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July News in August

August 10, 2025August 10, 2025 / Harriet Richardson / Leave a comment

July was not my most productive month, but I have enjoyed being side-tracked by a few enquiries. These have had me investigating the birthplace of Vivian Stanshall – the musician, writer, and co-founder of the Bonzo Dog Doo-dah Band (born in Oxford’s Radcliffe Maternity Home, which is not in Shillingford as given in his Wikipedia entry); hospitals built by E H Burgess Ltd (later E H Burgess & Son Ltd) on which Frederick Charles Kent (1883 – 1951) was the foreman; identifying a nursing home in Glasgow at No.6 Claremont Street (established around 1915 and still going in the 1960s); and failing to identify a chapel that may or may not have been part of a hospital.

Mystery Chapel

The Chapel was photographed in the 1950s, by someone who at that time was living in St Paul’s Cray, near Orpington, then in Kent now in the London Borough of Bromley. He suffered from TB and was in hospital from late 1953 to the Spring of 1956, latterly at Eversfield Hospital, Hastings. So far I have drawn a blank on the chapel’s identity, so if anyone recognises it, please get in touch. It may have nothing to do with a hospital, and could be a private chapel, but, though small and apparently isolated, it looks plain and simple in a manner that would be fitting for a hospital or children’s home. There is a glimpse of what might be a water tower on the left. This suggests that this might have been one of the large asylums built in the later 19th and early 20th century that once fringed outer London, but to me the chapel looks too small for that. It doesn’t match any of the ones that I know of in Kent, Sussex or Surrey.

Uppingham

As well as enquiries, I have also received some interesting and useful information. Out of the blue, I was sent a piece of research into a former Humphrey’s isolation hospital in Uppingham. The building was demolished in the early 1990s. It had been put up around 1892-3 by the Rural District Councils of Uppingham, Hallaton and Gretton which combined to form a joint hospital committee and purchased a ‘temporary iron hospital’ from Humphrey’s of Knightsbridge. The hospital was erected on land leased from the Earl of Gainsborough, on the north side of the town, not far from the gas works.

Although it seems that the hospital was primarily intended for smallpox cases it was only ever used on a handful of occasions, mostly for scarlet fever cases. The first time it was used was September 1899 following an outbreak of scarlet fever in Uppingham when five patients were admitted. The 1912 annual report of the County Medical Officer of Health for Rutland noted that the ‘small iron isolation hospital at Uppingham’ had frequently proved useful in emergencies but was inadequate to meet the needs of the district. It was situated in a grass field with no approach by road. The horse-drawn ambulance had to drive through fields to get to it. Constructed of galvanised iron raised on blocks to a height of about 1 ft off the ground, it contained two wards, each about 19ft long, 12 ft high and 12ft wide, with boarded floors and walls lined with matchwood. A small room off one of the wards was used as a bedroom by the nurse, and there was also a store room, kitchen and scullery, and two ‘pan closets’. (Bed pans had to be taken through the kitchen to the scullery for cleaning and disinfection.) Two tortoise stoves provided heating in the wards, and the windows which provided the only ventilation could not be fully opened. The isolation hospital continued to be used on an ad hoc basis until the mid-1920s when the land was sold and the Rural Council given notice to quit. The hospital was put up for sale in 1929 and subsequently converted into a house.

*Uppingham’s isolation hospital in 1993 shortly before it was demolished ©️ Mark O’Brien* *for composite photograph based on photography ©️ Beverly Hubbard all (rights reserved)*

Historic Hospitals in the Highlands of Scotland

*Lawson Memorial Hospital, Golspie, photographed in June 2025 ©️ H. Blakeman*

July saw the publication of the latest in the History of Highlands Hospitals‘ series. This volume is the seventh that Jim Leslie has researched and written with his son Steve. It covers the hospitals of Sutherland, an area that I passed through on the way to pick up the ferry to Orkney in June. On that trip we had stopped in Golspie to take some snaps of the Lawson Memorial Hospital and had broken our journey at Helmsdale where I took a walk up the hill to find the former General Pope Maternity Hospital. I have started revising the Highland page, adding in some recent photographs, and the new book will help add in some more information there.

*The former General Pope Hospital in Helmsdale, viewed from across the allotments, photographed in June 2025 ©️ H. Blakeman*

The next volume in the series will cover Caithness. On our trip north we also did a tour of (most of) the surviving hospitals in Wick – the main centre for the hospital services in the county. I was particularly interested to see that the old Bignold Hospital has been converted into housing – it was empty and boarded up when I first visited the site in about 1989.

*Former Bignold Hospital, Wick, photographed in June 2025 ©️ H. Blakeman*

Lincoln County Hospital

The Lincolnshire page on the website is one of the many pages that is sorely lacking in information. I was prompted to start revising the page following a wander round Lincoln County Hospital on a brief trip south in July.

*The former County Hospital, dating from the 1770s, photographed around 1878 at the time that the new hospital was built. Reproduced from Thomas Sympson’s ,* Short Account of the Old and of the new Lincoln County Hospitals, *1878* [Internet Archive]

The original hospital is amongst the earliest to be established in England outside London, first opening in 1769 in adapted premises and moving to a new purpose-built hospital in 1777 designed by John Carr of York. This building continued in use until 1878, and then became known as the Bishop’s Hostel having been converted to a theological college. It was renamed Chad Varah House in the 1990s (after the founder of the Samaritans and former student at the college) when it was acquired by the University of Lincoln. Appropriately, it housed the department of Conservation and Restoration, and History of Art and Design. That did not last, however, and the building has since been converted to apartments, named Bailgate Court, with a new infill building on the north fronting Drury Lane (in place of a 1960s extension). This adaptation, by Jonathan Hendry Architects, gained an RIBA East Midlands Conservation Award in 2021.[RIBA, Architecture.com accessed 8 Aug. 2025]

*The new county hospital photographed in 1878 when it was newly completed. Reproduced from Sympson’s* Short Account… *1878.*

The replacement for Carr’s building was built further out of the city in 1876-8 to designs by Alexander Graham who was appointed following an architectural competition. Only a small fragment of the Victorian hospital survives on the present site, much of it having been demolished in 2011. The present hospital mostly dates from the 1980s.

Lincoln County Hospital, main entrance, photographed in July 2025 *©️ H. Blakeman*

The 1870s hospital was designed on the standard pavilion plan that had become the norm in the 1860s, in this instance comprising a central administration block connected to ward pavilions on either side by cross-ventilated corridors. The administration block also had a small ward for the reception of accident cases and two eye wards. Here too were the operating theatre and associated ward, the out-patients’ department and dispensary, board room and staff accommodation.

*Ground plan of Lincoln County Hospital, as originally designed, published in 1878* *in Sympson’s* Account.

When the hospital opened in 1878 only the southern ward pavilions had been built. The OS map from 1904 (below) shows this arrangement with an additional block on the west side, which opened in 1892, and the laundry and boiler house added to the north-east in 1901. These additions and alterations were constructed to the designs of William Watkins, architect and surveyor to the hospital.[Stamford Mercury, 10 June 1892, p.6.: Lincolnshire Chronicle, 12 July 1901, p.8.]

*Lincoln County Hospital from the 25-inch OS map revised in 1904-5 CC-BY (NLS)*

*South end of the eastern ward pavilion of the original hospital, the only fragment of the 1878 hospital that remains on site. Photographed in July 2025 ©️ H. Blakeman*

In 1911 a new ward was opened. This seems to have been an extension northwards of the original eastern ward pavilion and is broadly similar in design. During the First World War it was used for military personnel returning to civilian use in 1919. After the war, the Red Cross distributed some of their surplus funds from donations etc to hospitals that had been used for military casualties. Lincoln County Hospital received around £4,000, which provided a welcome addition to funds.[Louth and North Lincolnshire Advertiser, 22 Feb. 1930, p.2.]

To the left is the ward extension built in 1911, with the earlier ward pavilion and segment of the link-corridor to the right. Photographed in July 2025, *©️ H. Blakeman*

A separate nurses’ home was added in 1914-15 designed by Watkins in a handsome neo-Georgian style. It is probably the most attractive of the surviving pre-war buildings on the site and is now a listed building. Originally it comprised the eastern H-plan block and had 52 bedrooms, ten of which were slightly larger, had bay windows, and were allocated to the nursing sisters. There was no dining-room as the nurses took their meals in the administration block of the hospital [The Builder, 18 June 1915, p.563. Historic England listing gives the architect as H. G. Gamble, citing the Pevsner architectural guide as their source.]

North front of the Nurses’ Home, there is a matching left-hand projecting wing out of shot, photographed July 2025 *©️ H. Blakeman*

*Lincoln County Hospital Nurse’ Home, architectural perspective from* The Builder, *1915*

*Ground- and First-Floor-plans of the new nurses’ home at Lincoln County Hospital built 1914-15, from* The Builder, *1915*

The home was extended to the west in the 1930s in sympathetic style, the extension having a lively west front with a row of canted bay windows topped by moulded decoration. There were plans for a similar extension on the east side, but this was never built. The architect was William Watkins’s son, William Gregory Watkins, who had taken over his father’s practice in 1918. Linked to the extension further west is a single-storey recreation hall, probably dating from the 1950s or early ’60s.

*Lincoln County Hospital, Nurses’ Home, viewed from the north west, photographed in July 2025 ©️ H. Blakeman*

The Red-cross funds were put towards building a new ward in 1923-4. However, it remained unopened until December 1926 as the hospital could not afford the running costs.[Lincolnshire Echo, 10 April 1924, p.4: Stamford Mercury, 25 Dec. 1926, p.4.]

