Devon

ASHBURTON

Ashburton and Buckfastleigh Hospital, Eastern Road (Ashburton and Buckfastleigh Cottage Hospital) SX 761 703 100700

First established around 1875-85 and moved to new purpose-built premises by 1905 to the north-east of Ashburton near the Umber Works. It is now (2025) the Ashburton Health and Wellbeing Centre.

AXMINSTER

Axminster Cottage Hospital (Axminster Carpet Factory)  SY 297 986 100793

Axminster Hospital (Axminster Cottage Hospital) SY 298 987 100794

Axminster Union Workhouse, Musbury road

BARNSTAPLE

Barnstaple Borough Isolation Hospital, Castle Street

Barstaple Union Workhouse, Bear Street/Alexandra Road

Hawley Tuberculosis Hospital

North Devon Infirmary, Litchdon Street SS 561 327 100556

BEAWORTHY

Winsford Hospital SX 445 999 100335

*Winsford Hospital, photographed in the 1990s © Louis Holmsted*

BIDEFORD

Bideford Infirmary and Dispensary, Meadow Street SS 451 263 100498, (demolished c.2010-11)

A dispensary was established on The Quay in 1850, and from 1873 began to admit in-patients, becoming the Infirmary and Dispensary. A new building on the south side of Meddon Street, just along from the Union Workhouse, was opened in 1887. The architect was G. Malam Wilson of Bideford. A children’s ward was created in 1895, occupying the former boardroom, and a new boardroom and outpatients’ waiting-room built, the plans drawn up by R. T. Hookway. The Infirmary relocated to larger premises in 1925 on Abbotsham Road (see below). By the 1990s it had become the Grenville Nursing Home. The building was still standing in June 2009, and can be seen on Google Street view from that time, but had been demolished by September 2011. New terraced housing has been built on the site and further new housing on the land to the south. [Sources: RCHME Hospital Report, K. A. Morrison, 1992; Google streetview.]

Bideford and District Hospital (Bideford Community Hospital) SS 448 265 100433

*Bideford and District Hospital on the 25-inch OS map revised in 1932 CC-BY (NLS)*

A new hospital to replace the building in Meddon Street was built on the north side of Abbotsham Road. The foundation stone was laid in December 1924, and the building estimated to cost £16,000. It opened in 1925, and the local Medical Officer of Health, Ellis Pearson, in his annual report for that year was full of praise for the new hospital: ‘Bideford new possesses probably the most up-to-date modern Hospital in the County, adn for its size the most efficiently equipped.’ The site had plenty of room, the buildings electrically lit and centrally heated. It provided 32 beds arranged in male and female wards of 10 beds, and for each there were also two separate wards, one of two beds and one single room for ‘bad, noisy or accident cases, those that are unsuitable for the general ward, or detrimental to the cases there’. In addition there was a children’s ward with six beds, an out-patients’ department, with waiting room, doctors’ consulting room, casualty room for dressing minor or septic surgical cases, and a dispensary, and also an operating theatre, X-ray room, pathological room, as well as facilities for eye treatment and refractive work. On top of all that, there was ‘ample accommodation’ for nurses and staff. [Sources: Western Mail, 12 Dec 1924 p.10: Borough of Bideford, annual Report of the Medical Officer of Health for 1925.]

Bideford Union Workhouse (Torridge Hospital,) SS 449 263 100499 (Part demolished – two front ranges extant, converted to housing: Westcroft Court.)

*Bideford Union Workhouse (The Whitehouse), on the 25-inch OS map revised in 1932, CC-BY (NLS)*

Bideford Union Workhouse was built in 1835-6 to a design by George Gilbert Scott. By 1886 an isolation block had been built to the south-east, probably built in the 1870s. A new infirmary, for which R. T. Hookway & Sons provide the plans, opened in 1903. [Sources: RCHME Hospital Report, K. A. Morrison, 1992.]

Kingsley Hospital (North Devon Joint Isolation Hospital; Bideford Isolation Hospital)

*Isolation hospital to the east of Bideford, on the 25-inch OS map surveyed in 1886, CC-BY (NLS)*

The original hospital on the site was probably built as a smallpox hospital around 1870. It had 9 beds. The Medical Officer for Health for Bideford Rural District proposed establishing a join isolation hospital in 1912, or that arrangements should be made to send patients to the urban isolation hospital should an urgent case arise.

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

However, no progress was made until the early 1930s when a new hospital was designed by Frank E. Whiting. The original hospital building was retained, at the west side of the site, and a lodge, administration block, and three new ward blocks added. The new hospital opened in June 1934. It was renamed Kingsley Hospital in 1955. The buildings are still extant, now named Kingsley House and in the care of the National Autistic Society and used as a residential centre. [Sources: North Devon Gazette, 26 March 1912, p.3.]

BOVEYTRACEY

Bovey Tracey and District Hospital SX 815 789 100320

Hawkmoor Sanatorium (Devon C C Sanatorium for Tuberculosis) SX 802 808 100322

BRAMPFORD SPEKE

Devon County Smallpox Hospital

BUDLEIGH SALTERTON

Budleigh Salterton Cottage HOspital, East Budleigh Road

CHAGFORD

Dartmoor Sanatorium (now Torr House Hotel) SX 684 868 100702

CHULMLEIGH

Chulmleigh Cottage Hospital, East Street

COCKINGTON

Torquay Corporation Sanitary Hospital

CREDITON

Crediton Hospital (Crediton Union Workhouse) SS 005 820

DARTMOUTH

Dartmouth and Kingswear Hospital (Dartmouth Cottage Hospital) SX 878 513 100706

DAWLISH

Dawlish Cottage Hospital, Luscombe Terrace NGR SX 958 769 HE Archive BR 100361 (extant in 2024, converted to residential use)

The cottage hospital in Dawlish was first established in 1871, moving to Luscombe Terrace in 1880, apparently adapted from two small houses. It was enlarged in 1905 and again in 1929, presumably when the vacant plot to the south was built over. The building is mostly red brick with white-painted render to the upper floor at the north corner, some curious rubble-stone facing at ground floor level, and slate roofs, with rather a jumble of gables. ‘COTTAGE HOSPITAL’ is inscribed on a band course on the north facade.

*Competition winning design for Dawlish Cottage Hospital, from* The Builder, *28 May 1937, p.1136 (from the Internet Archive)*

Hopes of replacing the hospital in the late 1930s were abandoned at the outbreak of the war, though a competition had been held for the design in 1937 that was won by the husband and wife architectural practice of J. T. Alliston & Jane Drew. The assessor of the competition was Leslie T. Moore, and entrants were required to be British architects practising within 200 miles of Dawlish. All 53 submitted designs were displayed in Dawlish (at Ivycroft, East Cliff Road).[Source: Historic England Archive, RCHME Hospital Report, K. A. Morriosn 1992.]

ERMINGTON

Lee Mill Hospital (Plympton St Mary RDC Isolation Hospital; Plymouth Isolation Hospital) SX 606 563 100379

EXETER

Digby Hospital (City of Exeter Lunatic Asylum) SS 770 880 60100

Ellen Tinkham School (Heavitree Isolation Hospital; Exeter Corporation Tuberculosis Sanatorium) SX 962 934 100364

Exeter Dispensary (now Exeter College o f Art and Design) SX 918 928 100321

Exe Vale Hospital (Wonford House Lunatic Asylum; Wonford House Hospital) SX 937 917 100362

Institution for Trained Nurses and Home Hospital  SX 923 923 100383

Princess Elizabeth Orthopaedic Hospital (Devonian Cripples’ Hospital) SX 930 920 100317

Redhills Hospital (St Thomas Union Workhouse: now Grasmere Court) SX 907 924 100367

*Front range of the former St Thomas’s Workhouse, now Grasemere Court, photographed in 2008 ©* *Roger Cornfoot from Geograph*

St Thomas’s Union Workhouse was built in about 1836. The first edition OS map above shows clearly that it was based on Samson Kempthorne’s Y-shaped model plan. The map also shows the chapel and H-plan infirmary block. A further infirmary building was added in 1897 on the north side of the H-plan range, connected to it by a covered way or corridor. The workhouse became a geriatric hospital under the NHS, renamed Redhills.

