Report of the Committee of Visitors of the County Lunatic Asylum at Lancaster : 1852 instituted 28 July, 1816.

  • Lancaster County Lunatic Asylum
Date:
1853
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Report of the Committee of Visitors of the County Lunatic Asylum at Lancaster : 1852 instituted 28 July, 1816. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    patient, was 7s. 7d, a-week ; but as this was more than the actual cost of maintenance at the Lancaster Asylum, and less than would be required in the infancy of the new Asylums, the accumulations at the former were to make good any deficiencies that might arise in the latter. This will explain the two items of £401 : 8 : 0 paid to the Prestwich Asylum, and £1276 to that at Rainhill, mentioned in the accompanying Accounts. The Committee think it right here to mention the alterations and im ¬ provements they have recently been enabled to make in the Lancaster Asylum, some of them arising out of the relief afforded by the opening of the new Asylums. At the commencement of the year 1851, there were in the Asylum, 785 patients—a number far too great for the comfort and well-being of the inmates ; and such had been the pressure for accommodation, that every available space was obliged to be used. Among other contrivances for room, an old Laundry, ill-adapted for its original purpose, was converted into a dormitory for thirty female patients. As was expected, the discharges and deaths became more numerous than the admissions, and the reduction in numbers enabled your Committee to effect several much-needed improvements. The old laundry was taken down ; more spacious lavatories made in several wards ; an additional bath and dressing room for the women provided ; and the Assistant Matron had a large store-room fitted up. The space between the beds has also, in most of the dormitories, been increased, and a more thorough ventilation accomplished. The use of steam having been found by your Committee admirably adapted for warming the building, has been extended throughout the whole of the female depart¬ ment, and has thus afforded, in the corridors, during the winter-months, a more comfortable temperature, which was much needed. In February, 1852, Mr. Shaw, the House Steward, owing to his continued ill health, felt it his duty to resign his office. His connection with the Asylum had existed for thirty-six years, and his faithful and efficient services as House Steward for the last twenty-six, formed, in the opinion of your Committee, a strong ground of recommendation for a re¬ tiring-pension. The subject was brought before the adjourned General Session in April following, and the Court granted a pension of forty pounds per annum. Mr. Shaw was succeeded by his son, the Assistant Steward,
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