*Lincoln County Hospital on the OS map revised in 1938 CC-BY (NLS)*

The nurses’ home extension was part of a wider scheme of redevelopment at the County Hospital made possible by an improvement in its income following the institution of ‘voluntary contributory institutions’. Often known as the ‘penny in the pound’ schemes these involved local businesses and employers contributing a small portion of their employees’ wages in return for which their employees would have access to treatment in the hospital. This method of generating a regular income became a vital life-line for voluntary hospitals at this time.

*The early 1930s ward wing, photographed when it was no long in use in 2006 ©️ Richard Croft from Geograph*

By 1928 plans were being formed to increase the number of beds, extend the out-patients’ facilities, replace the operating theatres and generally modernise the hospital. An appeal was launched in 1930 and tenders put out the following year for the first section comprising two new wards in a two-storey wing to the north of the original western ward block (containing Dixon and Johnson wards). The ward wing was completed in 1933, but, like the earlier new ward, could not be opened straight away. This time opening had to wait for the completion of a new boiler house, the extension to the nurses’ home, and the new kitchen, in order to provide the necessary services for the increased number of patients. It had only partly opened by the beginning of 1937. [Lincoln Leader and County Advertiser, 21 April 1928: Lincolnshire Echo, 16 May 1931, p.1; 5 Jan. 1933, p.6: Stamford Mercury, 19 Feb. 1937, p.11.]

Lincoln County hospital, boiler-house. The tall brick chimney probably dates from the 1930s, but the boiler-house in front is part of the post-war redevelopments on the site. Photographed in July 2025 ©️ H. Blakeman

When the hospital was visited as part of a national hospital survey conducted by the Ministry of Health during the Second World War (as part of its planning for post-war hospital services), it had 206 beds, 28 of which were in extensions that had come into use after 1938. The published report noted that the buildings were for the most part old, but that the out-patients’ department had only recently opened. The new X-ray department had not been completed when the surveyors visited the hospital. Their report concluded that although the buildings of the hospital were for the most part old-fashioned, they were serviceable.[Ministry of Health, Hospital Survey. The Hospital Services of the Sheffield and East Midlands Area, HMSO, 1945.]

*Maternity Unit, Lincoln County Hospital, photographed in July 2025 ©️ H. Blakeman*

Just to the east of the nurses’ home is the maternity unit, which was formally opened by Princess Margaret on 4 December 1968. The architects were Adam, Holden & Pearson in association with Watkins, Croombes and Partners. The design provided 78 consultant beds, 26 GP beds and 8 private beds along with a special care baby unit with 21 cots, ante-natal clinic and midwifery training school. The wards were planned on the race-track plan – where the wards encircled a central service core. [The Hospital, January 1969 p.30.] The 1980s redevelopment of the site was part of the NHS long term planning for Lincoln County Hospital to take over all the acute work in Lincoln from St George’s Hospital – with the intention that St George’s would be rebuilt as a geriatric unit.[NHS, Hospital Plan for England and Wales, 1962.] The first phase of the new hospital was completed in 1985 and officially opened by Princess Diana. Phase two was fully opened in 1993 and officially opened by Princess Anne.

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May News

May 24, 2025May 24, 2025 / Harriet Richardson / Leave a comment

The long spell of good weather lately has not been very conducive to research and writing indoors. I have made some progress, and have have begun revising the Suffolk page and did a bit of spring cleaning on the Aberdeenshire page. As always, any contributions of recent snaps, historic photos or drawings that could be added to the site would be very gratefully received.

*Foundation stone of new wing added to Letchworth Hospital in 1921, photographed in April 2025*, ©️ K. A. Morrison

May Queen Mystery

Lots of public buildings have foundations stones; these stones were usually laid by a local dignitary, marking the commencement of work. Usually they are inscribed with the name of the person laying the stone, the date, and often the names of the architect and builder. Recently I was sent photographs of Letchworth Hospital, including the one above ofthe foundation stone for the new wing built in 1921. It was the first time I had ever come across a foundation stone laid by the local May Queen. It also seemed unusual that the May Queen in question was not identified. I thought that I would easily find details in the local newspapers on the British Newspaper Archive, but have so far failed to turn up anything on the new wing or the May Queen. With a bit more digging, I found that the website Herts Memories lists all the May Queens from 1906 to 1966. The May Queen for 1920 was Edith Fox, later Mrs Stark, and I assume she was still in post in January 1921 when the foundation stone ceremony took place, before she was succeeded by Mary Cook (later Mrs Pound).

*The former Letchworth Hospital*, *photographed in April 2025 , ©️ K. A. Morrison*

Letchworth Hospital was established in a converted house at the beginning of the First world War. Plans had been drawn up before the war for a purpose-built hospital to designs by Barry Parker, of Barry Parker & Raymond Unwin based in Letchworth. Fundraising had been proceeding in 1913, but the amount raised fell far short of the £6,000 target by July 1914 when war was declared. War-time conditions made the need for a local hospital even greater, as beds in the London hospitals, where people from Letchworth had gone for surgery, were reserved for the military, and the nearest cottage hospital at Hitchin could not be relied on to have free beds for patients from Letchworth.

*The original Pixmore House in which Letchworth Hospital first opened in 1914, photographed in April 2025, ©️ K. A. Morrison*

A number of Letchworth homeowners came forward to offer up temporary accommodation. The hospital committee accepted an offer from Mr and Mrs Cockerell to take Pixmore House on lease for one year. At that time, many people believed that the war would not last long, so a year’s lease seemed adequate. Letchworth Temporary Hospital opened in October 1914. By March 1917, having extended the lease, the hospital’s board of management decided it should drop ‘Temporary’ from the hospital’s name. After the War a new fundraising scheme was launched to build a ‘peace memorial wing’. This was the extension for which the May Queen laid the foundation stone on 9 January 1921. Work was completed by November 1922. As well as not naming the May Queen, the stone did not record the names of the architect or builder, so as yet I am stumped. The plans may well have been provided by Barry Parker, who continued his association with the hospital into the 1930s. He was also the architect of Royston Hospital, about 12 miles north-east of Letchworth, built in 1920-4 to replace the earlier cottage hospital there.

*Royston Hospial photographed in August 2012 © Mick Malpass* *from Geograph*

Guy Dawber in Cockermouth

Over the last month or so I have been revising the Cumbria page. While doing some research to fill in gaps for one or two of the hospitals I was delighted to find that the cottage hospital at Cockermouth had been designed by one of the leading Arts & Crafts architects of the early twentieth century, Sir Guy Dawber. It was a relatively small commission.

*Former Cockermouth Cottage Hospital, photographed in 2007 ©️ Alexander P. Kapp, from Geograph*

Delight turned to dismay when I discovered that the building had been demolished relatively recently. It was damaged by the terrible floods that occurred in 2009, and a new hospital built further south. Part of the site has been redeveloped with retirement apartments (called Lancaster Court). The Guy Dawber hospital had been built in 1915, and by the late 1930s had 14 beds and two cots for children.

A Return to Margate

*Former Royal Sea-Bathing Hospital, Margate, photographed in May 2025 ©️ H. Blakeman*

A highlight for me this month was a trip to Margate on the Kent coast. Apart from the delights of Dreamland, the Walpole Hotel, the Margate Bookshop and many other attractions, it was an opportunity to catch up on developments at the former Sea Bathing Hospital site.

*The two-storey section of this wing added in the 1880s contained a sea-water swimming pool. Photograph May 2025 ©️ H. Blakeman*

The hospital closed in the 1990s when services transferred to Thanet District General. After a decade of standing empty planning permission was granted to convert the historic core into luxury apartments, and since then much of the former hospital has been adapted into housing.

*The large building centre right was built as a nurses’ home, built in 1922 and extended in 1935 when it was raised from two to four storeys. Photographed May 2025 ©️ H. Blakeman*

New apartment blocks have been built in sympathy with the 1880s additions to the hospital, and some high-end town houses built facing the sea. For more on the history of the site there’s a separate post here: Margate’s Sea Bathing Hospital

*West and East elevations of the hospital chapel, built at the south end of the 1880s wing. Photographed in May 2025 ©️ H. Blakeman*

*One of the new apartment blocks added to the west of the hospital. Photographed in May 2025 ©️ H. Blakeman*

April News

April 18, 2025 / Harriet Richardson / Leave a comment

The weather here in Scotland has been so lovely in late March and early April that I have been outside as much as possible. However, I have also had time to do a little work on Historic Hospitals and have had some interesting enquiries. So here is a summary of this month’s progress.

The mysterious case of a TB patient at Arlesey Hospital, Bedfordshire

A lady contacted me about the whereabouts of the Arlesey hospital to which her father had been admitted as a TB patient in the late 40s or early 50s. Having looked up Arlesey on the Historic Hospitals website the only reference she found was to Fairfield Hospital at Arlesley, the large psychiatric hospital that was founded as the Three Counties Asylum. She was understandably confused – as was I.

*The former Three Counties Asylum, later Fairfield Hospital, Arlesey, photographed in December 2018 ©️ H. Blakeman*

There was a severe shortage of beds for TB cases after the Second World War, so I wondered if some accommodation had been taken over at Fairfield Hospital for that purpose. A bit of research revealed that during the Second World War the London Chest Hospital established a country branch at Arlesey in the hutted annexe built in the grounds of Fairfield Hospital. This made perfect sense, as the patient was from London.