*St Thomas’s Union Workhouse on the OS map surveyed 1875-88 CC-BY (NLS)*

In 1974 the former workhouse was listed Grade II. It closed in 1990-1 and was standing empty when visited by the RCHME investigators. By around 1996 part of the site was in use as a day centre by Exeter Community Health Trust for mental health patients, but by then planning permission had already been granted to convert the hospital to 43 flats, which was amended in 1992 for conversion to 48 units and 63 new houses (new housing was built to the north of the site).[Sources: RCHME Hospital Report, K. A. Morrison 1992: Exeter City Council online planning portal: Exeter Memories]

Royal Devon and Exeter Hospital (Devon and Exeter Hospital; Dean Clarke House) SX 923 923 100365

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

The Royal Devon and Exeter Hospital is one of Britain’s oldest hospitals, and occupied this site in the heart of Exeter from the 1740s until it relocated in the 1970s to Wonford, where a new District General Hospital was built in the grounds of Wonford House Hospital (see below). The foundation stone of the Devon and Exeter Hospital was laid on 27 August 1741. The Dean of Exeter, Alured Clarke had instigated its establishment, who had instigated the foundation of the Royal Hampshire Hospital in 1736, while he was canon at Winchester Cathedral. The plan for the Exeter hospital was drawn up by John Richards, a builder and subscriber to the new hospital, and he offered his services as Clerk of Works free of charge. The original building comprised an administration block flanked by ward wings.

*View of north elevation of Devon and Exeter Hospital as proposed, detail from Rocque’s map of Exeter, 1744*

The view of the hospital in the margins of Rocque’s map of Exeter published in 1744 (above) was based on the proposed plan and elevation. This was the first purpose-built general voluntary hospital in England outside London, and there are elements in its design that would seem to have been drawn from Guy’s Hospital in London (opened in 1725) and Edinburgh’s Royal Infirmary (on which building commenced in 1738). The original design had a ground-floor colonnade on the south elevation (at the back of the building), though this feature was abandoned. Both Guy’s and the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary featured wards that were lit by windows on either side set opposite each other, as in the much later Nightingale style wards of the pavilion plan hospital. There is an indication on the plan of partitions between the beds – at Guy’s box beds lined the ward walls, and Edinburgh too seems to have originally had box beds or cubicles.

*Devon & Exeter Hospital on the OS map surveyed in 1888* *CC-BY (NLS)*

When the hospital opened in 1743 only part of the building had been completed: the central section and a truncated ward wing on the south side (five bays instead of the nine shown on the elevation). By the mid-1750s the ward wing to the north had been built and that to the south extended and in 1772 the central administrative section was enlarged, building out the central recessed bays to form the more elegant advanced pedimented front that we see today.

*Royal Devon & Exeter Hospital on the OS map revised in 1904* *CC-BY (NLS)*

The next main phase of alteration and extension came in the mid-nineteenth century when a lecture room and museum for anatomical specimens were built (in 1853) and the Halford Wing, following a legacy from a Mrs Halford in 1856. Plans for the Halford Wing were drawn up by John Hayward, and featured back-to-back wards. It was three storeys and attic over a basement, in red brick with slate roof. A children’s ward followed in 1860, funded by a legacy from Sir John Bowring, and in 1869 a chapel was built (John Hayward, architect) at the expense of Arthur Kemp, surgeon. Then in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century a further phase of extensions saw the erection of the Victoria Wing in 1895-9 (Charles Cole, architect), a new operating theatre in 1905 (A. C. Harbottle, architect), and an Ear, Nose and Throat department established in 1913.

*Royal Devon & Exeter Hospital on the OS map revised in 19*32 *CC-BY (NLS)*

After the First World War the Ministry of Pensions gave a grant of £2,000 towards the erection and equipment of a new ward for discharged, disabled ex-servicemen. The result was the Victory Wing, designed by E. H. Harbottle & Sons, which opened in 1922. A new nurses home and a new outpatients’ department were begun in 1933. Leslie Moore was the architect for both. The nurses’ home (since demolished) was built to the south-east of the Halford Wing.

*Royal Devon & Exeter Hospital on the large-scale OS map surveyed in 1950* *CC-BY (NLS)*

In 1947 plans were drawn up for a new radiotherapy department and dining hall, designed by H. M. R. Drury, with work scheduled to begin in 1948. The hospital also had at its service a convalescent home in Torquay: the Ockenden Convalescent Home. After the hospital transferred to the NHS it continued on this site until 1974 when it moved out of Exeter to a new building erected within the grounds of Wonford House Hospital. Work had begun on the new hospital by 1969. It was designed as a tower on a podium, with wards in an eight or nine storey slab block rising above a largely single storey podium containing services, outpatients’ departments etc. There was a separate laundry and boiler house. Problems with the concrete used in the construction of the new hospital were discovered in the mid-1980s. A replacement hospital was built immediately to the south, from the plan it appears to have been built to the standard ‘nucleus’ model designed by the Ministry of Health. The design forms a grid or lattice of internal courtyards. The buildings are of two-storeys and pitched roofs, and were built in two phases opening in 1992 and 1996.. The 1970s tower was demolished, its site subsequently built over. The Peninsula Medical School opened in 2000, and a new maternity, neonatal and gynaecology unit opened in 2007. [Sources: RCHME Hospital Report, K. A. Morrison 1992: Exeter Memories.]

Royal Devon and Exeter Hospital (Heavitree) (formerly Exeter Incorporation Workhouse; Exeter City Hospital) SX 932 927 100366

*Exeter Workhouse as depicted in the margin of Rocque’s map of 1744*

The earliest building on the site was erected as Exeter Incorporation Workhouse in 1698-1707. The plans were drawn up by Ralph Mitchell. Roque’s map included an elevation of the workhouse (above), showing a largely two-storey and attics building with projecting wings to the south. An infirmary was added in 1821, seemingly for maternity and fever cases. This building was enlarged in 1858. Subsequent additions and alterations provided a larger hospital, schools, workshops, ‘lunatic’ wards and receiving wards. The site was badly damaged during the Blitz in the Second World War, the large-scale OS map of 1949 still showing ruins on the south side. The only buildings to survive were the new infirmary of 1905 at the north end of the site (parts of which were still extant in 2024) and the children’s home of 1913 in the south-east corner of the site.

*Exeter Union Workhouse on the 25-inch OS map surveyed in 1888 CC-BY (NLS)*

The OS map surveyed in 1888 clearly shows the outline of the original workhouse, and the 1821 hospital and school added to the north.

*The former workhouse on the OS map revised in 1932, shown as a public assistance institution CC-BY (NLS)*

The OS map revised in 1932 shows the new infirmary built in 1904-5, linked to the earlier hospital block by a covered way. The infirmary was designed by the local architect R. M. Challice, and the building contractors were Ham & Passmore, also local. It comprised four detached blocks connected by covered ways. Three of these survived the bombing, the central administration block, the women’s ward pavilion to its west and maternity block on the north side. The ward pavilions were two storey high, with 66 beds distributed in two large and two small wards, with four single rooms for isolation. They also had day rooms and the usual bathrooms, kitchens and stores. The children’s Home was also designed by Challice. The foundation stone was laid in January 1913 and the builders were Soper & Ayres, of Exeter. The central block of three storeys was flanked by two-storey wings, of red brick and slate roofed.

*The workhouse site on the large-scale OS map revised in 1949, by which time it had developed as Exeter City Hospital CC-BY (NLS)*

*The large-scale OS map revised in 1971 shows the further development of the site and the renaming of the hospital as the Heavitree branch of the Royal Devon and Exeter Hospital CC-BY (NLS)*

In 1939 the former workhouse became the City Hospital, and in 1948 was transferred to the NHS. Under the NHS new buildings were added in the 1950s and ’60s as it developed into a centre for maternity, dentistry and geriatrics. The maternity unit closed in 2007. Some of the post-war buildings have since been demolished, including the staff accommodation in the south-western portion of the site which was sold to the John Lewis Partnership to make way for a Waitrose store which opened in 2011. The remaining hospital contains a number of specialist units. [Sources: RCHME Hospital Report, K. A. Morrison 1992; David Cornforth, ‘Heavitree Workhouse or City Hospital and City Workhouse a history’, Exeter Memories.]

