Rainhill Hospital

Rainhill Hospital was a very large psychiatric hospital complex that was located in Rainhill, formerly Lancashire but now Merseyside, England.

Rainhill Hospital
The site (on the left) where the hospital used to be
Shown in Merseyside
Geography
LocationRainhill, Merseyside, England
Coordinates53.4256°N 2.7647°W / 53.4256; -2.7647
Organisation
Care systemNHS
TypePsychiatric
Services
Emergency departmentNo
History
Opened1851
Closed1992
Links
ListsHospitals in England

History

The facility was designed by Harvey Lonsdale Elmes and opened as the Third Lancashire County Lunatic Asylum on 1 January 1851.[1] Additional wings designed by Henry Horner were completed in 1860.[1] It became the County Lunatic Asylum, Rainhill in 1861.[2]

In 1877 a new annexe was designed by George Enoch Grayson and Edward Ould and constructed to the north-west of Rainhill Road.[1] The annexe would later become known as the Avon Division.[1] The Avon Division was designed to facilitate the accommodation of long-term, chronically mentally ill patients who were breaching capacity on what became known as the Sherdley Division which was subsequently mainly used for acute cases.[1] The Avon Division was noted for its distinctive water towers and linear design.[1] Some new buildings designed in a Tudor Revival style were added to the Avon Division in around 1900.[1]

The hospital was the location of the Great Porridge Strike on 6 April 1913 when the staff, members of the National Asylum Workers' Union, went on strike in protest when meat was replaced by oatmeal porridge.[3] The facility became the County Mental Hospital, Rainhill in 1923[2] and at the peak of its activity, in the 1930s, there were approximately 3,000 inpatients resident at the hospital.[1]

From 1938 to 1949 the admissions part of the hospital served as a Royal Naval Auxiliary Hospital.[4] From 1943 to 1944 the Medical Officer in Charge was Surgeon Captain Joseph Roland Brennan RN.[5]

The hospital joined the National Health Service as Rainhill Mental Hospital in 1948.[2] Following the introduction of Care in the Community in the early 1980s, services transferred to Aintree Hospital and Whiston Hospital; the Avon Division closed in 1987 and the Sherdley Division closed in June 1992.[1] The Scott Clinic, a medium secure facility, moved to new facilities on the Sherdley Division site.[1]

The site was initially acquired by Pilkington Glass for development of a new headquarters but instead Pilkington decided to sell off the site for residential use.[6] The site has been developed and is now known as Reeve Court.[7]

See also

References
  1. "Rainham". County Hospitals. Retrieved 14 October 2018.
  2. "Details: Rainhill Hospital, Prescot". National Archives. Retrieved 9 April 2014.
  3. "The South London Women's Hospital Occupation 1984-85". Past tense. Retrieved 7 April 2014.
  4. "Mental Hospitals in England". May 30, 2015.
  5. "Royal Navy (RN) Officers 1939-1945". www.unithistories.com.
  6. "Pilks to sell off Rainhill site". Lancashire Telegraph. 20 June 1996. Retrieved 14 October 2018.
  7. "Concerns over retirement village sinking funds highlighted in new report". St Helens Star. 27 April 2018. Retrieved 14 October 2018.
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