*City of London Chest Hospital*, *photographed in 1992 ©️ H. Blakeman*

The Chest Hospital was severely damaged during bombing in 1941 hence the need to evacuate to the country. During his stay as a patient, the lady’s father, David Tatch, composed the following poem:

With Apologies to Rudyard Kipling
If you can take your strep and P.A.S. and multicoloured pills,
And swallow them, and still can smile, in spite of all your ills,
If you can sit precariously upon a bedpan chill,
With screens agape, and then can wait, while Ingrid has her fill.
If you can take a gastric tube, and still with sickly grin,
Say "Nursie dear, I didn't feel the blessed thing go in".
If you can stand "Bomb Happy" and say she's sweet and kind,
And listen to the row each night, and still retain your mind,
If you enjoy the country air, and don't mind losing weight,
If you can eat with relish the "bangers" on your plate,
And dine on stew, that's far from new, oblivious of the smell,
Then come to Arlesey, my son, PERHAPS you will get well.
a poem by David Tatch

One of the hutted ward blocks built on the Fairfield Hospital site at the beginning of the Second World War, *photographed in the 1990s © Louis Holmsted*

Developments in Devon

I also had an enquiry about the Bideford Isolation Hospital (North Devon) from someone who had been a patient there in 1954 with suspected polio. He recalled that he stayed there for most of the school summer holiday, and for about half that time was the only patient in the entire hospital. He also remembered that the hospital comprised ‘three bungalow style wards – each with about 6-10 rooms’. He got on well with one of the sisters, who informed him that not many summers prior to his stay, the place would be overflowing into the corridors with diphtheria cases, but vaccinations had put a stop to that. He also remembered the name of one of the doctors as either a Dr Hewitt or Hewitson.

*Kingsley Hospital, Bideford, on the large-scale OS map revised in 1957 CC-BY (NLS)*

Unfortunately, the Devon page on this site is another one that has very little on it. A little bit of investigating revealed that the North Devon Joint Isolation Hospital at Bideford was renamed the Kinglsey Hospital in 1955. This was probably in response to changing use with the decline in the need for isolation hospitals once vaccines dramatically reduced the incidence of measles, scarlet fever and diphtheria. I was delighted to find that the buildings are still extant, though now named Kinglsey House, a residential centre for people with autism run by the National Autistic Society. I have not yet tracked down any photographs of the buildings, which mostly seem to date from the 1920s and ’30s, of one and two storeys, in white-painted render with slate roofs. I would be very grateful if anyone had any that I could post on the website.

*Dean Clarke House, the former Royal Devon and Exeter Hospital, photographed in 2017 ©* *Derek Harper from Geograph*

Devon is particularly rich in historic hospitals. Exeter has the earliest purpose-built voluntary hospital in England outside London. It is no longer a hospital, but the building is still extant having been converted to offices, named Dean Clarke House. Devon also nearly had a cottage hospital designed by the Modernist architectural husband and wife team of Jane Drew and J. T. Alliston. They won a competition to design a replacement for the Dawlish Cottage Hospital held in 1937, but the outbreak of the Second World War led to the scheme being laid aside.

*Dawlish Cottage Hospital elevation and plan, from* The Builder, *28 May 1937, p.1136 (from the Internet Archive)*

James Thomas Alliston and Jane Drew were married in 1933 and their architectural partnership lasted from 1934 until 1939, when the couple’s marriage was dissolved. Drew subsequently married Maxwell Fry. Their architectural partnership is perhaps best known today for its work in West Africa and India, which included housing and public buildings, including hospitals.

James T. Alliston and Jane Drew, *from* The Builder, *28 May 1937 (from the Internet Archive)*

A Start to Revising Cumbria

Apart from dabbling in Devon and Bedfordshire, I have also started to tackle the hospitals in Cumbria. Earlier this month I began to add in some historic maps, photographs and potted histories. This work is very much in its early stages, but the highlight so far has been Brampton War Memorial Hospital. It is a particularly good example of the handsome cottage hospitals built after the First World War. It was designed by the Carlisle architect and photographer, Samuel W. B. Jack, and built in 1922-3.

*Brampton War Memorial Hospital photographed in 2018 ©️ Rose and Trev Clough from Geograph*

Ten Years Ago This Month

Finally, as it is ten years since I first launched the Historic Hospitals site, I thought I would look back at some of the earliest posts that I wrote. The very first one was on Airthrey Castle Maternity Hospital. Since then I have visited the site, which is now on the University of Stirling campus, so I have updated the post and added some maps and photos. Lots of people who were born there have commented on the post, though only a very small fraction of the 2,050 babies born there between 1941 and 1945, and no doubt many more thousands from 1945 up to about 1969 when it finally closed.

Garden front of Airthrey Castle, Bridge of Allan, Stirlingshire, that was a maternity hospital from 1941 to 1969. Now part of the University of Stirling campus. Photographed in *August 2018 ©️ H. Blakeman*

Herefordshire’s Historic Hospitals

October 19, 2024October 21, 2024 / Harriet Richardson / Leave a comment

Over the last year I have been revising the pages on this website that cover the hospitals in England. I am aware that some of the county pages have little more than a list of sites. Herefordshire was one that had very little information about any of the buildings, but it has now been revised with maps, brief histories and illustrations. This post gives a quick summary of the historic hospitals of Herefordshire and the present status of those buildings.

*Hereford General Hospital from the Annual Report for 1927, from the Wellcome Collection*

Hereford General was the first hospital in the modern sense to be established in the county. It was founded in 1776 and occupied adapted premises in Eign Street. Its success warranted a permanent structure for which a site was given by Lord Oxford (Edward Harley, the third Earl of Oxford and Mortimer, who was MP for Leominster and Droitwich). Building work began in 1781 to designs attributed to William Parker and was completed in 1783.

*Former Herefordshire General Hospital, photographed in 2013 © Stephen Richards from* ***Geograph***

The original building survives at the heart of the site, comprising the central nine bays with advanced pedimented centre. It has been much extended and altered, upwards and outwards, including the entrance porch that was added in 1887 at the same time as the Victoria Wing. By the middle of the twentieth century the site was heavily built over, apart from the open ground immediately in front of the original range overlooking the River Wye. A good sense of way in which the hospital evolved can be gained from a short film made in 2002, as the hospital faced closure, which gives the viewer a guided tour both outside and in (see Hereford Focus on YouTube).

*Victoria Ward, Hereford General Hospital, from the Annual Report for 1928, from the Wellcome Collection*

Hereford General remained the main acute hospital for the county throughout the nineteenth century and into the twentieth. The main alternative was Hereford Union Workhouse, which would have had some accommodation for sick paupers from when it was first built in 1836-7. New infirmary wings were built on the site in 1876 and in the early 1900s, but the main transformation came after the Local Government Act of 1929 which saw many former workhouses transformed into municipal hospitals. For Hereford this resulted in its development into the present Hereford County Hospital, initially with a new hospital range begun just before the Second World War. Shortly after the war broke a series of hutted ward blocks were built on the site as part of the Emergency Medical Scheme to provide for the anticipated large numbers of casualties.

*Hereford County Hospital. Part of the former workhouse buildings remaining on the site, photographed in 2008 *© Jonathan Billinger* from Geograph*

Hereford also had a number of specialist hospitals. The Victoria Eye and Ear Hospital opened in 1889, a handsome Tudor style building designed by the local architect E. H. Lingen Barker. Hereford Town Council also provided for infectious diseases with hospitals at Tupsley while the wider county was served by a sanatorium for tuberculosis near Ameley in a converted house (Nieuport Sanatorium). Provision for maternity cases was increasing in the 1940s, as hospital births began to be more common than home births. The County Hospital had a maternity department that was being extended at the end of the war, and there was a small public maternity ward at the General as well as a few private beds. There were also a few maternity beds at all but Ledbury of the former workhouses, while for private paying patients there was a maternity home in Hereford with four beds.

*Former Victoria Eye Hospital, now converted to housing. Photographed in the* *early 1990s © L. Holmstadt*

There was also the county mental hospital, St Mary’s, at Burghill, first opened in 1871 and a ‘mentally deficiency’ institution at Holme Lacy House that opened in the 1930s. In the rest of the county there were a few workhouses, cottage hospitals and small rural isolation hospitals that were established in the nineteenth century.

*Holme Lacy House, photographed in 2005, © David Dixon*, *from Geograph*

Most of the pre-war hospitals in the Herefordshire are no longer in the NHS estate. Some have been demolished, others adapted to new uses. When the NHS came into being in 1948 the hospitals in Herefordshire came under the Birmingham Regional Hospital Board, which also covered Worcestershire, Warwickshire, Staffordshire and Shropshire. This administrative structure remained in place until the NHS reorganisation of 1974.

*Postcard of the former St Mary’s Hospital, probably from around 1900-10*, *when it was still known as ‘the asylum’.*

Initially the Regional Board was responsible for around 220 hospitals with a total of about 42,000 beds. These were grouped into management units based on function and geographical location. Herefordshire Hospital Management Committee oversaw eighteen hospitals. These were: the General and County Hospitals and the Victoria Eye Hospital in Hereford; St Mary’s Mental Hospital, Tupsley Hospital for infectious diseases and Tupsley Smallpox Hospital; Holme Lacy Hospital for ‘mental defectives’; the cottage hospitals at Ledbury, Leominster, Ross-on-Wye, and Kington; Stretton Sugwas Hospital, near Credenhill; Nieuport Sanatorium; the former workhouses at Ross-on-Wye (Dean Hill Hospital), Bromyard, Leominster (Old Priory Hospital),and Kington (Kingswood Hall). Leominster and Kington were owned by Hereford County Council but the NHS had rights to accommodation under the 1948 National Assistance Act. Nieuport Sanatorium closed in 1951 and the Tupsley smallpox hospital was used as a store. Another smallpox hospital near Bromyard was transferred to the NHS but not used, it was sold in 1952.