West of England Eye Infirmary SX 923 922 100318

Whipton Hospital (Exeter City Isolation Hospital) SX 954 934 100319

EXMOUTH

Exmouth Cottage Hospital, Claremont Grove SY 009 810 100363

*Ground-floor plan of Exmouth Cottage Hospital, from* The Builder, *13 Aug. 1904 (Internet Archive)*

Exmouth Cottage Hospital was built in 1902-4 to designs by Tait and Harvey. It replaced an earlier hospital established in 1884 by Mrs Hume Long, named the Maud Hospital in memory of her daughter, who had died of diphtheria in 1880. Maud Hospital had opened at 8 Clarence Road and then moved into two houses on Bicton Street in 1885. It then had 9 beds for surgical cases. The new hospital provided 14 beds in two six-bed wards and two single rooms. In 1916 an extension to the rear allowed the kitchen to be moved from the upper floor to the ground floor, the new kitchen being built against the west side of the out-patients’ department. The architect was E. E. Ellis of Exmouth & Exeter.

*Exmouth Cottage Hospital on the 25-inch OS map revised in 1904 CC-BY (NLS)*

*Exmouth Cottage Hospital on the large-scale OS map surveyed in 1950 CC-BY (NLS)*

Extensive enlargement of the hospital took place in 1929, to plans by J. C. Beare. A Women’s ward, additional single wards, a children’s ward, new theatre, X-ray department and outpatients’ department were added at this time. The foundation stone of the south ward was laid by Lady Clinton on 9 October 1929. Plans for a further extension and alterations had been drawn up by the summer of 1937, which may have included the extension on the east side. The hospital was transferred to the NHS in 1948, and between 1965 and 1972 a health centre was built to the north of the hospital. More recently (in the 1990s or 2000s?) the hospital has been extended on the east side with the erection of the Dewdney Unit.[Sources: RCHME Hospital Report, K. A. Morrison 1992; The Builder, 13 Aug. 1904.]

GREAT TORRINGTON

Torrington Cottage Hospital SS 490 190 100798

HOLSWORTHY

Holsworthy Hospital (Holsworthy Union Workhouse) SS 340 042 100370

HONITON

Marlpits Hospital (Honiton Union Workhouse) ST 164 002 100316

ILFRACOMBE

Ilfracombe Isolation Hospital, Bicclescombe

KENTON

Western Counties’ Hospital (Western Counties Idiots’ Asylum; Royal Western Counties’ Hospital) SX 976 816 100334

KINGSBRIDGE

South Hams Hospital (South Hams, Kingsbridge, Salcombe and District Cottage Hospital) SX 731 447 100705

LYNTON AND LYNMOUTH

Lynton Cottage Hospital SS 710 490 100797

MORETONHAMPSTEAD

Moretonhampstead Hospital (Moretonhampstead Cottage Hospital) SX 752 862 100701

Moretonhampstead Convalescent Home, Court Street SX 751 859

*old postcard of Moretonhampstead convalescent home*

The convalescent home here had been established by the mid-1880s, and continued in operation into the 1970s. It is currently (2024) a care home, now called Coppelia House.

*Moretonhampstead Convalescent Home on the OS map surveyed in 1885, the home was on the south side of Court Street (see map below), CC-BY (NLS)*

*Moretonhampstead Convalescent Home on the OS map surveyed in 1936-7 CC-BY (NLS)*

NEWTON ABBOT

Newton Abbot Hospital (Newton Abbot Cottage Hospital and Dispensary) SX 860 710 100371

Newton Abbot Hospital (Newton Abbot Union Workhouse)  SX 861 710 100372

Newton Abbot Joint Isolation Hospital SX 852 702 100323

OKEHAMPTON

Okehampton and District War Memorial Cottage Hospital SX 591 951 100333

OTTERY ST MARY

Ottery St Mary District Cottage Hospital SY 100 956 100315

PLYMOUTH

Central Hospital (Devon and Cornwall Homoeopathic Hospital and Three Towns Dispensary) SX 476 543 100384

