HH62/1/FIFE/35

Transcription

[page] 34

Crossford. - This village is supplied by shallow wells near houses
and the quality of the water is suspicious.
Donibristle Village has a good gravitation supply of excellent
quality.
Fordell Village. - This village has a branch pipe from Crossgates
main, and this supply is open to the same remarks as for Crossgates.
It has also a small gravitation supply of its own, which might be
improved.
Halbeath. - This village has a good gravitation supply. A small
part of the village (Morningside) had not a good supply, but this has
now been procured.
Hill of Beath Colliery Village has a good gravitation supply, by
means of a branch pipe from Cowdenbeath water main.
Hillend Village. - This village gets its supply from shallow wells,
close to houses. The water has been analysed, and found to be bad.
There has been great difficulty in finding a substitute for this polluted
water supply, but now there is a prospect of a good supply being got
before long.
Gowkhall Hamlet derives its supply from the usual type of shallow
well. Several cases of enteric fever occurred here recently, due pro-
bably to the polluted water.
Oakley Colliery Village has now got a supply of water by gravitation,
but there is a necessity for better distribution by more wells over the
village.
Kincardine, Limekilns, Kelty, Saline, Queensferry, Lassodie, and
Wellwood are all well supplied with water.
Torryburn. - The water supply of this village is mainly from
shallow wells, but at the east end by a gravitation system. Owing to
the want of better storage, a large quantity of water runs to waste;
and it was suggested by the Sanitary Inspector for the District to
utilise this waste by making a storage tank and leading a pipe to that
portion of the village supplied by shallow wells. The expenditure
would have only been a few hundred pounds, but the inhabitants did
not take our advice in the spirit it was given, and offered strenuous
opposition to the proposal. The District Committee instructed us to
take the necessary steps to have the wells believed to be polluted
closed. Two samples of water were examined, from two different wells,
and the waters were declared unfit for use by the analyst. The wells
were accordingly closed. The water which supplies the school comes
in an open ditch from a field where cattle graze in summer, and is
therefore unfit for human use. The opposition to the proposed new
supply, however, still continued; and we were instructed to take the
necessary steps with other wells, if found polluted, to have them shut
up. Two other samples were analysed, and one was found to be pol-
luted to a most dangerous extent with organic matter, and the other to
a less extent. The analyst's reports of three samples of Torryburn
water are appended, so that it may be considered whether the position
that the sanitary officials took up in regard to the question of water
supply of Torryburn has been justified or not, with this additional
information now in possession of the District Committee.

[page] 35

COPY OF ANALYSES OF FOUR WELL WATERS FROM TORRYBURN
BY MR FALCONER KING. RESULTS ARE EXPRESSED AS
GRAINS PER GALLON.

[table inserted]

No. 1, "Nelly Morris's Well." | No. 3, Rockvale Well.
No. 2, Drummond's Well. | No. 4, Drummond's Well.

These analyses show that none of these waters are of a high class,
and that Nos. 1, 2, and 3 are polluted with dangerous organic matter.
Steps were taken to have these three closed.
The analyses were made at a time when the wells were least liable
to pollution - in the autumn and winter. If they had been made after
the gardens in which they are situated had been manured, the results
would doubtless have been worse.
This general report of the water supply of the various populous
places of the District shows that in many places there are excellent
systems of water supply, but that in many others there are very defective
systems; and my duty does not end by merely condemning, but requires
that I should recommend what measures, in my opinion, are necessary
to remedy the defects.

RECOMMENDATIONS.

I have endeavoured in the District Reports to so arrange that I
shall not repeat references which are equally applicable to all the
Districts in the County; and in this Report I shall refer to other
Reports where special matters are considered.
So frequent reference has been made to the dangers liable to fol-
low the use of a water supply derived from shallow wells near to houses,
and as this means of water supply is so extensively made use of in all
the districts in Fife, it appears to me to be very desirable to give the
reasons for my opinion on this subject.
In the Rivers Pollution Commissioner's Sixth Report, the following
remarks occur regarding village wells, and as they are specially appli-
cable, I quote them:- "The common practice in villages, and even in
many small towns, is to dispose of the sewage, and to provide for the
water supply of each cottage, or pair of cottages, upon the premises. In
the little yard or garden attached to each tenement, or pair of tenements,
two holes are dug in the porous soil; into one of these, usually the
shallower of the two, all the filthy liquids of the house are discharged;
from the other, which is sunk below the water line of the porous