Joseph Quick (1809-1894)

Joseph Quick (6 November 1809 - 30 March 1894) was an English civil engineer who was closely involved in improvements to water supply in the great industrial cities of the nineteenth century. Both his father and his son (author of "The Water Supply of the Metropolis". London and New York: 1880) were also waterworks engineers by the name Joseph Quick.

On March 28, 1844, as engineer to the Southwark Waterworks, Quick was called to give evidence before the Health and Towns Commissioners of the British Parliament. [Joseph Fletcher, “Historical and Statistical Account of the Present System of Supplying the Metropolis with Water”, "Journal of the Statistical Society of London" 8:2 (1845), pp. 148-181.] Again after the 1848/49 outbreak of cholera in London, he was one of the advisors to the government to improve the London water supply infrastructure. One proposal was to have all intake of water from the Thames moved from the tidal Thames to up-river of Teddington Lock.Obituary, "Minutes of Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers", v.117 1893-1894 pt.3, Institution of Civil Engineers, pub. 1937.] The expert evidence heard by parliament led to the Metropolis Water Act (1852), as a result of which Quick was entrusted with the building of the new Hampton Waterworks [http://www.hampton-online.co.uk/tside.html] , which he designed in an Italianate style.

Even before work at Hampton was complete, contamination of the water supply of the Southwark and Vauxhall Waterworks Company, providing water to the borough of Southwark, Battersea, and other locations in the vicinity, [John Weale, "The Pictorial Handbook of London". London: H.G. Bohn, 1854. p. 856.] led to the 1853 cholera outbreak studied by John Snow. The company’s new facilities up-river at Hampton (shared with two other water companies) only came into operation in 1855.

By 1851 Quick was also consulting engineer to the Grand Junction Waterworks Company. ["The British Metropolis in 1851: A Classified Guide to London". London: A. Hall, Virtue & Co., 1851. p. 166.] As such he bore responsibility for the water tower constructed in 1857-58 on Campden Hill, of which there is a well-known contemporary [http://www.british-history.ac.uk/image.aspx?compid=49922&filename=figure0363-036-a.jpg&pubid=363 print] , although he himself was not the designer. ['Campden Hill Square area', "Survey of London: volume 37: Northern Kensington" (1973), pp. 87-100 (made available [http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=49869 online] by English Heritage). Date accessed: 18 December 2007.]

In 1857, together with Alexander Fraser, he was granted a patent for “improvements in apparatus for regulating the drawing off and supply of water and other fluids”. ["Journal of the Society of Arts", March 1, 1857, p. 267.]

Quick’s expertise as a waterworks engineer was such that together with his son he set up an international consulantcy, and in the 1860s became involved in projects for the provision of modern water supplies in Amsterdam, Berlin, Saint Petersburg, Antwerp [W. Van Craenenbroeck, “Onstaan en ontwikkeling van de moderne drinkwatervoorziening in de stad Antwepen”, "NEHA-Jaarboek" 1998, p. 264; citing archived press cuttings and W. Van Craenenbroeck, “Easton & Anderson and the Water Supply of Antwerp (Belgium)”, "Industrial Archaeology Review" 20 (1998), pp. 105-116.] and Beirut. In St Petersburg the open filter method that proved highly successful in Amsterdam turned out to be entirely unsuitable to local climatic conditions. [Maria Mandrik, [http://www.valt.helsinki.fi/projects/enviro/articles/a-maria.htm "The Development of the Water Supply and Sewerage Systems in St Petersburg in the 19th Century"] .]

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