Military Families’ Hospital (subsequently Cumberland House Residential Unit) SX 458 544 100332

Mount Gould Hospital (Plymouth Borough Fever Hospital)  SX 498 552 100328

Plymouth General Hospital (South Devon and East Cornwall Hospital; Prince of Wales Hospital)  SX 485 553 100385

Plymouth General Hospital, Freedom Fields (Plymouth Incorporation Workhouse) SX 487 567 100329

Royal Albert Hospital and Eye Infirmary (Devonport, Stonehouse and Cornwall Hospital) SX 453 549 100327

Royal Eye Infirmary (Plymouth Eye Dispensary; Plymouth Eye Infirmary) SX 480 556 100375

Royal Military Hospital (now Devonport High School for Boys)  SX 463 549 100376

Royal Naval Hospital  SX 466 547 100373

Scott Hospital (Devonport Borough Isolation Hospital; Swilly Isolation Hospital) SX 464 567 100326

Stoke Damerell Workhouse SX 460 565 100374

SEATON

Seaton and District Community Hospital (Seaton and Beer Cottage Hospital) SY 240 900 100795

SIDMOUTH

Victoria Cottage Hospital SY 125 876 100796

SOUTH BRENT

Didworthy Chest Hospital (Devon and Cornwall Sanatorium for Consumptives) SX 685 622 100331

TAVISTOCK

Tavistock Hospital (Tavistock Cottage Hospital and Dispensary) SX 474 742 100382

TEIGNMOUTH

Teignmouth, Dawlish and Newton Infirmary and Convalescent Home (Teignmouth Dispensary; Teignmouth and Dawlish Dispensary and Marine Infirmary) SX 940 730 100799

Teignmouth Hospital SX 940 730 100800

TIVERTON

Belmont Hospital (Tiverton Union Workhouse) SS 958 130 38934

Blundell’s School Sanatorium  SS 975 130 100434

Post Hill Hospital (Tiverton and District Hospital for Infectious Diseases) SS 986 013 100503

Tiverton and District Hospital (Tiverton Hospital and Dispensary) SS 956 008 100500

TORBAY

Brixham Hospital (Brixham Cottage Hospital and District Nursing Institution) SX 925 554 100707

Erith House Home of Rest (Erith House Residence for Gentlewomen with Chest

Disease) SX929 638 100703

Kings Ash Hospital (Paignton Isolation Hospital)  SX 874 608 100709

Paignton and District Hospital (Paignton Cottage Hospital) SX 887 608 100708

Rowcroft Hospice (Rowcroft Convalescent Home), Avenue Road SX 900 646.

Originally Pilmuir House, owned by the Wills family from Bristol of cigarette manufacturing fame. The house was built in 1902. After the First World War it was occupied by one of the Wills family daughters Ella Rowcroft. She built Rainbow House on the estate in 1935, into which she moved in 1937, and turning the earlier house into a convalescent home for women and children with Tb. During the Second World War the house became a maternity home. Ella Rowcroft died in 1941 leaving an endowment fund to continue the work of the convalescent home. In 1982 the home became a hospice with backing from the Torquay Lions Club. A new ward was created in 1983, and another together with a single room in 1990. [Sources: Rowcroft Hospice website.]

Torbay Hospital  SX 898 659 100647

Torbay Hospital, Provident Dispensary and Eye Infirmary (Torquay Dispensary; now Castle Chambers) SX 911 645 100704

TORQUAY

Babbacombe Hospital for chronic and Incurable Children

Rosehill Children’s Hospital SX 900 650 100817

Torquay Isolation Hospital  SX 897 662 100648

TOTNES

Broomborough Hospital (Tomes Union Workhouse) SX 795 603 100325

Totnes and District Hospital (Totnes and District Cottage Hospital; Totnes Cottage Hospital)  SX 810 604 100324

UGBOROUGH

Moorhaven Hospital (Plymouth Borough Lunatic Asylum) SX 667 577 100330

click on the link above for a post on Moorhaven village