A brief historical account of the origin, progress, and present state of St. Thomas's Hospital, Southwark / By a student of medicine [i.e. B. Golding].

  • Golding, Benjamin, 1793-1863.
Date:
1816
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A brief historical account of the origin, progress, and present state of St. Thomas's Hospital, Southwark / By a student of medicine [i.e. B. Golding]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    quences which must result from the unavoidable inter¬ course by this means likely to take place between persons of abandoned morals and those of respectable characters, must be obvious to every one. In the yard to which [ have just alluded, are placed the brewhouse, bakehouse, warm and cold baths, and till very lately the anatomical theatre and dissecting room. A clean bath is always kept warm, to prevent delay in case of ac¬ cidents requiring its assistance. The cold bath is not without merit: it is well contrived, and is plentifully supplied with good water from a large reservoir: its dimensions are about five feet deep, six or seven long, and three wide. A large back gate opens into St. Thomas’s Broad Way, and through it those who die in the hospital are conveyed to the burial ground, or removed by their friends ; and all the disagreeable traffic, is effectually prevented from disturbing the front squares. Within the iron gates, at the side entrance, are some excellent and roomy houses, occupied by the treasurer, apothecary,reg ister, and rector of the parish. The whole hospital contains 19 wards and 430 beds, besides convenient rooms for the servants of the charitv, and the ground it covers is equal in space to the entire extent of St. Thomas’s Street, from the Borough High- street to the Broad Way. Convenience appears to have been most particularly studied in the arrangement of the different departments in this hospital, which gives it an advantage not to be found in others of later date. The numerous colonnades connecting all parts of the building to each other, defend the patients from wet, and admit of a ready communication with every part in the most inclement weather, without the slightest inconveni¬ ence ; in short, the comforts of this institution are so manifold, that any further attempt at description on that head would be doing an injustice to its merits. It has been in another place remarked, that the hospital was originally removed to its present situation, partly for
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