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sherlock60This week, the canon story we’re looking at is The Hound of the Baskervilles, Chaps. 1-4 and the chosen topic is Hospitals.
A few facts:
🏥 There were several different kinds of hospitals in Victorian times. These hospitals consisted of the Voluntary hospitals, Specialist and cottage hospitals, Poor Law infirmaries, Hospitals for Infectious Diseases and Asylums for the mentally ill. [Welcome to 1876 Victorian England]
🏥 The voluntary hospital began as a charitable institution initially developed to serve the poor without charge. They were funded by donations and subscriptions from wealthy benefactors. These hospitals turned away the truly destitute [the hospitals were aimed at the ‘deserving’ poor—those that were in work when they became ill] as well as those who could afford to pay for the services… Doctors working in these types of hospitals [were] not compensated. They [made] their living from private practice. [Welcome to 1876 Victorian England]
🏥 The out-patients' department of a Victorian general hospital was very like today's accident and emergency departments where most cases could be treated and sent home… Those who had been seen by a doctor emerged from the consulting room with a prescription card which they took to the dispensary. Unlike today, bottles were not supplied free of charge so patients brought their own jars as receptacles for their medicine, or bought one from an itinerant bottle-seller outside the hospital. As well as medicines, out-patients could be prescribed surgical appliances such as crutches, artificial eyes or limbs, spectacles or a truss for supporting a hernia (a common complaint amongst labourers). [Michelle Higgs]
🏥 Around 1850-1860, Specialist hospitals began to evolve out of the need for caring for certain medical conditions which were excluded by the Voluntary hospitals… in the 1860s the "British Medical Journal" ran a campaign against specialist hospitals arguing that it drew away interesting cases from the general hospitals (which… had [actually] been turning these cases away) harming the education of medical students.
The 1850s-1860s also brought the creation of the Cottage Hospital which began to develop in the rural areas to reduce the distance people had to travel to get to a hospital… Modest weekly sums [were] charged for the services provided by these facilities. The first of these cottage hospitals opened at Cranleigh in Surrey in 1859. By 1875, 148 cottage hospitals were opened. [Welcome to 1876 Victorian England]
🏥 The Poor Law infirmaries [were] hospitals within the workhouses... It was here where the aged or incurable sick often ended up… Poor Law Infirmaries ranked lowest in the performance of medical care. [Welcome to 1876 Victorian England]
🏥 In order to prevent the spread of infection, [Hospitals for Infectious Diseases] were established to isolate patients with contagious diseases. In many instances, there was no charge to the patient to encourage them to enter the hospital in order to protect the public from exposure. [Welcome to 1876 Victorian England]
🏥 The mentally ill [were] accommodated in asylums, provided for by public funds as the result of the 1808 County Asylums Act… For financial reasons, by 1870, it became the policy of leaving harmless cases in the workhouse and sending away only the dangerously insane to the asylums. [Welcome to 1876 Victorian England]
🏥 Leavesden Asylum was a vast site that was built in 1870. It was built by Victorians who recognised that there were some poor in the London workhouses that could not be safely housed and cared for… Though Leavesden is now almost on the edge of London, 150 years ago it was a remote location… The 78 acre site housed “quiet and harmless” imbeciles from north London in a totally self-sufficient estate… 860 women were housed in 6 separate and identical looking blocks whilst 700 men were housed in five separate blocks. There was also a medical area, exercise gym, administration office, church, farm and various ancillary buildings such as boiler-rooms and laundry rooms. [Stephen Liddell]
🏥 In 1818… Dr Benjamin Golding (1793-1863), together with his friend John Robertson, established the West London Infirmary and Dispensary at No. 16 Suffolk Street, behind the Haymarket Theatre. [Golding had previously thrown open his own house in Leicester Place to "such poor persons as deserve gratuitous advice”.] In 1823 it moved to a larger building…
In 1827 the Infirmary's name was changed to Charing Cross Hospital… In 1830 a site in Agar Street, just off the Strand, was offered by the government, with an annual ground rent of £400.
The hospital was completed in January 1834 and opened to in-patients on 10th February… The building was extended in 1840 and, in 1850, the freehold was purchased… In 1862 children's wards opened and, in 1867, the Hospital was extended again. In 1877 much of the Hospital was rebuilt and enlarged, doubling its size. It then had 120 beds. In 1885 the Hospital was extended again and, in 1888, the first Matron and Sisters engaged. [Lost Hospitals of London]
🏥 When Conan Doyle published his first Sherlock Holmes mystery, A Study in Scarlet, he told his readers that Dr Watson trained as an army doctor at Netley – its name was so well known that the author did not need to explain any further. The hospital was, after all, a town in itself, a 200-acre medicropolis with its own gasworks, reservoir, school, stables, bakery and prison. There was a grand officers' mess, complete with ballroom, and modest married quarters for other ranks. There was even a salty swimming pool, fed by a windmill pumping water from the sea. By Philip Hoare on The Guardian website.
