848, Report on the Glasgow Mortality Rate for 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  37. PRO/MH12/6248/Cardiff/1847. Cardiff Guardians to Poor Law Commissioners, 19 July 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  38. PRO/MH12/6248/Cardiff/1847. Cardiff Guardians to Poor Law Commissioners, 2 August 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  39. PRO/M1–112/6248/Cardiff/ 1847/5110B. Cardiff Guardians to Poor Law Commissioners, 7 March 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  40. PRO/MH12/6248/Cardiff/1847. Letter from Poor Law Commissioners to Cardiff Guardians, sanctioning the purchase of land using money from the poor rates.

    Google Scholar 

  41. J.Hickey, Urban Catholics in England and Wales from 1829 to the present day, London, 1967, p. 80. Hickey is quoting the statistics contained in the Report to the General Board of Health on the Town of Cardiff, London, 1850.

    Google Scholar 

  42. Hickey, op.cit, p. 81.

    Google Scholar 

  43. SC (1854) Appendix, No. 14. Summary of Irish Paupers Relieved in the Town of Cardiff and the Cost Thereof, From September 1846 to September 1850, Paid by The Cardiff Poor Law Unions.

    Google Scholar 

  44. PRO/MH12/6248/Cardiff/1847/5026B. Cardiff Guardians to Poor Law Commissioners, 12 April 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  45. Curdiff and Merthyr Guardian, 15 May 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  46. ibid.

    Google Scholar 

  47. PRO/MH12/6248/Cardiff/1847/14004B. A.Bevan to Poor Law Commissioners, 16 July 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  48. PRO/MN 12/62481 /Cardiff/ 1847/90178 Cardiff Guardians to Poor Law Commissioners.

    Google Scholar 

  49. Vagrancy (1848) p. 47–8.

    Google Scholar 

  50. PRO/MI-112/8089/Newport/1847/12604. Report of lohn Lewis, Assistant to Poor Law Commissioners, on a visit to Newport Union on 5 June 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  51. PRO/MH12/8089/1847/6461. Newport Guardians to Poor Law Commissioners, 23 March 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  52. Dublin Quarterly Journal of Medical Science, Vol VIII, part III, 1849. Letter from Dr Massy on the recent epidemic of fever in Wales, dated 16 May 1849, pp. 438–447. I am grateful to Dr Margaret Crawford for drawing my attention to this letter.

    Google Scholar 

  53. Massy, op.cit, p. 439.

    Google Scholar 

  54. Massy, op.cit, p. 440.

    Google Scholar 

  55. Massy, op.cit.

    Google Scholar 

  56. 56 The Tablet, 26 June 1847.

    Google Scholar 

  57. The Tablet, 31 July 1847.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. European Studies Research Institute, The University of Salford, Salford, England

    Frank Neal (Professor of Economic and Social History)

Authors
  1. Frank Neal
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Copyright information

© 1998 Frank Neal

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Neal, F. (1998). Glasgow, South Wales and the Irish Fever. In: Black ’47. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230372658_6

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230372658_6

  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London

  • Print ISBN: 978-1-349-39833-1

  • Online ISBN: 978-0-230-37265-8

  • eBook Packages: Palgrave History CollectionHistory (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation