Volume 3

Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge.

  • Addenbrooke's Hospital
Date:
1938]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Early History --- Like most great enterprises, Addenbrooke’s Hospital had a small beginning, and was founded in pursuance of the Will of John Addenbrooke, M.D., formerly of Catharine Hall, Cambridge, who died in 1719. He left about £4,500 to Trustees on the death of his widow “‘to hire, fit up, purchase or erect, a building for a small Physical Hospital for poor people of any Parish or any County.” ‘This bequest gave John Addenbrooke the distinction of being the first Englishman to bequeath his private wealth to found a Voluntary Hospital. His was the first example in England of that public patriotism of private individuals which has ever since been the driving force of the Voluntary Hospital movement. In 1728—8 years after the death of his widow—land was purchased, and in 1740 the building of the Hospital was commenced on the site of St. Anne’s Chapel, which was apparently connected with the Hospital of St. Anthony and St. Eligius for lepers, founded in 1361. The Hospital was administered by the Trustees until 1766, When they found their funds insufficient for the completion and maintenance of the building, and an appeal was made for public support. In that year, as a result of a large meeting of “the principal Gentlemen of the County, University and Town” an Act of Parliament was obtained for “‘establishing and well-governing a General Hospital to be called Adden- brooke’s Hospital in the Town of Cambridge.” When the hospital was taken over by the Governors elected under the Act of Parliament, a kitchen and other equally essential offices were either totally wanting or incomplete, and to remedy this defect a small tenement adjoining the Hospital was purchased. Patients were admitted in accordance with the following rule :— “Persons who meet with sudden accidents requiring the immediate Help of Surgery are received at any hour of the day or night without any recommendation. All other patients are admitted on MONDAYS between the hours of ten and twelve ;
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