ABSTRACT
Wolverhampton is a large inland town close by and just to the north-west of Birmingham, within the modern Metropolitan County of the West Midlands. Wolverhampton's piped sewage was to be led here using only gravity. For the Higher Level half of the farm, a second inflow pipe led the sewage onto the site to be used, via the carriers, for broad surface irrigation before similarly flowing off into the Wergs and Pendeford Brooks. The plaintiffs, in March 1885, had originally applied to the Court of Chancery asking for damages and an injunction to restrain the fouling of the Pendeford Brook, but the suit was transferred to the Queen's Bench Division at the insistence of Wolverhampton. Wolverhampton was still obtaining certificates of exemption under the 1891 Wolverhampton Corporation Act well into the twentieth century, and the town authorities invoked the acts power to evade a summons for polluting the Penk with sewage as late as May 1928.