🏥 Re Bart’s: in 1850, Elizabeth Blackwell, one of the pioneers of medicine as a career for women, was permitted to study at St Bartholomew's Hospital by James Paget, the first warden of the medical school and later Serjeant-Surgeon to Queen Victoria. After Blackwell’s departure female students were opposed and excluded until 1947.
In 1877, the School of Nursing was founded and the first ‘probationers’, or student nurses, entered St Bartholomew's.
In 1881, Ethel Gordon Manson (later Mrs Bedford Fenwick) was appointed as matron. She went on to become Britain’s first state registered nurse.
In 1896, X-rays were first used at St Bartholomew's. [Barts Health]
🏥 The League of St. Bartholomew’s Nurses was founded in 1899 by Isla Stewart, who became one of the founder members of the International Council of Nurses. [League of St. Bartholomew’s Nurses]
🏥 The Nightingale Home and Training School for Nurses opened its doors to trainees in July 1860, as part of the newly built St Thomas’s Hospital in London. One of the first institutions to teach nursing and midwifery as a formal profession, the training school was dedicated to communicating the philosophy and practice of its founder and patron, Florence Nightingale. [British Library]
Some useful resources:
Hospitals On The Victorian Web. Photos and images of, and brief articles about, hospitals opened in Victorian times.
List of hospitals and dispensaries On The Dictionary of Victorian London. Extracts taken from Victorian sources.
Victorian Hospitals On Welcome to 1876 Victorian England.
Hospitals in the Victorian Era On victorianerahealthandmeds.weebly.com
Victorian Hospitals: The Out-Patients’ Department By Michelle Higgs on A Visitor’s Guide to Victorian England.
Voluntary Hospitals On The Development of the London Hospital System, 1823 - 2015 by Geoffrey Rivett.
The Poor Law Infirmaries On The Development of the London Hospital System, 1823 - 2015 by Geoffrey Rivett.
Smallpox and Fever Hospitals On The Development of the London Hospital System, 1823 - 2015 by Geoffrey Rivett.
Bethlehem Hospital [AKA Bethlem Hospital or Bedlam] On The Dictionary of Victorian London. Extracts from Victorian era sources.
Letters tell of life inside Victorian mental asylum Specifically the Royal Edinburgh Asylum in Morningside. On The Scotsman’s website.
Leavesden Asylum – A Victorian Hospital with a modern twist! By Stephen Liddell.
Palace of pain: Netley, the hospital built for an empire of soldiers By Philip Hoare on the Guardian website. [Netley is where Watson went through the course prescribed for surgeons in the army.] The article is truly about Netley during WWI but there is a reference to Victorian times.
Charing Cross Hospital On Lost Hospitals of London. Brief history, and (modern) photographs of the original building, now the Charing Cross Police Station.
Brief History During the Snow Era (1813-58) Brief history of Charing Cross Hospital and Medical School, during the Snow period—that is, during the life of John Snow.
St. Bartholomew's Hospital [Bart’s] On The Dictionary of Victorian London. Extracts from Victorian sources.
Our history On the Barts Health website.
History On the League of St. Bartholomew’s Nurses website.
The Nightingale Home and Training School for Nurses, St. Thomas's Hospital On the British Library website.
Records reveal life at Victorian children's hospital By Eleanor Bradford on the BBC website.
Historic Hospital Admission Records Project HHARP, the home of 19th century children’s hospital records… ...the databases cover a period from 1852 to 1921.
Hospitals and Medical Education On The Development of the London Hospital System, 1823 - 2015 by Geoffrey Rivett.
Please feel free to discuss this topic in the comments.
Please also feel free to comment about the canon story itself or any related aspects outside this week’s theme. For example, any reactions, thoughts, theories, fic recs, favourite adaptations of the canon story… Or any other contribution you wish to make. And if you have any suggestions for fic prompts springing from this week's story, please feel free to share those in the comments as well.
