Editing Haworth (section)

==History==
Haworth is first mentioned as a settlement in 1209.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.haworth-village.org.uk/visitors/visiting-bronte-country/visit-haworth.asp |title=Haworth Village – Visiting Haworth – England |access-date=10 August 2010 |url-status=usurped |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110516073627/http://www.haworth-village.org.uk/visitors/visiting-bronte-country/visit-haworth.asp |archive-date=16 May 2011 }}</ref> The name may refer to a "hedged enclosure" or "hawthorn enclosure".<ref>{{cite book|last1=Ekwall|first1=Eilert|title=The concise Oxford dictionary of English place-names|date=1960|publisher=Clarendon Press|location=Oxford|isbn=0-19-869103-3|page=227|edition=4}}</ref> The name was recorded as "Howorth" on a 1771 map.

In 1850, local parish priest [[Patrick Brontë]] invited [[Benjamin Herschel Babbage]] to investigate the village's high early mortality rate, which had led to all but one of his six children, including the writers [[Emily Brontë|Emily]] and [[Anne Brontë]], dying by the age of 31.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Temple |first1=Emily |title=Apparently the Brontës all died so early because they spent their lives drinking graveyard water. |url=https://lithub.com/apparently-the-brontes-all-died-so-early-because-they-spent-their-lives-drinking-graveyard-water/ |website=Literary Hub |access-date=18 December 2022 |date=14 May 2021}}</ref> Babbage's inspection uncovered deeply unsanitary conditions, including there being no sewers, excrement flowing down Haworth's streets, waste from slaughterhouses and pigsties being held for months in fenced-in areas, overcrowded and poorly-ventilated housing, and a poorly-oxygenated and overcrowded graveyard that filtered into the village's water supply. These conditions contributed to an average life expectancy of 25.8 years and 41.6% of the village's residents dying before the age of 6. This report was presented to the [[General Board of Health]] and prompted work to improve conditions in the village.<ref>{{cite web |title=Sanitary report on Haworth, home to the Brontës |url=https://www.bl.uk/collection-items/sanitary-report-on-haworth-home-to-the-bronts |website=British Library |access-date=18 December 2022}}</ref>