*Nieuport House was used as a TB sanatorium by Herefordshire County Council in the 1930s. Photographed in 2007 © Philip Halling, from Geograph*

There are now four NHS hospitals in Herefordshire: Herefordshire County Hospital (the main complex built in 1999-2001, W. S. Atkins Healthcare, with other blocks from 1950s-80s and fragments of the 1830s workhouse), and three community hospitals at Leominster (1899, partly rebuilt 1991), Ross-on-Wye (1995-7 incorporating part of the former workhouse) and Bromyard (1989, Abbey Hanson Rowe Partnership). Mental Health services also operate two in-patient units in Hereford: the Stonebow Unit is on the County Hospital site and is a purpose-built facility erected in 1985 that was recently upgraded, and Oak House in Barton Road, a residential rehabilitation unit in a converted house.

*Stonebow Unit photographed in 2008, © Jonathan Billinger, from Geograph*

Herefordshire in 1945 was still an essentially rural county with no large centres of population. The advent of the NHS was seen as an opportunity to rationalise services, including centralisation, continuing a process that had begun before the war. In order to inform the strategic planning of the hospital service, the Board drew on the Hospital Survey of the West Midlands Area published in 1945 by the Ministry of Health. The Survey did not cover the mental health service which was considered as an essentially separate service with its own legislative basis and at the time there were uncertainties about how it might be integrated within a broader national health service, or even if it should be included at all.

*Former Ledbury Cottage Hospital, converted to apartments in 2009. Photographed in 2016 © John M. from Geograph*

The future of cottage hospitals was particularly threatened by the wider policy for modernisation, centralisation and rationalisation. The Hospital Survey of 1945 noted that Ross-on-Wye cottage hospital had 16 beds, plus ‘a few beds in huts in the garden’, Leominster had 13 beds, Ledbury 12 and Kington just 10 beds. There had also been a cottage hospital at Bromyard, but financial difficulties had led to its closure during the First World War. The others lasted longer. Ross-on-Wye Cottage Hospital was replaced by the new community hospital built on the site of the old workhouse. It was demolished after closure in 1997 and replaced by retirement flats. The original Leominster Cottage Hospital partly survives, absorbed by the present community hospital. Its ward block was demolished to make way for the new hospital building which opened in 1991. Ledbury Cottage Hospital was converted to mixed residential and business use in 2009, having closed in 2002. The Victoria Cottage Hospital at Kington is now Kington Youth Hostel.

*Former Bromyard Hospital, now Enderby House, photographed in 2021* © J. Thomas, from **Geograph**

The Hospital Survey also noted that five former workhouses in Herefordshire had chronic sick wards: Leominster, Ross, Kington, Ledbury and Bromyard. Leominster workhouse, like Kington Cottage Hospital, has become a youth hostel (the workhouse had incorporated some fifteenth-century priory buildings). Ross-on-Wye union workhouse developed into Dean Hill Hospital for geriatrics and mental health unit, and had 157 beds by the mid-1960s. The workhouse buildings have partly been demolished to make way for the present community hospital. Kington and Ledbury Workhouses were not transferred to the NHS. Kington has been demolished and Ledbury partly demolished, but some of the workhouse ranges were converted into housing. Bromyard Workhouse has also been turned into flats, not with great sensitivity.

*The former Medical Superintendent’s House of St Mary’s Hospital, photographed in 2011 © Philip Pankhurst from Geograph*

The largest hospital in the county was St Mary’s, built as the City and County Asylum. It closed in 1994 and in 1998 most of the hospital buildings were ‘stupidly demolished’ (according to the Pevsner Architectural Guide) to make way for a large housing development. The entrance building (St Mary’s House) remains along with sections of the ward wings which were converted to flats.

More information on Herefordshire’s hospitals can be found on the Herefordshire page. There is also more on the workhouses on the workhouses.org site. Archival records relating to the hospitals are mostly at Herefordshire Archive and Records Centre, and I would also recommend the Herefordshire Through Time website, which has a section on hospitals. Historic England Archive has the hospital reports and building files that were put together for the national survey of hospitals carried out in the early 1990s on which I worked (though not on Herefordshire). The files may contain photographs of buildings that were standing then but have since been demolished.

Hertfordshire Hospitals Survey Revisited

October 4, 2024October 5, 2024 / Harriet Richardson / Leave a comment

Hertfordshire was one of the counties covered by the London team of the national hospitals survey, carried out in the early 1990s by the Royal Commission on the Historic Monuments of England. The London team comprised myself and Colin Thom (now Director of the Survey of London). At that time we only investigated hospitals built prior to the inauguration of the NHS in 1948 – so major post-war hospitals, such as those at Welwyn and Stevenage, were excluded.

*Welwyn Garden City’s early post-war general hospital was demolished in 2017.* *Photograph from in February 2017 © Gerry Gerardo, on* **Geograph**

Fieldwork for the survey was carried out in 1991-3. There was not enough time to visit every single site, and some were considered in greater detail than others. The selection had as much to do with ease of access as it did with the historic significance of the buildings. This meant that some ‘important’ sites were either missed out or only briefly dealt with. I am puzzled now as to why some weren’t visited. In Hertfordshire we seem not to have managed to get to Welwyn, Royston or Hitchin, and also didn’t photograph Letchworth Hospital. The rest we visited on various dates between May 1992 and June 1993, while also covering the rest of the South East (Greater London, Essex, Kent, East and West Sussex, and Surrey) as well as Avon, Staffordshire, Shropshire and parts of the West Midlands, added late on to help out the York-based team. We covered a lot of ground, so perhaps I shouldn’t be too surprised that I’m struggling to remember visiting some of them.

For each site a building file was created, and these can be consulted in Historic England’s Archive based in Swindon. (The reference numbers for the files can be found on each of the county pages of the gazetteer after the name of the hospital following the grid reference.) These files vary in content, but generally have a report, photographs and maps.

Follow the link to the Hertfordshire page of this website for more details of individual sites.

What does Pevsner say?

The best known architectural guide to the buildings of Britain is the series begun by Nikolaus Pevsner after the Second World War. The Pevsner guides are generally the first place to look for information about the historic buildings throughout the UK. The original Pevsner guide to Hertfordshire was published in 1953, with an extensive revision published in 1977 (revised by Bridget Cherry). A further revised guide with new material edited by James Bettley was published by Yale University Press in 2019. I have relied heavily on this for updates to the condition of the various hospitals that we visited back in the 1990s. However, hospitals, especially former hospitals, are not easy to find in the guides and often receive only cursory mentions, if any at all. It is not a reflection of their historic significance as public buildings, but rather their relatively lowly architectural status, as they were seldom designed by ‘top’ architects, many are more interesting for their plans than their outward appearance, and where there have been many additions and alterations they can seem muddled and incoherent.

*Original central administration block of West Herts Hospital, Hemel Hempstead, from the 1870s rebuilding of the infirmary. Photographed in 2018 © Dormskirk* *CC BY-SA 3.0*

In its introductory overview, the guide notes that the first purpose-built hospitals appeared around the same time as the first workhouses built after the Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834. The West Herts Infirmary at Hemel Hempstead was built in 1831-2 followed swiftly by Hertford’s County Hospital in 1832-3 to designs by Thomas Smith. In 1840 Hitchin Infirmary was built designed by Thomas Bellamy. The last two have since been replaced, and only the core of their original buildings has been retained. Bellamy’s Hitchin Infirmary is now Bellamy House – the remainder of the site now occupied by a Waitrose supermarket. Hertford County Hospital has been replaced by a new building constructed alongside in 2003-4 (architects Murphy Phillips) leaving the old building rather marooned. West Herts is a typical multi-phase hospital, with much of its built heritage remaining in use, including the early Cheere House of 1831 and Coe and Robinson’s 1875-7 pavilion-plan infirmary (see photo above).

*Former Watford Union Workhouse from Vicarage Road, photographed in May 1992. The former workhouse building became part of Watford District General Hospital © Harriet Blakeman*

As well as general hospitals, there was a private asylum at Much Hadham established around 1803 (principally of architectural interest to the Guide because it occupied The Palace), and a crop of workhouses. Of the latter, there are partial survivals at Buntingford (1836-7 by W. T. Nash); St Albans (1836-7 by John Griffin); Ware (1839-40 by Brown & Henman) and more substantially at Watford (1836-7 by T. L. Evans) where the workhouse developed into the general hospital.

*Architectural aerial perspective view of proposed asylum, Leavesden*, *from* The Builder

During the Victorian and Edwardian eras Hertfordshire attracted children’s homes and mental hospitals, including the Metropolitan Asylums Board’s ‘Imbeciles’ Asylum’, later Leavesden Hospital, at Abbots Langley designed by John Giles & Biven and built in 1868-70. This asylum was the twin of Caterham Hospital which served the south of the Metropolitan area.

*View looking up the central spine of the hospital with the ends of the ward pavilions to the left, water tower on right.* *All of the buildings in the photograph were demolished as part of the redevelopment of the site. © Harriet Blakeman*

Of Leavesden Hospital only the former administration block, chapel and recreation hall have been retained, converted to the residential Leavesden Court – a gated development – with new housing built to the north and west on the site of the former ward pavilions and parkland to the east.

