PUBLIC SERVICES.
By the mid 19th century
Smethwick had the usual sanitary problems of a
growing town. (fn. 63) There was no system of drains, and
refuse collected in stagnant cesspools or on the
roads. There was a surface drain in Rolfe Street,
but in 1854 the district medical officer of the poorlaw union reported that it was blocked up and that
as a result his cellar was full of water. Refuse was
collected by farmers, but only when convenient to
themselves. Such conditions meant that the town
was never free from fever, and epidemics were not
uncommon. Chances' workers who lived in Scotch
Row near the glass-works were constantly ill until
R. L. Chance had drains and paving laid down in
the earlier 1840s; at once there was a remarkable
improvement in health. One of the duties of the
doctor engaged by Chances from 1843 was to inspect
the state of workers' houses. The Spon Lane area,
Rolfe Street, Cross Street, and Windmill Street (presumably Windmill Lane) were described in 1854 as
particularly insanitary. Cottages in the town were
small, overcrowded, and badly ventilated. In 1862
twelve houses in Slough Lane (now Wellington
Street) had only two privies between them; in 1871
the 40 houses in the same road had one privy to
every three houses, and both houses and privies
were dirty. The 28 houses in the court off Bridge
Street known as Kingston Square (demolished in
1933), (fn. 64) had only eight privies between them, two in
each corner of the square; in 1871 all the privies
were found to be filthy and badly constructed. The
numerous pigsties were another nuisance; it was
stated in 1850 that 'the effluvia, nastiness, and dirt
incident thereto are most injurious to the health of families, which your dried flitch and cured ham
strung up in your kitchens by no means compensate'. In 1871 a pigsty built against a house in Vittoria Street was causing a stench which was 'very
detrimental' to the occupants. Smoke nuisance too
was prevalent by the 1850s. In 1854 a surgeon
stated that when the wind blew from the southwest the smoke from a chemical works took the
bark off the trees and killed the leaves; he did not,
however, know whether the smoke was prejudicial
to human life. All the same it was claimed in 1854
that Smethwick's sanitary condition compared
favourably with that of Oldbury, West Bromwich,
and Bilston and that as far as buildings went the
town was not yet overcrowded.
The local board of health established in 1856
soon appointed a surveyor and an inspector of
nuisances. (fn. 65) In 1871, after receiving a report on the
insanitary state of Kingston Square, Slough Lane,
and Vittoria Street, the board appointed a medical
officer of health. (fn. 66) The board turned its attention
to smoke nuisance but apparently without effect;
indeed in 1858 a motion to enforce the provision of
the Local Government Act of that year requiring
factories to consume their own smoke was defeated by five votes to three. (fn. 67) In 1859 the board
made a by-law forbidding the erection of back-toback houses. (fn. 68) In 1877 the Tame and Rea Drainage
Board was formed to deal with the drainage and
sewage of a large area including Smethwick. (fn. 69)
Sewers were being laid from 1888, and the system
was completed in 1895. The conversion of privies
into water-closets and the abolition of middens was
then undertaken by the urban district council, and
by 1907 nearly 4,500 water-closets had been provided and nearly 3,000 middens removed. (fn. 70) A refuse destructor was built in Rolfe Street in 1908. (fn. 71)
In 1949 the corporation began a series of measures
to combat smoke nuisance. (fn. 72)
In 1920 the corporation was arranging the erection of 600 houses, although lack of space forced it
to site well over half of them within the urban district of Oldbury (Worcs.). Indeed, when the Warley
Woods area of Oldbury was added to Smethwick
in 1928, housing was quickly built there. (fn. 73) In 1933
the corporation began a two-year drive to deal with
unfit property, including the demolition or conversion of the 314 back-to-back houses in the borough. (fn. 74)
By 1939 it had built 4,759 houses; 1,178 of them
were then within the borough of Oldbury. (fn. 75) The
outbreak of war halted slum clearance, and in 1945
6,000 of Smethwick's 21,400 houses were substandard. It was not until 1958 that the corporation
began a full attack on substandard housing, starting
with the Windmill Lane area. (fn. 76) Extensive clearance
was still in progress in 1971. Scarcity of land for new
houses remained a problem after the war, and by
1959 the corporation had built 252 houses in West
Bromwich as well as more in Oldbury. (fn. 77) The last
major development of land owned by the corporation outside the borough was the Kingsway estate
in the Quinton part of Oldbury, which was being
built in 1962. (fn. 78) By 1966 the corporation had built
some 8,400 dwellings, many of them in multistorey blocks to make the most of the land available. (fn. 79)
In 1857 the South Staffordshire Water Works Co.
