ABBOTS LANGLEY

Abbots Langley Hospital and Leavesden Hospital Annexe, College Road (St Pancras Industrial School). The main building on this site was built in 1870 as St Pancras Industrial School. It is a large, red-brick ‘Institutional Gothic’ building by John Giles & Biven. In the 1930s it became an annexe to Leavesden Hospital, but was requisitioned as an emergency hospital in 1939, when a complex of brick-built ward huts was erected in the annexe grounds. After the war the old school buildings were returned to Leavesden Hospital and the hutted buildings became Abbots Langley Hospital for geriatrics. TL 102 012 101187

Leavesden Hospital (Metropolitan Asylum for Imbeciles; Leavesden Mental Hospital). Leavesden Hospital was established as one of the two asylums for pauper imbeciles provided by the Metropolitan Asylums Board, the other being at Caterham. Both asylums were designed on identical plans by John Giles of Giles and Biven in 1868.TL 103 017 101186

BISHOP’S STORTFORD

Bishop’s Stortford and District Hospital (Bishop’s Stortford Cottage Hospital) TL 488 222 101514

Herts and Essex Hospital, Haymeads Lane (Bishop’s Stortford Union Workhouse; Haymeads Institution). A typical Kempthorne-plan mid-Victorian workhouse, of brick and stone, comprising a central Y-plan group of three-storey dormitory wings surrounded by smaller out-buildings. An additional wing, with open south-facing veranda and balcony, was added in the 1930s; a two-storey red-brick nurses’ home also dates from this period. During World War Two, two complexes of Emergency Medical Service (EMS) huts were erected in the grounds, as was an extra nurses’ home. TL 500 209 101343

BUSHEY

Bushey and District Hospital (Bushey Heath Cottage Hospital) TQ151 945 101516

CHESHUNT

Cheshunt Cottage Hospital, Church Lane. This small cottage hospital, with just six beds, was founded as a memorial to Queen Victoria’s Golden Jubilee in 1887. It was designed by Young and Hall and opened in 1890. A two-storeyed central block was flanked by the single-storeyed ward wings and the building was constructed of local stock brick. It has undergone many small alterations and a large extension was built in the 1930s. In 1992 it served as an out-patients’ clinic under the National Health Service (NHS). TQ 355 029 101338

COLNEY HEATH

Hill End Hospital (Hertfordshire County Asylum). Hill End Hospital was built as the Hertfordshire County Asylum. It was designed in 1896 by G. T. Hine on an échelon plan and opened in 1899. It originally contained accommodation for 576 patients but by the 1930s this had risen to 1,232. The main buildings are largely of two storeys, of red brick and are lacking in any great architectural distinction. TL 176 067 101236

HARPENDEN

Harpenden Memorial Hospital, Carlton Road (Harpenden Auxiliary Hospital and Memorial Nursing Centre). A small general hospital, established in 1929 in a late-nineteenth-century house, known as The Red House. A single-storey ward wing was added in 1940. TQ136 147 101238

Sanatorium for Consumptive Children (National Children’s Home and Orphanage Sanatorium) TL 132 151 101998

HEMEL HEMPSTEAD

Bennet’s End Hospital (Hemel Hempstead Joint Isolation Hospital). A small rural isolation hospital, built in 1914-15 to designs by John Saxon Snell and Stanley M. Spoor of London. It comprised a combined administration block and nurses’ home, two single-storey ward blocks, an observation block, and a service block housing the laundry, mortuary and ambulance garage. TL 068 064 101233

Hemel Hempstead Union Workhouse (demolished), Redbourn Road. Hemel Hempstead workhouse was built in 1836. In 1869 a separate infirmary was added which provided 40 beds. This was enlarged in 1935 to accommodate 76 beds and a small nurses’ home was built at the same date.  TL 061 079 101075

King’s College Hospital Convalescent Home (West Hertfordshire Infirmary) TL 060 079 101519

West Hertfordshire Hospital (West Hertfordshire Infirmary) TL 061 079 101520

West Hertfordshire Infirmary TL 050 090 BF101518. In 1831 a new hospital was built at Marlowes in Hemel Hempstead to replace the existing one at Piccotts End to the north of the town, which had become inadequate in terms of its size and location. The first stone of the new building was laid by the Countess of Clarendon on 8 May 1831 and it was completed in time to deal with the many accidents that happened when the London to Birmingham railway was being built through the town of Hemel Hempstead. The new building was funded by Sir John Sebright, and was called the West Herts Infirmary. In 1878 the building ceased to be a hospital was renamed Cheere House and became a convalescent home. In 1946 the building became a residential training school for nurses and remained as such until the early 1960s when it was used as administration offices and Doctors’ accomodation. By the early 1990s the building needed major repair and was refurbished to provide a medical post-graduate centre.

