14. When the government closed centuries-old cesspits in 1846, people had no option but to throw their waste into the Thames
Years before the Great Stink hit London, the city’s citizens had been calling on the government to clean up the river. Things came to a head when Parliament passed the Nuisances Removal and Diseases Prevention Act in 1846. Contrary to the title of the legislation, this made things much worse for the majority of Londoners, making disease far more rampant. The Act called for the closure of old cesspits, some of which had been in use since the time of Henry VIII, while others were filled in with stone. To replace this old method of waste disposal, the Act ruled that small drains should be connected to the main sewers, completely overwhelming the system.
In 1848, the Metropolitan Commission of Sewers (MCS) was set up to deal with the problem. It soon appointed Joseph Bazalgette as its head. The esteemed engineer immediately drew up plans for a new sewerage system for the city. The problem was, he estimated his plan would cost £5.4 million, while the city authorities only had a budget of around £2.4 million. Even the locations of Bazalgette’s proposed discharge points were dismissed by the men in charge. The plans were put on hold, and London continued to suffer.