A few facts:
🏥 There were several different kinds of hospitals in Victorian times. These hospitals consisted of the Voluntary hospitals, Specialist and cottage hospitals, Poor Law infirmaries, Hospitals for Infectious Diseases and Asylums for the mentally ill. [Welcome to 1876 Victorian England]
🏥 The voluntary hospital began as a charitable institution initially developed to serve the poor without charge. They were funded by donations and subscriptions from wealthy benefactors. These hospitals turned away the truly destitute [the hospitals were aimed at the ‘deserving’ poor—those that were in work when they became ill] as well as those who could afford to pay for the services… Doctors working in these types of hospitals [were] not compensated. They [made] their living from private practice. [Welcome to 1876 Victorian England]
🏥 The out-patients' department of a Victorian general hospital was very like today's accident and emergency departments where most cases could be treated and sent home… Those who had been seen by a doctor emerged from the consulting room with a prescription card which they took to the dispensary. Unlike today, bottles were not supplied free of charge so patients brought their own jars as receptacles for their medicine, or bought one from an itinerant bottle-seller outside the hospital. As well as medicines, out-patients could be prescribed surgical appliances such as crutches, artificial eyes or limbs, spectacles or a truss for supporting a hernia (a common complaint amongst labourers). [Michelle Higgs]
🏥 Around 1850-1860, Specialist hospitals began to evolve out of the need for caring for certain medical conditions which were excluded by the Voluntary hospitals… in the 1860s the "British Medical Journal" ran a campaign against specialist hospitals arguing that it drew away interesting cases from the general hospitals (which… had [actually] been turning these cases away) harming the education of medical students.
The 1850s-1860s also brought the creation of the Cottage Hospital which began to develop in the rural areas to reduce the distance people had to travel to get to a hospital… Modest weekly sums [were] charged for the services provided by these facilities. The first of these cottage hospitals opened at Cranleigh in Surrey in 1859. By 1875, 148 cottage hospitals were opened. [Welcome to 1876 Victorian England]
🏥 The Poor Law infirmaries [were] hospitals within the workhouses... It was here where the aged or incurable sick often ended up… Poor Law Infirmaries ranked lowest in the performance of medical care. [Welcome to 1876 Victorian England]
🏥 In order to prevent the spread of infection, [Hospitals for Infectious Diseases] were established to isolate patients with contagious diseases. In many instances, there was no charge to the patient to encourage them to enter the hospital in order to protect the public from exposure. [Welcome to 1876 Victorian England]
🏥 The mentally ill [were] accommodated in asylums, provided for by public funds as the result of the 1808 County Asylums Act… For financial reasons, by 1870, it became the policy of leaving harmless cases in the workhouse and sending away only the dangerously insane to the asylums. [Welcome to 1876 Victorian England]
🏥 Leavesden Asylum was a vast site that was built in 1870. It was built by Victorians who recognised that there were some poor in the London workhouses that could not be safely housed and cared for… Though Leavesden is now almost on the edge of London, 150 years ago it was a remote location… The 78 acre site housed “quiet and harmless” imbeciles from north London in a totally self-sufficient estate… 860 women were housed in 6 separate and identical looking blocks whilst 700 men were housed in five separate blocks. There was also a medical area, exercise gym, administration office, church, farm and various ancillary buildings such as boiler-rooms and laundry rooms. [Stephen Liddell]
🏥 In 1818… Dr Benjamin Golding (1793-1863), together with his friend John Robertson, established the West London Infirmary and Dispensary at No. 16 Suffolk Street, behind the Haymarket Theatre. [Golding had previously thrown open his own house in Leicester Place to "such poor persons as deserve gratuitous advice”.] In 1823 it moved to a larger building…
In 1827 the Infirmary's name was changed to Charing Cross Hospital… In 1830 a site in Agar Street, just off the Strand, was offered by the government, with an annual ground rent of £400.
The hospital was completed in January 1834 and opened to in-patients on 10th February… The building was extended in 1840 and, in 1850, the freehold was purchased… In 1862 children's wards opened and, in 1867, the Hospital was extended again. In 1877 much of the Hospital was rebuilt and enlarged, doubling its size. It then had 120 beds. In 1885 the Hospital was extended again and, in 1888, the first Matron and Sisters engaged. [Lost Hospitals of London]
🏥 When Conan Doyle published his first Sherlock Holmes mystery, A Study in Scarlet, he told his readers that Dr Watson trained as an army doctor at Netley – its name was so well known that the author did not need to explain any further. The hospital was, after all, a town in itself, a 200-acre medicropolis with its own gasworks, reservoir, school, stables, bakery and prison. There was a grand officers' mess, complete with ballroom, and modest married quarters for other ranks. There was even a salty swimming pool, fed by a windmill pumping water from the sea. By Philip Hoare on The Guardian website.
🏥 Re Bart’s: in 1850, Elizabeth Blackwell, one of the pioneers of medicine as a career for women, was permitted to study at St Bartholomew's Hospital by James Paget, the first warden of the medical school and later Serjeant-Surgeon to Queen Victoria. After Blackwell’s departure female students were opposed and excluded until 1947.
In 1877, the School of Nursing was founded and the first ‘probationers’, or student nurses, entered St Bartholomew's.
In 1881, Ethel Gordon Manson (later Mrs Bedford Fenwick) was appointed as matron. She went on to become Britain’s first state registered nurse.