Setting aside children’s homes, the Guide also notes Holman & Goodrham’s TB sanatorium built for the National Children’s Home built in 1909-10 (survives as the King’s School); Rowland Plumbe’s Napsbury Hospital built in 1901-5 (partially demolished, parts converted to housing); and G. T. Hine’s Hill End Asylum of 1895-9 (largely demolished). The only ‘local hospitals’ during this period mentioned in the Pevsner Guide are the cottage hospital at Watford of 1885 designed by C. P. Ayres (still extant) and the Sisters Hospital at St Albans designed by Morton M. Glover of 1893 (later extensions demolished, original main buildings converted to housing).

One of the former ward blocks of Hill End Hospital, photographed in May 1992. Only the chapel and the southernmost blocks were retained when the site was redeveloped for housing. *© Harriet Blakeman*

In the 1920s Royston Hospital was built to designs by Barry Parker (still an NHS hospital, but much extended). Then in the 1930s the large new mental hospital at Shenley was built, designed by W. T. Curtis (mostly demolished), and ‘a rather utilitarian general hospital’ at Welwyn designed by H. G. Cherry (still an NHS hospital with a newer block built to the south).

Part of the former Shenley Hospital, photographed in May 1992, now demolished, *© Harriet Blakeman*. Only the chapel, medical superintendent’s house and one small accommodation block were retained

The chapel at Shenley Hospital, photographed in May 1992 *© Harriet Blakeman*

There is no mention in the introduction of the post-war hospitals, and the Lister at Stevenage is quickly covered by two sentences that provide the date (1966-72), the architect (E. A. C. Maunder of the North West Metropolitan Regional Hospital Board) and summary of its appearance (A central Block of nine storeys, a symmetrical elevation with projecting balconies, surrounded by extensive lower buildings.) Before too long, I hope to produce a separate post on the Lister and the other post-war hospitals in Hertfordshire.

Hertfordshire Hospitals in the 2020s

Hospital services in the 21st Century have become significantly more complex since the early years of the NHS. The NHS currently has thirteen hospitals in the county (not including those that were formerly in Hertfordshire which now lie within Greater London – such as in Barnet). There have been at least 44 hospitals in Hertfordshire in the past, not including a few small local authority hospitals for infectious diseases. The decline in the number of hospitals reflects increasing centralisation of services and changing practices in medical care and treatment. Of the 44 that feature in the Hertfordshire gazetteer page, only five are still NHS hospitals; 15 have been converted to housing or other use, including partial demolition; and 24 have been either entirely or largely demolished. The scale of demolition is larger than even that figure suggests, as it includes some of the largest hospital complexes in the county.

*Former Harperbury Hospital, photographed in May 1992 © Harriet Blakeman*

It has been depressing to discover the extent of destruction of former hospital buildings, a great many of them only having been demolished in the last ten to twenty years. A great deal more should and could have been retained, particularly of the large former mental hospitals such as Shenley, Harperbury and Hill End.

*Former St Pancras Industrial Schools that became part of Abbots Langley Hospital, photographed in the early 1990s, now demolished. © Harriet Blakeman*

Leavesden Hospital, as mentioned above, has largely been demolished to make way for housing. The hospital also had an annexe to the south. This had formerly been the St Pancras Schools, together with detached hospital and babies home. It had an Emergency Medical Scheme spider block built at the start of the Second World War on vacant ground behind the buildings which became Abbots Langley Hospital when transferred to the NHS in 1948. These emergency hutted buildings were intended to be temporary, and it is perhaps more surprising that they lasted into the 1990s than that few of them are left in the 2020s.

*The wartime extension of EMS hutted ward blocks* *at Abbots Langley Hospital, photographed in the early 1990s, now demolished. © Harriet Blakeman*

I have always had a few favourite hospitals – ones that were particularly attractive or interesting. In Hertfordshire, Shenley was one – at least in part because of its lovely grounds. The hospital was laid on the Porters Park estate, along with the mature landscape around the mansion house.

Porters Park mansion was adapted for convalescent patients at Shenley Hospital. *© Harriet Blakeman*

Porters Park has a complicated history having been substantially rebuilt or remodelled on more than one occasion. Its present appearance is largely due to the rebuilding of 1902 for C. F. Raphael by the architect C. F. Harold Cooper. The house and estate were transformed into Shenley Mental Hospital in the 1930s. The map below show the extent of the hospital in the 1950s. It was designed on a colony plan, whereby all the patients’ accommodation and treatment blocks were detached, and arranged in the manner of a village, with central service buildings and chapel.

*Shenley Hospital on the OS map surveyed in the 1950s CC-BY (NLS)*

The map below shows the modern housing development on the site. The existing buildings are shaded orange. The map is overlaid on the 1950s OS map above – and the grey shapes of the hospital blocks can just be seen behind. Only the PW – place of worship – and the small block to its south are from the hospital era.

*Overlay map of Shenley showing the new housing development on the former hospital site. OS map of the 1950s* *and OS Opendata CC-BY (NLS)*

Napsbury was another favourite – here too the landscape setting was particularly good, but the architect for this large asylum, Rowland Plumbe, was allowed to bring his characteristic style to the buildings, which were more decorative than Hine’s more pedestrian Hill End. The picturesque qualities of Napsbury no doubt made its adaptation appealing for the developers of the site, and it is now at the heart of Napsbury Park – a residential development near St Albans largely constructed between 2002 and 2008 (see blog post on Napsbury here).

One of the detached villas at Napsbury Hospital, photographed in the 1990s. Sadly, this villa was demolished *© Harriet Blakeman*

If I had to name a top three of Hertfordshire hospitals, Napsbury would probably be at number one, with Shenley at number two. At number three I would put Bennett’s End – and I was particularly saddened to see that this one has been demolished. It was the perfect small local authority isolation hospital, built in accordance with the Local Government Board’s model plans.

*Aerial perspective of Bennett’s End Hospital published in 1914*, *the hospital looked remarkably similar to this when we visited in the 1990s.*

*Bennett’s End Hospital, administration block © Harriet Blakeman*

There were a few other losses that I am particularly saddened by. Potters Bar Hospital was a charming low-rise late 1930s Deco-ish building that has been replaced by a Tesco supermarket. A new Community Hospital was built on Barnet Road.

*Potters Bar and District Hospital, Mutton Lane, built* c.1938, *closed 1995 © Harriet Blakeman*

I was also shocked to find that I had missed Welwyn Garden City’s Queen Elizabeth II Hospital, demolished in 2017 after the new QEII was built on the adjacent site. The original QEII opened in 1963 and was one of the first new general hospitals to be completed by the NHS. There is a little more information on the Hertfordshire page.

*Model of the* *Welwyn-Hatfield new hospital, published 1958 by the North-West Metropolitan Regional Hospital Board*

It has been a sobering exercise, revisiting the survey of Hertfordshire’s hospitals. Far more has gone than I had anticipated. We knew at the time that the NHS was winding down the majority of the large former mental hospitals in England. There had also been an increase in hospital-building during the 1980s with many ‘nucleus’ district general hospitals being built. Together this contributed to a great many hospital closures and redundant buildings. Replacing the older pre-war hospitals had been an early ambition of the new NHS in 1948, but it has taken most of the second half of the twentieth century to come close to that ambition.

Winsley Sanatorium

July 14, 2024 / Harriet Richardson / Leave a comment

Winsley Sanatorium was built on the outskirts of Winsley, a small village between Bath and Bradford on Avon. It first opened in 1904, and was transferred to the NHS in 1948. Originally established to treat tuberculosis, as vaccination and antibiotics led to a decline in the need for such specialist hospitals it developed into a specialist chest hospital. Few additions were made in the post-war period, and it continued use into the early 1980s. After closure the site was developed as Avonpark retirement village. The original building (pictured above) was retained in the redevelopment, but plans this year have been put forward for further development on the site which would see this building demolished. The planning application stressed that ‘little heritage interest’ survived as most of the former sanatorium buildings had been demolished, and this one had been ‘significantly altered’. It had not been so altered for its original appearance to have been lost.

*Winsley Sanatorium, photographed in the early 1990s, © L. Holmstadt*

Winsley Sanatorium’s foundation was in large part due to the efforts of Dr Lionel Weatherly of Bath, chairman of the Gloucester, Somerset and Wilts branch of the National Association of for Consumption. The promoters were delighted by the site, which was conveniently placed between the three counties. It had been the site of Murhill Quarry, the local stone being used in the construction, looking out over the Wiltshire downs and the White Horse at Westbury. The design was inspired by the sanatorium at Hohenhonnef on the Rhine, but the plans of all the principal Continental sanatoria were consulted in the design stage and their leading features adopted.

*Hohenhonnef Sanatorium, 2012, photograph © Wokenkratzer,* CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikemedia

*Typical upper floor plan of the Hohenhonnef Sanatorium*, *reproduced in F. Walters* Sanatoria for Consumptives, 1905.

The perspective view (below) shows a three-storey building, with a butterfly plan in which the outer ends of the building were angled to create a sheltered sun-trap. On the north side – not shown on the perspective view – the wings were angled more sharply, at 90 degrees. The main entrance was also positioned on the north side, while a detached building was to house the kitchen, offices and patients’ dining-hall. Typically the patients’ rooms faced south, accessed from a corridor that ran along the north side of the main range, but with rooms on either side of a central corridor in the angled end wings, as in Hohenhonnef Sanatorium (see illustrations above). Open-air treatment was to be facilitated by a wide veranda, or ‘liegehalle’, along the south side of the building and wrapping around the wings.

