It's lovely to see Mount Pleasant steps being 'prettied up' at the moment but let's not forget it's scary past.

The incredibly steep steps beside Whitehaven harbour are the last remains of one of the worst slums in Britain - called, without a hint of irony! - Mount Pleasant. Many people know the iconic picture of the families standing beside and on the steps (the slums went off at right angles to the steps). However I stumbled across a description of them made in 1835 made by Sir George Head who was touring Britain. It appears in his book, A Home Tour Through The Manufacturing Districts of England.

He writes: "Excepting at South Shields, I think I never ascended a more uncouth flight of stone steps than those which lead from the docks at Whitehaven to the high land on the southern extremity of the town. Not only is the inclined plane of considerable declination, and the steps unusually deep, but many of the latter are so much worn towards the outer part as to be absolutely perilous; - at all events, whether considered impassable or otherwise, some persons, to whom I spoke on the subject, said that, though they had lived in the town all their lives, they had never been either up or down. On both sides, all the way up, on the right and on the left, are built small houses for the colliers, where, as is usually the case, in proportion to the size of the dwelling, inversely is the stock of little children: these, at all hours, sit, ten or a dozen at a time, like unfledged rooks, on perilous crags of stone, and crawl backwards and forwards from the little alleys which diverge at right angles from the landing places.

"I observed some with red heads, others with white heads, but all with black faces, alike carelessly clambering up and down, and playing on the verge of precipices quite awful to behold. One little creature, hardly able to walk, nevertheless made his way up without any assistance, and alone - a little boy, covered by one single, very short petticoat, and it was curious to observe how cautiously he crawled on all fours, and as he travelled on the back part of his hands and his feet, carried his hind quarter high up in the air. 'Do your children never tumble down these steps, and if they do, where in goodness do they stop? said I to a poor woman. 'O yes, Sir, very frequently,' said she 'but they hardly ever hurt themselves, somebody always stops them'."

But it's Sir George's last line which perhaps should still be engraved on the steps - it's better than any Health and Safety warning the council could dream up. He writes: "A step one way or the other carries a child to its cradle or its grave".