450
STETTIN.
In 1X71, when Stettin was still encircled by ramparts and moats such as
surround Königsberg and the greater part of Dantzig at the present day, its
population numbered only 76,000. Two years later the fortifications were
dismantled. Their sites are now occupied by wide streets and promenades, and
the population has increased to 227,000 (end of 1906), or to about three times
the figure at which it stood in 1871. A large part of this increase has, however,
followed from the incorporation within the municipal area, on April 1st, 1900,
of the three outlying communes of Grabow, Bredow, and Nemitz, with a
combined population of about 48,000.
The population at each census since 1871, together with the rate of intercensal
increase, is shown in the following Table :—
Year.
Population.
Increase.
Increase per cent.
1871
1875
1880
1885
1890
1895
1900
1905
76,280
80,972
91,756
99,543
116,228
140,724
210,702*
224,119
4,692
10,784
7,787
16,685
24,496
69,978
13,417
62
133
8-5
16-8
21-1
49-7
6'4
* Including Grabow, Bredow and Nemitz.
During the 25 years 1881-1905 the mean annual birth-rate has been
34*3 per 1,000 inhabitants, as against a death-rate of 25 2, so that the
mean annual rate of natural increase during that period has been 9T per 1,000.
Both the birth-rate and the death-rate have on the whole been declining
since 1891, the latter more rapidly than the former, with the result that
the natural growth of the population has been proceeding at an accelerated
pace. In the five years 1891-5 it amounted to 9 2 per 1,000 inhabitants per
annum ; in the succeeding five years it was 10'o, and in 1901-5 11*8 per 1,000
inhabitants. This acceleration in the rate of natural increase has been in some
part due to a decline since 1901 in the mortality of infants under a year old.
In that year there were in Stettin 356 deaths of such infants to every 1,000
births, a rate of infant mortality higher than that recorded during the last
15 years in any other large German town except Chemnitz.
The following statement shows the birth-rate, death-rate, and infant
mortality rate of Stettin for each of the last five years for which the figures are
available : —
Y ear.
Birth rate per 1,000
of population.
Death rate per 1,000
of population.
Infant mortality rate
per 1,000 births.
1901
1902
1903
1904
1905
37 9
35-0
32-3
34-0
32-0
25-8
214
21-6
23-3
22-4
356
241
287
265
263
While the area comprised within the municipal boundary of Stettin is
large (about 16,500 acres), the space actually built upon is only 1,511 acres, or
less than one-tenth of the whole, including private yards and gardens ; and