*Architectural perspective of the proposed sanatorium, published in the* Bristol Medico-Chirurgical Society Journal, *June 1901*

It was an ambitious project, but the funding was initially precarious. There seem to have been hopes that it would be chosen as the site for the King’s Sanatorium for which Sir E. Cassell had promised the handsome sum of £200,000, but after the site was inspected by members of the King’s advisory board, it was found to be too small. The projected cost of the proposed sanatorium was £20,000, but by March 1902 they had only raised about £5,000. [Lancet, 29 March 1902, p.930.] That year the Bristol Medico-Chirurgical Society Journal reported that the site had been levelled and a large quantity of good building stone had been prepared and stacked ready for use as soon as the Committee had sufficient money in hand to justify commencing building operations.

*Ground and first-floor plans of the front range of the principal block. Reproduced from* The Builders’ Journal, *1 Feb. 1905, p.56*

The foundation stone was laid on 4 June 1903 by Lady Dickson-Poynder, a ceremony attended by many of those involved with establishing the sanatorium, including Dr Weatherly, and local dignitaries, including the Bishop of Bristol, Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice M. P. and Sir John Dickson-Poynder, M. P. [Lancet, 13 June 1903, p.1693.]

Early postcard of Winsley Sanatorium, showing the principal block to the left, the bedroom block on the right and the rest hall on the higher ground between the two. Reproduced by permission of H. Martin

The first buildings of the sanatorium were constructed in 1903-4, the first patients being admitted in December 1904 and a formal opening taking place the following year. The architects were the local firm of Thomas Ball Silcock jr and Samuel Sebastian Reay, and the builders were Jacob Long & Sons of Bath. The lack of funds meant that the original design for the principal block had to be scaled back: the angled wings were lopped off and the height reduced from three storey plus attics to two storeys with attics. [Annual Report of the Medical Officer of Health, City of Gloucester, 1905: The Builder, 1 Aug. 1906, p.56.]

*OS map of 1922, showing the positions of the original main ranges. CC-BY (NLS)*

In addition to the principal block there was a separate ‘bedroom block’, although there were also 26 bedrooms for the patients in the main building which also had a central reception room featuring a broad bay window, a suite of rooms for the doctor, and accommodation. The ‘bedroom block’ was three storeys high with 34 patient rooms. All the interior walls were finished with hard plaster. Corners and angles that might harbour dirt and dust were avoided by curved covings. The bedroom floors were finished with floorcloth (not unlike linoleum, this was manufactured in large sheets of oiled canvas). The architects designed or specified the furniture for the sanatorium which included bedsteads, washstands, wardrobe a dressing chest, bedside table and a single chair that were all enamelled white with nickel-plated fittings. The only piece of soft furnishing in each room was an armchair.

*Winsley Sanatorium, centre section of the rest hall or ‘liegehalle’, photographed in the early 1990s © L. Holmstadt*

Rainwater was captured and stored in a large tank on the site to serve the laundry, housed in a detached building. Electric lighting was employed, the contractors for the electric lighting being Edwards & Armstrong of Bristol, with an ‘electric light station’ on site near the laundry building. The hospital was only connected to the national grid in 1950.[Bath Chronicle, 18 March 1950, p.12.] Heating was by a mix of hot-water pipes and open fireplaces.

*Rear view of the long rest hall showing partial demolition in the early 1990s © L. Holmstadt*

There was also a detached rest shelter or ‘liegehalle’, measuring 100ft in length, that formed a link range between the principal and the bedroom blocks. This seems to be the timber structure pictured above that was in a state of dereliction in the early 1990s (pictured above). It was highly unusual with its thatched central portion, and definitely a picturesque element of the sanatorium. The idea of a rest hall or ‘liegehalle’ came from open-air treatment practised in Germany where patients were encouraged to spend as much time as possible out in the open air, or in a shelter such as this, that offered some protection from the worst the weather might threaten, but were thoroughly ventilated by plentiful window openings.

*End section of the rest hall in the early 1990s © L. Holmstadt*

Within a year of opening the sanatorium’s finances were in a mess. It was £15,000 in debt and its annual income well short of its outgoings. There were accusations of extravagance on the initial outlay on building, but also misgivings about the efficacy of the treatment offered. Support was generally lacking. Its 60 beds were barely adequate for its populous catchment area, centred on Bath, but without financial support expansion was impossible. Some of the immediate difficulties in 1906 were countered by raising some £7,500 on mortage.[The Medical Press and Circular, 19 Sept 1906, p.295.]

*Possibly the workshop range, buildings on northern boundary of the sanatorium in the early 1990s © L. Holmstadt*

An extension was completed in 1934 which comprised a new admin block, nurses’ home, and a recreation and rest room for women. Additional beds were thereby provided in the original main block. The new admin block was situated at the western end of the original main block and was designed ot harmonise with it. At the west end of the new admin block was the women’s recreation room, which enjoyed a fine view across the valley. It comprised two large rooms, and was flat-roofed, with generous glazing and french windows opening out on to a croquet lawn.[Wiltshire Times and Trowbridge Advertiser, 20 Oct. 1934, p.5.]

*OS Map from 1936 showing the additions, including the new administrative block to the west of the original principal block CC-BY (NLS)*

By the end of the 1930s the sanatorium had expanded to provide 135 beds. In 1948 the sanatorium was transferred to the National Health Service and in 1950 changed its name to the Winsley Chest Hospital. An article in the Bristol Observer published in December 1950 described the life of the patients there, whose average stay in the hospital was nine months. ‘They live… that kind of friendly community life that in the outside world is being killed by the ever-quickening tempo of modern life.’ Here, ex-servicemen found the comradeship they knew in the Services. To help the patients structure their day and fill their time was the occupational therapist – the first full-time OT appointment had been made in 1942. Handicrafts were encouraged, particularly of articles that the patients would find useful in their own homes. They were supplied with materials at cost price to make rugs, woven ties and scarves, tapestries, cushion covers, soft toys etc. Special workrooms were provided, but patients also worked while in bed. Entertainments included whist drives, lectures and concerts. The patients also produced a magazine, which had begun in 1936, was suspended during the war, and started up again in 1949 when it changed its name from the ‘Winsley Sanatorium Magazine’ to the ‘Winslonian’.[Bristol Observer, 2 Dec. 1950, p.3: Bath Chronicle and Weekly Gazette, 17 Sept. 1949, p.7.]

*One of the outbuildings at Winsley Sanatorium in the early 1990s © L. Holmstadt*

For around forty years, between 1930 and 1970, Dr A. J. P. Alexander served as the resident consultant physician to Winsley Sanatorium. He witnessed the revolution in the treatment and prevention of tuberculosis, and steered the hospital in the new direction of specialising in other diseases of the chest, including lung cancer. Dr Alexander established the league of friends, which raised funds to improve patient amenities, paying for a new hall that was named after the Alexander. [Somerset Guardian, 3 July 1970, p.7.]

*Postcard of Winsley Chest Hospital, sent in 1957 by a patient who marked their room with a blue cross.*

The hospital closed in 1982, and put up for sale in 1988. Since then most of the buildings on the site have been demolished to make way for housing development. The original principal block, together with its western extension, were retained – for a while as accommodation for the elderly, but plans have been passed recently by the local planning department to allow this remnant of the former sanatorium to be demolished.

Further reading: Wiltshire and Swindon History Centre have a good set of records of the hospital. A history of the hospital was published in 1992 written by John Willet, a former hospital administrator, Hospital Diary, The History of Winsley Chest Hospital. See also Bradford on Avon Museum’s website for further information and photographs.]

Tenbury Cottage Hospital

July 8, 2024July 10, 2024 / Harriet Richardson / Leave a comment

I recently acquired this postcard of the cottage hospital in Tenbury. It wasn’t a hospital that I was familiar with, and it seems to have missed out of the RCHME hospitals survey – perhaps because it lies on the border of two counties, Tenbury itself being in Worcestershire while the hospital lies over the river, and over the county boundary, in the Shropshire parish of Burford. Shropshire was one of the counties that I worked on, but this hospital slipped through the net. It’s a pity, not least because it is still an NHS hospital and the original section is a listed building.

Tenbury surveyed for the 25-inch OS map in 1883, the cottage hospital is at the top right, along the road from the Swan Hotel. The main village is south of the river, with Tenbury Union Workhouse the first building to the east of the Teme Bridge. Reproduced by permission of the National Library of Scotland, CC-BY (NLS)

The hospital was established in a converted house in 1869, and originally called St Mary’s Cottage Hospital. The early nineteenth century house was extended westwards around the turn of the century. The extension is probably the part shown on the postcard to the left, with veranda and balcony. In the 20th century the hospital expanded on its east side. It is currently (2024) a community hospital administered by Worcestershire Health and Care NHS Trust.

*The cottage hospital at Tenbury from the 25-inch OS map surveyed in 1883. CC-BY (NLS)*

The original building seems to have been listed because of its interest as a house. It was built around 1835 by Richard Titt, landlord of the Swan Hotel, who died in 1843, aged 86, having been the Swan’s landlord for over 40 years. However, it is also historically important as an early example of a cottage hospital in England, having opened on 1 September 1869. This was only ten years after the very first cottage hospital which opened in 1859: Cranleigh Cottage Hospital, Surrey. It is particularly rare to find a first-generation cottage hospital still using its original building.

*The 1902 OS map shows the small western extension of the cottage hospital. CC-BY (NLS)*

The hospital featured in Horace Swete’s Handy Book of Cottage Hospitals published in 1870. Swete described the hospital as a ‘small villa, with garden, coach-house and stable, altered for the purpose’. Patients contributed a small fee towards the cost of their care and treatment, charged at a weekly rate. Mrs Arabella Prescott served as the lady president of the establishment, and it was she who had purchased the house and footed the bill for fitting it up as a hospital, including the provision of linen, dressing-gowns and slippers for the use of the patients.