Cheere House was designed in the Victoria Gothic style. It has an irregular plan form and is constructed of brown, stock brick with stone banding and hood mould detail. The roofs are steeply pitched and have decorative barge boards, the roof is tiled with plain ridge tiles and fish-scale tiles. There is an open-fronted entrance porch with decorative barge boards to the north elevation.

In 1946 it became a residential training school for nurses. From the early 1960s, Cheere House was used as administration offices on the ground floor with doctors accommodation above, although by this time it had become run down and was in need of comprehensive repair. In the early 1990s the money became available to fund a major programme of refurbishment to provide a medical post-graduate centre. This included restoration and conversion of the original operating theatre to a lecture theatre and reinstatement of various period details such as the 19th century floor tiles in the main hallway. The building has been significantly extended. In the late 19th century an additional bay was constructed at the north-western end and during the 20th century, a series of large wings and extensions were added to the south and east.

On the ground floor there is a series of administration offices and meeting rooms all of which have modern interiors with few fixtures and fittings of historic or architectural interest. The old operating theatre has been restored and converted to a lecture theatre. It has half-panelled walls, decorative cornice moulding, a wall plaque commemorating Robert Cheere and a plain niche. There is also a fireplace with decorative tilework and moulded timber surround. The gallery has been restored and this features decorative scrolled ironwork, a timber balustrade, and a clock with moulded timber surround.

Of note in the main entrance hallway is the original floor of decorative encaustic tiles laid in a geometric pattern, a typical feature in buildings of the later 19th century. Two of the ground floor rooms retain their fireplaces, one featuring plain blue glazed tiles, the other with decorated tiles and a moulded timber surround. There is a 19th century staircase which has a wreathed newel post, turned balusters and a polished hardwood handrail. There is a suite of rooms at first floor and attic level which are used for residential accommodation.

HERTFORD

East Herts Hospital, Ware Road (Hertford and Ware Isolation Hospital). This former isolation hospital comprises an administration block, three detached single-storeyed ward pavilions, erected in 1897-8, and two on the east side of the site which appear to have been added in the 1920s or 1930s. One of these last was a cubicle isolation block. TL 350 130 101340

Hertford County Hospital, North Road (Hertford General Infirmary). The general infirmary at Hertford was built in 1832-3, the institution having originated in a dispensary established in 1822. A three-storey classical building of stuccoed brick, it was erected by a Mr Smith, and was a typical example of the country-house style of such institutions at this time. The infirmary was enlarged in 1878, when a chapel was added, and again in 1895. A new wing for nurses and patients was built in 1922, but the most interesting feature of the site is the complex of ward wings added in 1932-3. These were designed by C. Ernest Elcock and were the first examples in England of ‘veranda wards’. Beds were arranged parallel with the long walls and in groups separated by screens of steel and glass. The windows were in large horizontal units, with sashes which folded back fully from the centre to either side, thus rendering unnecessary the provision of sun balconies and avoiding the movement of beds. TL 319 126 101339

Hertford Union Workhouse TL 344 131 100920

HITCHIN

North Hertfordshire and South Bedfordshire Hospital (North Hertfordshire and South Bedfordshire Infirmary) TL 182 293 101513

LETCHWORTH

Letchworth Hospital TL 225 323 101512

Rosehill Hospital (Letchworth and Hitchin Isolation Hospital) B309 101999

LONDON COLNEY

Cell Barnes Hospital, Highfield Lane (Cell Barnes Mental Colony). A psychiatric hospital, established in 1933, comprising individual domestic-style patient ‘villas’, arranged within attractive grounds around a central core of service and administrative buildings. TL 174 061 101237

Napsbury Hospital, Shenley Lane (Middlesex County Asylum). Designed in 1900 by Rowland Plumbe, Napsbury Hospital reflected many of the developments in asylum design and planning at the turn of the century, comprising a main complex laid out in a dog-leg échelon accompanied by a detached hospital complex and a number of detached villas. It was erected to supplement Springfield Asylum, transferred to Middlesex from Surrey County when the earlier Middlesex Asylums were taken over by the London County Council in 1889. TQ 165 038 101222

POTTERS BAR

Potters Bar Hospital, Mutton Lane. A small district hospital, of red brick, erected in c.1938. It has a symmetrical plan, with single-storey ward wings arranged in a double-crucifix around a central two- and three-storey administration section.TL 258 010 101057

