MARKFIELD RE-OPENS

The Markfield beam engine was built to pump sewage and drainage water, it is the successor to a smaller engine that was built earlier for the same purpose. In the 19th century, Tottenham was a village surrounded by countryside, six miles from the centre of London. Sanitary conditions for the labouring classes in the towns and villages of Britain were poor. In the 1840s the Government were stirred into action to tackle the problem by fear of a cholera epidemic that was sweeping through Europe. In 1848 the Public Health Act was passed and a General Board of Health established. It had no funding and was advisory only in encouraging the establishment of Local Boards of Health.

In Tottenham the Local Board of Heath led the way with the building of a small sewage treatment works built at the convergence of two small rivers on marshland of Markfield House