promoted a Bill to extend its area of supply to
Smethwick. The local board opposed the Bill with
the claim that Smethwick had streams of goodquality water flowing through the parish sufficient
for double the population. The board also hoped
that a supply would come from the Birmingham
Waterworks Co. whose rates were lower. The board
withdrew its opposition when a clause was inserted
in the Bill making the South Staffordshire company's power to supply Smethwick dependent on a
request from the board. The company began laying
mains in the district in 1862. (fn. 80) Even so in 1871 the
28 houses in Kingston Square were still dependent
on a pump in the centre of the square; in Vittoria
Street 20 houses were without water, although the
near-by Slough Lane on the eastern boundary was
supplied by the Birmingham company. (fn. 81)
The public baths in Rolfe Street were built in
1888 to the designs of Harris, Martin & Harris of
Birmingham. Those at the Bearwood end of
Thimblemill Road, the main baths for the area,
were opened in 1933 and extended in 1966. The
slipper baths in Malkin Street, West Smethwick,
date from 1929 and those at Cape Hill from 1954. (fn. 82)
A smallpox epidemic in 1883-4 led to the building
of an infectious diseases hospital in Holly Lane. (fn. 83)
It was closed after Smethwick became a member of
the South Staffordshire Joint Smallpox Hospital
Board in 1904 and a hospital had been built at
Moxley in Wednesbury. In 1906-7 Oldbury urban
district council and Smethwick built an infectious
diseases hospital to serve both places on the site
of the Holly Lane hospital. (fn. 84) Since 1954 it has been the Midland Centre for Neurosurgery and Neurology. (fn. 85) In 1934-5 Smethwick corporation bought and
extended St. Chad's Hospital in Hagley Road,
Birmingham, built some 20 years before by the Edgbaston Private Nursing Home Ltd. (fn. 86)
The first cemetery in Smethwick was that at
West Smethwick which was opened in 1857; it
belonged, however, to the Oldbury burial board. (fn. 87)
The architect of the chapels was W. Wigginton. (fn. 88)
Holy Trinity churchyard was then the main burial
ground for Smethwick. Its closure had become
necessary for sanitary reasons by 1885 but was postponed until the local board should open a cemetery. (fn. 89)
The board had been constituted a burial board in
1884, but the provision of a cemetery was delayed by
the decision of the nonconformist majority on the
board not to allow any part of a new cemetery to be
consecrated. Their aim was to prevent the Anglican
clergy from enjoying an advantage over the nonconformist ministers in the matter of fees. The four
vicars of the town waived all such financial privileges, but the cemetery opened in Holly Lane in
1886 was never consecrated. (fn. 90) In 1890, however,
Uplands cemetery was opened with a consecrated
section. (fn. 91)
A county police force was established in Harborne parish in 1840. (fn. 92) A police station was built in
High Street, Smethwick, a little to the south of
Queen Street in 1860; (fn. 93) it was replaced by the
station in Piddock Road in 1907. (fn. 94)
In the 19th century several firms formed their
own fire brigades—Chances in 1843, Mitchells in
1882, Tangyes by 1885, and the Credenda Seamless
Tube Co. c. 1890; the Birmingham Railway Carriage
and Wagon Co. also had a brigade. A volunteer
brigade was formed for the area in 1878 with an
engine housed at the depot of the local board's
highway department behind the public buildings.
The fire station in Rolfe Street was opened in 1910;
the adjoining block of twelve flats for married firemen dates from 1933. (fn. 95) In 1948 Smethwick became
a joint fire authority with West Bromwich, and the
arrangement lasted until the local government
reorganization of 1966. (fn. 96) The new county borough
of Warley then formed its own brigade with headquarters in Rolfe Street. (fn. 97)
From the beginning of 1857 the Birmingham and
Staffordshire Gas Light Co. provided gas for 112
street lamps. The main road through the town, however, was not included since it was the responsibility
of the turnpike trustees. Agreement was reached
between the local board and the trustees for the
lighting of the section of the road northwards from
Watery Lane at the end of 1858, but it was not
until 1863 that arrangements were agreed for the
remainder. (fn. 98) In 1876 an Act empowered the board
to establish its own gas undertaking, (fn. 99) and the
works in Rabone Lane was opened in 1881. With
nationalization in 1949 the undertaking passed from
Smethwick corporation to the West Midlands Gas
Board. (fn. 1)
In 1898 the urban district council was empowered
by Act to supply electricity in its area, (fn. 2) and a
generating station was built in Downing Street. (fn. 3)
In 1907 the corporation transferred its undertaking
to the Birmingham and Midland Tramways Ltd.
(renamed the Birmingham District Power and Traction Co. Ltd. in 1912), which under an Act of 1913
transferred its rights to the Shropshire, Worcestershire and Staffordshire Electric Power Co. (fn. 4) With
nationalization in 1948 the undertaking passed to
the Midlands Electricity Board. (fn. 5)
A steam tramway from Birmingham to Dudley
via Smethwick was opened by Birmingham and
Midland Tramways Ltd. in 1885, with a branch
from West Smethwick along Spon Lane to West
Bromwich. (fn. 6) The depot was at West Smethwick.
In 1902 Smethwick corporation bought the tramways in the borough but leased them to Birmingham and Midland Tramways, which had passed
under the control of the British Electric Traction
Co. Ltd. in 1900. Electric trams began operating on
the Birmingham-Dudley line in 1904. New electrified branches were opened to Bearwood and
along Waterloo Road in 1904 and to Soho station
along Heath and Cranford Streets in 1905. In 1906
Birmingham corporation took over some of the
shorter routes. All the Smethwick trams were replaced by buses in 1939, with Birmingham corporation working the Soho and Bearwood routes and
the Birmingham and Midland Motor Omnibus Co.
('Midland Red') working the route to Dudley. There
is a large bus garage in Bearwood Road, Bearwood,
dating from 1914. (fn. 7)
Until 1837 the inhabitants of Smethwick had to
go to Birmingham to send and collect mail. (fn. 8) In that year a post office was opened in a small house
in what is now High Street. The first postmaster was
Joseph Vernon, a coal dealer and owner of a general
store, who had led the agitation for a local post
office. The office was managed by his daughter, and
his sons acted as the postmen. Vernon remained
postmaster until his death in 1866 when his daughter
succeeded him. On her marriage her husband became postmaster, but she retained the management
of the High Street office until her retirement in
1884. In 1890 a new head post office was opened in
Rolfe Street. It was replaced by the office in Trinity
Street in 1968.
Parks and libraries are treated elsewhere. (fn. 9)