Exeter City Garbage Disposal 100 years ago
By Heather at Exeter
From time to time readers may have come across the old bottles, ceramic pots and other items in antique shops, bric-a-brac stores and in museum displays. They are bygones from Victorian, Edwardian and Georgian times (usually dating from the 1870's to the 1920's) and they were once the everyday trash of city homes, but are now treasured and displayed for their charm and beauty.
The old bottles were made from glass which came in various shades of green, aqua, brown, amber, clear and bright blue and they were sometimes adorned with a picture design as well as, perhaps, the name of a local chemist or brewery moulded into the glass. Some of the glass is full of artistic-looking ripples and air bubbles, because back then the techniques of manufacture were less sophisticated than the more perfect mass production of today.
Products such as jam, potted meats, ointments and beauty creams came in ceramic jars and pots, some lavished with transfer designs in fancy lettering or with coloured pictures fused to the clay during the making of the container. Even toothpaste came in ceramic pots with lids, and fizzy drinks came in heavy glass bottles, unlike the thin cans of today. Many a fizzy drink bottle was broken after use to get hold of the glass marble in the neck so that children could play with them. These Codd bottles were named after the inventor, and the glass marble was trapped in the neck to keep in the fizzy drink but released when pressed.
In our modern age of plastic containers, carrier bags and environmentally friendly schemes (slogans like "Don't let Devon go to Waste" spring to mind) it might be easy to imagine that the growing mounds of household garbage are a modern problem, but local councils still had the same sort of concerns 100 years ago. In some cases recycling was also taking place back then too.
Some 30 years ago I was doing a research project at the Devon Studies Library, which involved reading through the old records taken at City Council meetings in the area. Recently I stumbled upon some of the notes I had jotted down back then, and thought they might be fascinating to readers and would reveal some of the varied ways that refuse was disposed of in and around the City of Exeter in past times.
West of the Exe, refuse was used to fill in old quarries, reclaim marshland and to build up the banks of the river as flood prevention. Not far from Cowley Bridge, a whole loop of the river was back-filled to help straighten the Exe!
In the 1890's the composition of Exeter house refuse was made up of the following: ashes, cinders, bones, rags, straw, vegetable matter, broken crockery ware, old boots, scrap iron, tinplate. Also glass and paper which were the bulkiest to deal with. Generally, refuse was sifted and the finer material sent to farmers to spread on the land, while bulkier material was sold off.
Refuse needed to be treated before it began to ferment and create an increased health hazard. Some was sent to farmers to manure the land, some incinerated, some used to fill in wasteland and marshes, but the majority was taken out to sea off Exmouth by barge and dumped. Contemporary reports labelled the dumping of refuse into the sea "barbarous", and suggested that dumping on waste-ground would be better.
Disposal ideas were considered by looking into the way refuse was being treated in larger cities such as London and even New York in America! It was suggested that a new site for dumping should be considered for Exeter that would be in a central location, taking into account the levels of the city.
Exmouth railway junction (which, despite its name, is in Exeter -- between Prince Charles Road and Pinhoe Road, near Polsloe Bridge station) was considered suitable. At the time of this proposal, operations were being carried out in the open air close to housing in New North Road, causing a nuisance. At the new site, refuse would be sifted to remove items such as large clinkers of 3 inches in size. It was resolved that Exmouth Junction would be suitable.
On 22nd June 1892, sites belonging to the London and South West Railway Co were being considered, with a view to the Council being granted land for tipping at Queen Street Station Yard or at Exmouth Junction.
By 28th Sept 1892 , there was little hope left of obtaining the proposed site at Queen Street Yard.
On 30th Nov 1892 it was reported that a specific piece of land at Exmouth Junction, 60 feet long by 22 feet wide, was being considered.
On 27 Sept 1893 , a refuse depot in Whipton Lane is mentioned.
On 27 Nov 1895 , a depot by the roadside at Polsloe Bridge is mentioned in the records. It is not clear whether this is the land near Exmouth Junction mentioned earlier.
By 28 Feb 1894 , an old stone yard at Exe Lane had been put into use as a refuse depot.
On 24th Feb 1897 , minutes recorded a nuisance of rubbish being dumped in a field at Sweet Briar Lane in Heavitree (fly-tipping was common in those days too).
In 1900 an electric power station and adjoining destructor (incinerator) existed on Haven Rd, Haven Banks.
A disposal report dated 28th Nov 1900 stated that refuse was being deposited on farmland as manure but it was commented that iron, glass and crockery are still mixed in with the manure, and this is not good for the land.
In the following years, demand for refuse as manure declined, and the cost of transporting the material to farmland increased, so in many places it was decided to fill up disused quarry holes, or any other convenient place, or to use the refuse for reclaiming bogland. In some locations, the burning of rubbish in open places was still practised, but most was now dealt with by the City destructor (incinerator).
During other projects on similar topics, I also found myself researching the minutes of Council meetings for the Teignmouth and Torbay areas. Some of the more interesting notes that I came across were as follows:
In order to bury refuse at a site in Torbay, trenches were first dug by WW1 troops during training. These trenches were then filled with old metal cans and other metallic items, which were then repeatedly crushed by a mechanical roller, presumably a steam roller. Then, when they were full, general town garbage was placed several feet thick over this. Further burned material was added, and finally a layer of thick clay was used to seal it.
Councils in other areas visited Exeter and Teignmouth to see how well the destructors were operating and to consider building their own but costs in some cases were discussed for many months, even years.
Rats were another problem on refuse sites and in one place children were paid a bounty for killing rats, as evidence for which they were required to present the foreman of the site with the tails of the rats killed.
With a little research, the reading of old council minutes is a fascinating pastime revealing many aspects of Exeter's past. There are so many topics to explore, not just refuse disposal.