*Cranleigh village hospital was the first of its kind, opening in 1859 and featured as the frontispiece of Horace Swete’s* Handy Book of Cottage Hospitals *published in 1870.*

There was no connection to a mains sewer, so earth closets (or ‘earth commodes’ as Swete termed them), were used throughout the hospital. The floors were waxed and polished ‘with a view to greater cleanliness’, but Swete was critical of this, as it might make the floors slippery: ‘A poor fellow getting out on his crutches for the first time, would find considerable difficulty in walking upon it without falling’.

The hospital had a convalescent ward, and the coach-house was converted into a mortuary chamber, top-lit and fitted with a slate-topped table. The nurse in Swete’s time had formerly been a sister at Middlesborough Cottage Hospital. By 1910 the Tenbury cottage hospital had 9 beds, later extended to 12. An extension was built on the east side of the original house in 1912 named the Elizabeth Wing.

In 1915 the hospital featured in Henry C. Burdett’s How to Become a Nurse which listed the requirements for of various hospitals for trainees. St Mary’s, as it was then still known, took on young women for a month’s trial after a personal interview, which if satisfactory, led to one year’s training. Women had to be between 20 and 22 years of age, between 5ft 2in (1.57m) and 5ft 11in (1.80m) in height, with satisfactory evidence as to character and health. ‘Applicants should be of the upper middle class and Church of England’. Training included lectures by the matron on anatomy, and examinations were held twice yearly. ‘Laundry and text-books provided. Separate bedrooms.’

*H. C. Burdett’s* How to Become a Nurse, *1915*

Although the hospital charged fees for admission and subscriptions from wealthier supporters, fund raising was an essential activity. Church collections were the main source of ad hoc donations. The nearby Swan Hotel hosted an ‘invitation charity ball’ in December 1884, and in 1899 and 1900 a ‘guess the weight of a cake’ competition. The Hotel later instituted an annual ball which took place until the outbreak of the First World War. Nevertheless, by the later 1890s the hospital’s income did not meet its expenditure, causing the hospital to dip into its endowment funds.

St Mary’s survived into the 1920s, but had to close in 1928 in the face of rising costs and staffing difficulties. All was not lost, and in 1931 it was re-orgnised and re-opened as Tenbury and District Hospital, with a further extension to the east opened in 1935 to provide an operating theatre. In the hospitals survey conducted by the Ministry of Health during the war it was described as having 16 beds, maintained by the Tenbury and District Hospital and Nursing Association. Six local general practitioners formed the honorary medical officers alongside a general surgeon from Leominster, an ear and throat surgeon from Kidderminster and a dental surgeon.

Under the NHS the hospital was well supported by the local league of friends. Expansions and modernisation improved facilities, and in 1986 a new outpatients department was built. A Millennium Project provided a further extension .

[Sources: Tenbury and District Civic and Historical Society, Tenbury and the Teme Valley People and Places, 2007: Horace Swete, Handy Book of Cottage Hospitals, 1870, pp.161-2: Report of the Royal Commission on the Poor Laws, 1908: Worcester Journal, 5 Jan. 1843, p.3: Wellington Journal, 27 October 1877, p.8: Tenbury Wells Advertiser, 16 Dec 1884, p.4; 31 Oct. 1899, p.5; 30 Jan. 1900, p.5: Kington Times, 6 July 1935, p.4: Ministry of Health, Hospital Survey. The Hospital Services of the West Midlands Area, 1945.]

Lost Hospitals of Northumberland

April 12, 2024March 21, 2025 / Harriet Richardson / Leave a comment

Over the past few months the Northumberland page has been thoroughly revised and expanded. The page covers hospitals within the current county of Northumberland, there is a separate pages for Tyne & Weir that covers Newcastle. Historic maps of the sites have been added in, and short accounts of the history of each building added, mostly based on the reports written for the Royal Commission’s Hospital Survey carried out in the 1990s. At that time many more of the pre-NHS hospitals were still in use, and others still standing. Although not all the historic hospitals of Northumberland have been lost, a great many have been demolished. The Royal Commission hospital files include now rare record photography of demolished sites. They can be found at Historic England Archive, based in Swindon, and can be seen by the public.

Berwick Infirmary, photographed by Bill Harrison in 2017, from **Geograph**

There are now twelve NHS hospitals in Northumberland with in-patient facilities: Berwick Infirmary; Blyth Community Hospital; Alnwick Infirmary; Haltwhistle War Memorial Hospital; North Tyneside General Hospital; Hexham General Hospital; Rothbury Community Hospital; Wansbeck General Hospital; Northumbria Specialist Emergency Care Hospital, Cramlington; St George’s Park, Morpeth; Ferndene, Prudhoe and Northgate Hospital, Morpeth. (There are other clinics and health centres that treat out-patients.)

Alnwick Infirmary, photographed in 2011 by Michael Dibb from **Geograph**

Historically Newcastle provided the main hospital services for the county, with large teaching and specialist hospitals. Most of the population was concentrated in the city, the rest of the large county having a scattered population resulting in a network of relatively small hospitals. There have been at least thirty-five hospitals in Northumberland outside Newcastle in the past, including workhouses that would have had small infirmaries for the sick. That number does not include private nursing homes, which are generally not included on the historic-hospitals website (although I have slowly been adding ones that come to my attention). There are various reasons for their general exclusion, but mostly it is because they tended to occupy converted buildings, and the main focus of the historic-hospitals site is to explore the design of purpose-built hospitals.

Berwick Workhouse from the OS Town Plan published in 1852, reproduced by permission of the National Library of Scotland CC-BY (NLS). The early ordnance survey maps often include ground plans of public buildings, such as hospitals.

The large reduction in the number of hospitals now part of the National Health Service reflects the way in-patient care has developed, with patients spending less time in hospital and more procedures being done in out-patient clinics or day-care units. Plans for post-war reconstruction and the need for some form of national health service were addressed during the Second World War. A national survey of hospitals was commenced in 1942, that was published in 1946. It covered most hospitals but excluded those for mental illnesses or disabilities, and few private nursing homes. The survey, together with the recommendations made in the published reports, laid the foundations for the administrative organisation of the NHS.

The report on the hospitals in the North East of England did not paint a rosy picture. The general acute hospitals were mostly found to be out-of-date, too small, and on sites that did not allow for expansion. Out-patient departments were particularly poor, inconvenient and cramped. Even then it was recognised that the demands on out-patient departments had steadily increased in step with medical progress, and would continue to do so ‘departments that were once regarded with pride are now recognised as hopelessly inadequate’. The rise in specialisms was also impacting on the problem, as new clinics had to somehow be shoe-horned into existing buildings. In those days there were no appointment systems in place, which only added to the difficulties. The survey recognised that some improvements had been made before the war, but many more plans had been set aside in 1939.

Marshall Meadows, near Berwick upon Tweed, now a country house hotel, was a hospital between 1939 and 1958. Photographed by Rod Allday in 2009, from **Geograph**

About 23 hospitals in the county of Northumberland were transferred to the NHS in 1948. These were nine cottage hospitals, three of the five former workhouses in the county, five out of the eight infectious diseases hospitals, three sanatoria (for tuberculosis), two smallpox hospitals, and one maternity hospital. They fell within the administrative area of the Newcastle Regional Hospital Board, a huge area that stretched across to Cumbria and down to Sunderland, Teeside, County Durham and parts of North Yorkshire. Day-to-day administration was carried out by 33 Hospital Management Committees. This remained the case until the 1974 reorganisation of the NHS which saw the introduction of smaller area health authorities. In the early 1990s most of the hospitals transferred in 1948 were still either in use or at least still standing. Many have been demolished relatively recently. Only Berwick and Alnwick Infirmaries continue in some of their original buildings to this day.

Graylingwell

February 9, 2024March 21, 2025 / Harriet Richardson / Leave a comment

Graylingwell Hospital, to the north of Chichester, opened in July 1897. It was originally built as the West Sussex County Asylum to ease overcrowding at the main county asylum at Haywards Health. The hospital was for ‘pauper lunatics’. The plans were drawn up by Sir Arthur W. Blomfield and Sons in 1895 and building work began in May of that year. The building contractors were Messrs James Langley & Co. of Crawley, and the estimated cost of construction £114,669.

*Site of Graylingwell Hospital, from the one-inch OS map revised in 1893, reproduced courtesy of the National Library of Scotland, CC-BY (NLS)*

The site was some way to the north of Chichester, just to the east of Chichester Barracks, formerly occupied by Graylingwell farm. The farmhouse, steading and the ‘grayling well’ were retained for the use of the hospital.

*Former Graylingwell hospital, 25-inch OS map revised 1896, CC-BY (NLS)*

The main complex was designed on an échelon plan of the standard type with the administration block at the centre to the north, the recreation hall, kitchen and stores at the centre and the patients’ pavilions arranged in an arc, off the outer corridor. It was a plan that allowed the patients’ blocks each to have an unobstructed southerly view. Most of the blocks are of two storeys. A chapel was provided to the north of the administration block and a separate hospital for infectious diseases was built to the north-east near the farm buildings and the old Graylingwell house.

*Central south elevation of the former hospital*, *June 1992*

The main hospital buildings are in Queen Anne style, the administration block the most ornate with its grey stone dressings and central pedimented bay. The main entrance was given classical details on the door surround, surmounted by a broken segmental pediment, over that is a Venetian window, and up again to an oeuil de boeuf window in the pediment. A clock tower sits at the apex of the roof. Within the matron had rooms on the first floor above the entrance.

