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Hospital history
The oldest photo of the Hospital, pre-1880 and discovered in a loft
A HOSPITAL WITH HISTORY
Victorian photos discovered in a loft illustrate new book on historic hospital…
Photographs dating back to the 1870’s have been used to illustrate a new book about the first half-century of the first ever specialist mental hospital in Wales.
The book, written by Clwyd Wynne, a former nursing manager at the North Wales Hospital, hits the bookshelves just as planners have thrown a lifeline to the iconic Grade II* listed building in Denbigh.
Victorian Asylum, the story of the North Wales Hospital from its opening in 1848 to the end of the 19th Century, is the first of three volumes covering the history of
“The North Wales Asylum for the Insane”.
After the hospital closed in 1995, the buildings were neglected and fell into a state of dangerous decay, hastened by vandalism and arson attacks, before Vale of Clwyd-based contractors Jones Bros drew up ambitious plans to redevelop the site and save the magnificent original central building. Those plans have now been
approved by Denbighshire County Council, subject to detailed agreement, paving the way for a project which will boost the local economy by £75 million and create 1,200 jobs.
“It’s got to be good for Denbigh and I’m glad that the original 1848 building is being retained and restored,” said Clwyd, who began his career at the hospital as a 19-year-old nursing assistant in 1965 and worked there for 30 years. “I’m pleased that it is a local firm that is carrying out the redevelopment because it will
provide jobs for the area and apprenticeship opportunities for young people. At last something positive is being done.”
Clwyd, whose wife Carol was also a nurse, retired in 1999 after helping find new
roles for the 500 staff who remained when the hospital closed in 1995 when there were still 600 patients. He then took charge of the Ablett Ward, the psychiatric ward of Ysbyty Glan Clwyd, Bodelwyddan, named after Joseph Ablett, the wealthy
Matron Catherine Parry and colleagues with Dr Llewellyn Cox about 1900
Male staff in 1884
Hospital Matron Miss Pugh, late 19th Century
Clwyd Wynne with his new book, Victorian Asylum, which charts the 19th Century history of the North Wales Hospital in Denbigh
benefactor from Llanbedr Hall near Ruthin, who donated the 20 acres on which the original North Wales Hospital was built.
He is chairman and a founding member of the North Wales Hospital Historical Society and as chairman of Vale of Clwyd MIND is still involved in supporting people with mental health issues.
In the book he documents how the five counties of North
Wales came together to plan and build the very first
psychiatric hospitals in Wales. It also tells of the dreadful conditions in which unfortunate people were often kept if they were judged to be insane by their families.
Dr Richard Lloyd Williams of Denbigh, the driving force behind the building of the hospital and later the visiting physician at the hospital, described the conditions of a woman found in appalling squalor in a room above a blacksmith’s forge in Llangefni in 1844: “In the middle of this loathsome chamber was Mary Jones, the lunatic, on a foul pallet of chaff or straw and here she had been confined for a period of 15
years and upwards… seated in a bent and crouching posture on her bed of nauseous and disgusting filth.”
The hospital opened in 1848 with 200 patients, but by 1890 that number had trebled – many of those sent to the hospital from across North Wales came from the workhouses which existed in most towns and it was cheaper for the county councils to keep them at the hospital. There was a strict regime for the patients but treatment consisted simply of work and recreation.
“Life was very hard for poor people in those times and often it would have been easier for the patients who would have regular meals and clean and sanitary conditions,” continued Clwyd. “Many of them probably lived longer as a result of being at the hospital – a lot of them were there for very many years. One of those admitted in the first week of the
opening in November 1848, died there in 1907.
“It wasn’t until the 1920s that any idea of treatments started and then it was very rudimentary, experimental and sometimes horrific. That was the case until the NHS was
founded in 1948 – but from then on the hospital had a very high reputation for the care and treatment it provided. At the same time the people of Denbigh were very welcoming and accepting of the patients and many strong friendships were forged and obviously it was a big employer and many families worked there for generations.”
Clwyd, who wrote a brief history of the Hospital in 1995, is already halfway through volume two of the hospital story which will cover the years from 1900 to the foundation of the NHS with the third and final book taking the story up to
its closure in 1995. n
