blished in 1834, came to an end, its dissolution being brought about by disagreements between Chadwick and the two commissioners. Chadwick's own remarkable zeal and his impatience with those who shrank from carrying out his drastic plans of reform, especially those based on his full belief in centralisation, undoubtedly contributed largely to breaking up the board. In the following year he became a commissioner to inquire into the health of London, and in the report advocated the separate system of drainage. On the recommendation of Prince Albert he was created C.B. in 1848, in which year the first board of health was formed, with Chadwick as one of the commissioners. He remained in active service until the board was merged in the local government board in 1854, when be retired on a pension of 1,000l. a year.
During the Crimean war he persuaded Lord Palmerston to send out a commission to inquire into and relieve the sufferings of the troops. In 1858 he brought before the social science congress the subject of defective sanitation in the Indian army, and the support which his views gained afterwards led to the appointment of the Indian army sanitary commission.
In 1855 his advocacy of competitive examinations as tests for first appointments in the public service was followed by the appointment of the civil service commission, 'his was an old subject with him, for he had brought it forward in 1829. Among the matters with which he subsequently occupied himself were sanitary engineering, open spaces, agricultural drainage, and sanitation in the tropics. He also urged the maintenance of railways as public highways by a responsible public service.
While in Paris in 1864 in connection with the preparation for an exhibition, Chadwick had a conversation with Napoleon III, who asked him what he thought of Paris. Chadwick's characteristic answer was: 'Sire, they say that Augustus found Rome a city of brick and left it a city of marble. If your majesty, finding Paris stinking, will leave it sweet, you will more than rival the first emperor of Rome.' The reply so pleased the emperor that he directed an inquiry into the subject referred to.
In 1867 he was brought out as a candidate for the representation of London University in parliament, but was unsuccessful, though he received the active support of John Stuart Mill and many others.
Subsequently, by desire of W. E. Gladstone, Chadwick examined the economy of a general system of cheap postal telegraphy, and in 1871 inquired into a plan for the drainage of Cawnpore, submitted to him by the Duke of Argyll. He presented an alternative plan, that of the 'separate system,' namely, the removal of storm water by distinct channels, and of fouled water and excreta, by separate self-cleansing house drains and sewers, which principle was approved by the government and carried out by the army sanitary commission. This was the last subject on which Chadwick was consulted by the ministry. He afterwards filled the presidential chair of the section of economy of the British Association, and of the section of public health of the Social Science Association, and presided over the congress of the Sanitary Institute in 1878, and over the section of public health of the sanitary congress in 1881. He also acted as president of the Association of Sanitary Inspectors.
His public services were tardily recognised in 1889 by the bestowal of a knighthood. On the continent his work was well known,and he was elected a corresponding member of the Institutes of France and Belgium, and of the Societies of Medicine and Hygiene of France, Belgium, and Italy. He died at Park Cottage, East Sheen, Surrey, on 6 July 1890. By his marriage in 1839 to Rachel Dawson Kennedy, daughter of John Kennedy (1769-1855) [q. v.] of Manchester, he left an only son, Osbert Chadwick, C.M.G., an eminent sanitary engineer. A portion of his library was presented by his son to the Manchester Free Library.
Chadwick was a voluminous writer of pamphlets, reports, papers, and letters to the press, his latest production being dated 1889. His chief works have been admirably condensed by Sir Benjamin Ward Richardson [q. v. Suppl.], in two volumes, published in 1889, entitled 'The Health of Nations: a Review of the Works of Edwin Chadwick, with a Biographical Introduction.' The first volume is in two parts, 'Political and Economical,' and 'Educational and Social,' and the second, also in two parts, 'Sanitary and Prevention of Disease,' and 'Prevention of Pauperism and Poverty.' A portrait is prefixed to the first volume.
[The best account of Chadwick is that by Richardson, op. cit. See also Simon's English Sanitary Institutions, 1890, pp. 179, 232; Palgrave's Dict. of Political Economy; MacKay's Hist. of the English Poor Law, 1899, pp. 37, 55 et passim; Biographies reprinted from the Times, iv. 244; Reid's Mem. of Lyon Playfair, 1899, pp. 64, 65, 162; information from Lord Fortescue and O. Chadwick, esq.]
