Complete Record - Heirs of Hippocrates No. 1626

SIR EDWIN CHADWICK (1800-1890) Report to Her Majesty's principal secretary of state for the Home Department, from the Poor Law Commissioners, on an inquiry into the sanitary condition of the labouring population of Great Britain. Printed by W. Clowes, for Her Majesty's Stationery Office 1842 xxx [2] 457 pp., plates, plans (part fold.), fold. diagr. 21.3 cm.

Chadwick was the nineteenth-century's outstanding sanitarian and he played a major role in the developmental stages of the public health era. Trained as a lawyer, he became interested in the problems of public health and eventually came to work with the Poor Law Commission. It was largely through his efforts that England's Public Health Act of 1848 came into existence. The Poor Law Commission was established in 1832 to investigate the operation and administration of England's obsolete poor law system which had been codified in 1601. At the time this report was submitted to Parliament, Chadwick was secretary to the Commission and eventually was appointed to chief commissioner. In the report he chronicled the health of the working population and described the deplorable sanitary conditions throughout England and Wales. It was this report that laid the foundations for later systems of government inspection, passage of the public health act, and establishment of a General Board of Health.

Cited references: Garrison-Morton 1608; Wellcome II, p. 322

Gift of John Martin, M.D.