In 1896, X-rays were first used at St Bartholomew's. [Barts Health]
🏥 The League of St. Bartholomew’s Nurses was founded in 1899 by Isla Stewart, who became one of the founder members of the International Council of Nurses. [League of St. Bartholomew’s Nurses]
🏥 The Nightingale Home and Training School for Nurses opened its doors to trainees in July 1860, as part of the newly built St Thomas’s Hospital in London. One of the first institutions to teach nursing and midwifery as a formal profession, the training school was dedicated to communicating the philosophy and practice of its founder and patron, Florence Nightingale. [British Library]
Some useful resources:
Hospitals On The Victorian Web. Photos and images of, and brief articles about, hospitals opened in Victorian times.
List of hospitals and dispensaries On The Dictionary of Victorian London. Extracts taken from Victorian sources.
Victorian Hospitals On Welcome to 1876 Victorian England.
Hospitals in the Victorian Era On victorianerahealthandmeds.weebly.com
Victorian Hospitals: The Out-Patients’ Department By Michelle Higgs on A Visitor’s Guide to Victorian England.
Voluntary Hospitals On The Development of the London Hospital System, 1823 - 2015 by Geoffrey Rivett.
The Poor Law Infirmaries On The Development of the London Hospital System, 1823 - 2015 by Geoffrey Rivett.
Smallpox and Fever Hospitals On The Development of the London Hospital System, 1823 - 2015 by Geoffrey Rivett.
Bethlehem Hospital [AKA Bethlem Hospital or Bedlam] On The Dictionary of Victorian London. Extracts from Victorian era sources.
Letters tell of life inside Victorian mental asylum Specifically the Royal Edinburgh Asylum in Morningside. On The Scotsman’s website.
Leavesden Asylum – A Victorian Hospital with a modern twist! By Stephen Liddell.
Palace of pain: Netley, the hospital built for an empire of soldiers By Philip Hoare on the Guardian website. [Netley is where Watson went through the course prescribed for surgeons in the army.] The article is truly about Netley during WWI but there is a reference to Victorian times.
Charing Cross Hospital On Lost Hospitals of London. Brief history, and (modern) photographs of the original building, now the Charing Cross Police Station.
Brief History During the Snow Era (1813-58) Brief history of Charing Cross Hospital and Medical School, during the Snow period—that is, during the life of John Snow.
St. Bartholomew's Hospital [Bart’s] On The Dictionary of Victorian London. Extracts from Victorian sources.
Our history On the Barts Health website.
History On the League of St. Bartholomew’s Nurses website.
The Nightingale Home and Training School for Nurses, St. Thomas's Hospital On the British Library website.
Records reveal life at Victorian children's hospital By Eleanor Bradford on the BBC website.
Historic Hospital Admission Records Project HHARP, the home of 19th century children’s hospital records… ...the databases cover a period from 1852 to 1921.
Hospitals and Medical Education On The Development of the London Hospital System, 1823 - 2015 by Geoffrey Rivett.
Please feel free to discuss this topic in the comments.
Please also feel free to comment about the canon story itself or any related aspects outside this week’s theme. For example, any reactions, thoughts, theories, fic recs, favourite adaptations of the canon story… Or any other contribution you wish to make. And if you have any suggestions for fic prompts springing from this week's story, please feel free to share those in the comments as well.
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no subject
Date: 2016-09-04 07:21 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-09-04 09:33 am (UTC)I am currently listening to an audiobook called Sherlock Holmes was Wrong: Reopening the Case of the Hound of the Baskervilles by Pierre Bayard. I haven't got very far (we're still in summary and intro) but I'll report next week.
no subject
Date: 2016-09-04 01:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-09-04 01:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-09-04 01:08 pm (UTC)Somebody has to write a confrontation between young Holmes and the matron of Bart's. I may even have to do it myself ^^
no subject
Date: 2016-09-04 07:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-09-04 08:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-09-09 02:27 am (UTC)(Thanks for these marvelous resources!)
Trivia (or meta, if you prefer):
The Charing Cross Hospital of ACD's Holmes' times was located on Agar Street (as mentioned above). This location continued as a hospital into WWI. I have compared Google Images historical photos with contemporary Google Street view imagery (hey, it's cheaper than international travel) and have determined that the main structure survived the Blitz and is now a Metropolitan Police Station. (Charing Cross Police Station). The hospital currently bearing the CC name moved to greener, modernised pastures. This was background info I wanted to confirm before continuing a WIP case-fic, and not just a random peregrination of a lunatic mind. I swear!
no subject
Date: 2016-09-11 08:27 pm (UTC)Actually, one of the links in the resource list does give a brief but complete history of the hospital and includes a photograph of the original building as it is now - as you say, a police station. I must admit, until I put together this post I hadn't known the hospital Holmes and Watson would have known was now physically somewhere else.