ROYSTON

Royston and District Hospital TL 350 410 101523

Royston Cottage Hospital TL 350 410 101517

Royston Isolation Hospital TL 364 413 102802

SHENLEY

Shenley Hospital, London Road (Middlesex County Mental Hospital). This large mental hospital was designed in 1930 by the County Architect, W. T. Curtis. The adjacent Harperbury colony for mental defectives had been commenced in the previous year to his designs. Shenley is a good example of its type, the well planted and gently rolling site provides the interest lacking in the functional brick buildings and contrasts with its austere neighbour of Harperbury. Perhaps some of the landscaping was retained from the Porter’s Park estate, along with the large mansion which was converted into a convalescent home. The hospital was designed to accommodate 2,000 patients and was constructed in two main building phases. The first phase, completed in 1934, comprised all the central administration buildings, kitchen, boiler house and recreation hall as well as about half the villas for the patients. One of the most attractive buildings on the site was the chapel, built in the second building phase which was underway by 1937. The hospital was transferred to the National Health Service in 1948 and remained in use as a mental hospital in 1992, although its future was then uncertain. TQ 184 007 101239

ST ALBANS

St Albans and Mid-Hertfordshire Hospital and Dispensary (St Albans Dispensary) TL 147 069 101515

St Albans and Mid-Herts Hospital, Verulam Road (St Albans Dispensary; St Albans and Mid-Herts Hospital and Dispensary). A small urban hospital, established as a dispensary in 1843. In 1888 the institution moved from its home on Holywell Hill to a new, purpose-built home in Verulam Road. This was a two-storey, vernacular-style building, of red brick, designed by Alexander Graham, of London. Plans for expansion, dating from the 1930s, appear not to have been carried out, although the site has remains of recently-demolished extensions. TL 144 076 101235

St Albans City Hospital, Union Lane (Sisters’ Hospital). This attractive hospital for infectious diseases was founded by Sir Blundell Maple as a memorial to his daughters, and opened in 1893. It was designed by Morton M. Glover and comprised three detached buildings: an administration block, ward block and a service block containing the laundry, mortuary and ambulance shed. The buildings were of red brick with half-timbered gables and tile-hanging. In 1911 a ward pavilion for diphtheria cases was added to the site and further additional ward blocks were erected in the inter-war period. The hospital now forms part of St Albans City Hospital together with the former St Albans workhouse. TL 144 080 101234

St Albans City Hospital (St Albans Union Workhouse) TL 144 080 100683

ST STEPHEN

Harperbury Hospital, Harper Lane (Middlesex Colony for Mental Defectives). This large hospital complex was originally built between 1929 and 1936 as the Middlesex Colony for mental defectives. It provided accommodation for 1,154 patients in three groups of pavilions or villas for men, women and children. The buildings, designed by the County Architect, W. T. Curtis, were mostly very plain and relied on their distribution over the well laid out site to soften their austere appearance.  TL 174 017 101240

WATFORD

Holywell Hospital (demolished), Tolpits Lane (Watford Joint Isolation Hospital). An isolation hospital, designed by Charles Ayres for the Watford Union Rural Sanitary Authority and erected to the south-west of Watford in 1893-6. When opened it comprised 42 beds. The hospital was enlarged in 1904, and again in 1934-6 when new cubicle and diphtheria blocks were added by W. H. Hobday, increasing the accommodation to 100 beds. TQ 093 949 101230

Watford and District Peace Memorial Hospital (largely demolished), Rickmansworth Road.  This district general hospital, built to designs by Wallace Marchment in 1923-5, comprised a neo-Georgian administration block, connected by covered corridors to two flanking ward blocks and a north-facing operating theatre block. All the buildings were of brick. Unusually, all the sanitary facilities were housed within the wards, rather than in disconnected annexes. The hospital was extended in 1932-7, although apparently not on the ambitious scale planned by Marchment in 1929.

Of a 5-acre complex, which included an electrical treatment and casualty departments, only the administration block (disused) and the nurses’ home  (a nurses’ training college) remained in 1992. TQ 105 968 101231

Watford Cottage Hospital, Vicarage Road. A typical late-nineteenth century cottage hospital of the smaller type, Watford Cottage Hospital was erected in 1885 to designs by Charles Ayres. It is a single-storey brick-and-tile building to which extra ward wings were added in 1897 and 1903-6. In 1992 it was in use as Victoria House Day Centre. TQ 109 962 101144

Watford General Hospital, Vicarage Road (Watford Union Workhouse; Shrodells Hospital). The former Watford Union Workhouse survives on part of the site of this large modern general hospital. TQ 105 957 101232

WELWYN

Queen Victoria Memorial Hospital TL 225 159 101511

Victoria Cottage Hospital, Codicote Road TL 220 160 101521

Victoria Cottage Hospital, Elm Gardens TL 220 160 101522