*Graylingwell Hospital, one of the patients’ pavilions* *on the east side of the main complex, photographed June 1992*

The administration block was one of the most attractive blocks on the site, but the patients’ blocks were also pleasing, though not so highly embellished. The accommodation within the patients’ blocks followed a ‘gallery ward’ arrangement, the gallery being the main day space for patients, furnished with books, papers and games. The dormitories had polished pitch pine floors, were furnished with iron bedsteads, with wire mesh spring mattresses (‘Lawson Tait’ mesh), hair mattresses and bolsters, and white quilts. They were overlooked by one or two attendant’s rooms wit glass panelled doors looking into the dormitory. Single rooms off the dormitories provided for restless or noisy patients. Connecting the various sections of the main complex were the corridors and beneath these ‘great subways, through which a man may walk’.

*Patients’ pavilion, south end of the main complex*

To either side of the administration block were workshops, the boiler house, laundry and the mortuary. If they were able, the male patients spent their days either in the workshops, engaged in work such as shoemaking, tailoring, or plumbing, in the gardens or on the farm. Women worked in the kitchen, laundry or work-rooms. The patients’ pavilions were arranged around the edge of the semi-circular complex. They were all constructed of red brick with grey stone quoins and grey slate hipped roofs. There were four pavilions to the west and five to the east. This would suggest that the female side was the larger east side, as female patients generally out-numbered the male patients. When the asylum opened, the local newspaper carried a lengthy report on the buildings, noting how such hospitals had changed for the better over the last sixty years: ‘Every effort is made to abolish the ‘institution’ and to establish a “home” or at worst a “hospital”.’ [The Observer and West Sussex Recorder, 28 July 1897.]

The elegant Medical Superintendent’s house, situated just to the south-west of the complex, was attached to the perimeter link corridor by its own private corridor, like an umbilical cord. The two-storey and attic house was not much smaller than the whole of the administration block and was similarly detailed. The first medical superintendent was Dr Kidd, the head of a staff of around 95. The assistant medical oficer was Dr Steen. Miss Baines was the first matron; Mr Newman the steward and clerk; Mr Newman the head attendant.

At the centre of the complex, behind the administration block, were the communal service areas, such as the kitchen and stores, and the large recreation hall. The latter was next to the main kitchen and also served as the dining hall. There was a gallery at one end and a stage, complete with orchestra pit, at the other. The proscenium arch is ornamented simply with pairs of half-fluted pilasters resting on high plinths which flank the stage. The Observer and West Sussex Recorder noted the plans for dances, theatrical entertainments and concerts to be held in the ‘magnificent theatre’ during the winters, and out-door entertainment once a week in the summer with the Asylum band.

The chapel has quite a different character. Queen Anne gave way to simple Early English gothic, and red brick was replaced by flint. It is a chapel of great charm, with the air of a small parish church. It comprises a four-bay nave with side aisles screened by a pointed-arched arcade. The side aisles are lit by single lancets and the clerestorey above by quatrefoils. The west wall had two pairs of lancets containing stained glass. The chancel comprised a short choir and sanctuary with a mosaic altar-piece. The east window was a triple lancet with fine figurative glass by Heaton, Butler and Bayne of London. When the asylum first opened, all able patients attended chapel every day for morning prayer.

*Stained-glass window in the chapel* *at the west end.*

The photograph of the chapel above shows the twin entrances that were typical of asylum chapels, allowing separate entrances for men and women, and with a room to the side that could be used to remove a patient from the service if they were unwell, disturbed or noisy.

*Side elevation of Graylingwell chapel, photographed in 2005 after the hospital’s closure*

*Chapel interior*, *looking towards the west end.*

*Chapel interior, from the choir, looking towards the entrance at the east end*

The long drive up to the entrance was planted with lime trees to created an avenue, while a separate road provided access for deliveries. The layout of the gardens and grounds were planned by Mr Lloyd of the Surrey County Asylum at Brookwood, and were laid out by the head gardener at Graylingwell, a Mr Peacock, with the help of 22 workmen. Creepers were planted to soften the buildings.

*former infectious diseases hospital at Graylingwell*

The separate infectious diseases hospital to the north-east of the site comprised a single-storey, symmetrical, south-facing ward block, with sanitary annexes to the rear, joined by a single-storey link corridor to a two-storey north block. Again, it is constructed of red brick but the decorative elements are even more sparse, although it does have two rather jolly roof ventilators on the ward block and also a pleasing porch come glazed verandah at the centre.

In the 1930s a nurses’ home was built to the north-east of the chapel. This rather austere, three-storey, 13-bay, hip-roofed block had its appearance greatly improved by the rampant vegetation which covered most of the south front. Stone quoins could just be seen, peeping from under the foliage. At the same time as the nurses’ home was built, two blocks were added to the south-east of the site. The more northerly and larger had become the Richmond Day Hospital by the early 1990s. It was a symmetrical E-plan, two-storey block. The long, main south front had verandas on either side of the central projecting bay, stylistically blending in well with the original patients’ pavilions.

*Graylingwell Hospital from the 25-inch OS map revised in 1932 CC-BY (NLS)*

The block to the south of of the day hospital, and about half its side, was named Kingsmead in the 1990s. It was similar in style to the Richmond Day Hospital. Another contemporary building was named Summersdale, situated on the north-west side of the site. It had a foundation stone, inscribed with the date 29 October 1931.

*Graylingwell Hospital, pavilion on the north-east side of the hospital complex, photographed in 2005 after closure.*

There were some post-war additions to the site, mostly on a small scale, such as the day-rooms added to the patients’ pavilion on the north-east side of the complex (see above). This looks to have been an addition dating to the 1960s, and is more stylish than usual. As yet I have found no information about the work, but I would guess that it was designed in house by the South West Metropolitan Regional Hospital Board’s architect’s department. The architect to the Board from about 1956 to 1968 was Richard Mellor, F.R.I.B.A., formerly architect to the Leeds Regional Hospital Board (where he was succeeded by P. B. Nash). In 1968 Mellor was succeed as architect to the South West Metropolitan Regional Board by B. W. East .

*Graylingwell Hospital, patients’ pavilions in 2005.*

By the 1990s although closure was mooted, the grounds were still well maintained and the larger elements of the original planting, namely the trees and shrubs, were still very much in evidence. There was a mixed variety of species with particularly fine trees around the Medical Superintendent’s house and the administration block and chapel, where there was a mixture of evergreens and deciduous trees, including the obligatory Yew tree by the chapel.

Since closure a large housing development has been built on the site, incorporating and adapting some of the old hospital buildings: the main patients’ pavilions of the original complex and the administration block (the Clock House) have been detached from their ancillary buildings and converted into flats, while infill housing has been built in place of the recreation hall, kitchens, workshops, laundry etc. The chapel has been retained and the water tower, medical superintendent’s house, and parts of the isolation hospital. Summersdale House is now the Harold Kidd Unit, for the care of the elderly, those with dementia and other mental health conditions, but the Richmond Day Hospital and the Kingsmead block have been demolished. Further mental health facilities have been provided to the south of the site in the Centurion Mental Health Centre and Jupiter House built in 2001.

Davidson Hospital, Girvan

December 10, 2022May 3, 2023 / Harriet Richardson / 8 Comments

*Davidson Cottage Hospital, Girvan, photograph October 2022 © H. Richardson*

At the end of September my husband, Chris, and I took a trip to the south-west corner of Scotland, to the Rhins of Galloway. On the way there and on the way back we stopped off at various hospitals, including this one at Girvan, on the Ayrshire coast.

*General view of the hospital from The Avenue. Photographed October 2022 ©* H. Richardson

This small cottage hospital was designed by the Glasgow firm of architects Watson, Salmond and Gray and built in 1921-2. It was officially opened on 15 June 1922. Thomas Davidson founded and endowed the hospital as a memorial to his mother. The Builder described the style as ‘a free treatment of the Scottish domestic’ and noted that the roofs were slated with Tilberthwaite slates (silver grey). The builders were the local masons, Thomas Blair & Son, who fashioned the handsome Auchenheath stone. They worked with J. & D. Meikle, joiners; William Auld & Son, slater, and William Miller, plasterer, all from Ayr. Tile work was carried out by Robert Brown & Sons of Paisley and the plumbing was done by William Anderson, Ltd, Glasgow. [The Builder, 1 July 1921, p.10.]

*The main front of the hospital. It has been boarded up for about eight years. Photograph © H. Richardson*

When it was visited in the 1940s as part of the Scottish Hospitals Survey it was praised for its good condition. At that time it had 14 beds in two wards, and two single rooms available for maternity cases. It was mostly used for accident cases and work connected with the local medical practitioners. It had a fairly well-equipped operating theatres and good domestic offices.

*Detail of the main front. The inscription over the door reads ‘The Davidson Hospital’. Photograph © H. Richardson*

It is one of my favourite Scottish cottage hospitals, but it has been on the Register of Buildings at Risk since 2014. It has been replaced by a new Community Hospital on the outskirts of Girvan.

*This extension was added in 1971. An effort was made to respect the original building, being small, low, set back and with stone cladding.*

Plans to turn the building into an Enterprise Centre came to nothing. More recently an application was submitted for the conversion of the building into two dwellings. I do hope that the former hospital will be cherished by its new owners.

Historic Hospitals

An Architectural Gazetteer

English Hospitals

July News in August

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May News

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April News

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Herefordshire’s Historic Hospitals

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Hertfordshire Hospitals Survey Revisited

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Winsley Sanatorium

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Tenbury Cottage Hospital

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Lost Hospitals of Northumberland

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Graylingwell

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Davidson Hospital, Girvan

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