Report, together with the minutes of evidence, and an appendix of papers / from the Committee Appointed to Consider of Provision Being Made for the Better Regulation of Madhouses in England (ordered by the House of Commons, to be printed, 11th July, 1815) ; each subject of evidence arranged under its distinct head by J. B. Sharpe, Member of the Royal College of Surgeons.

Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons. Committee Appointed to Consider of Provision Being Made for the Better Regulation of Madhouses in England.

Date:: 1815

Credit: Report, together with the minutes of evidence, and an appendix of papers / from the Committee Appointed to Consider of Provision Being Made for the Better Regulation of Madhouses in England (ordered by the House of Commons, to be printed, 11th July, 1815) ; each subject of evidence arranged under its distinct head by J. B. Sharpe, Member of the Royal College of Surgeons. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by University of Bristol Library. The original may be consulted at University of Bristol Library.

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$house were dismissed, or their places declared vacant, except one. Not being perfectly satisfied with what was done, I thought it incumbent upon me to publish a letter to Lord Fitz- villiam, as Lord Lieutenant of that Riding; in which, to the best of my knowledge, I stated every thing that I knew relatiug to the Institution, and to the abuses which had taken place in that house. The Appendix contains a Report of the Com- mittee appointed to investigate the abuses, and the new Rules and Regulations. [A Copy of this Pamphlet was laid upon the Table of the Committee.'] In what condition did you find this Asylum when you visited it in the Spring Assize week of 1814?—Having suspicions in my mind that there were some parts of that Asylum which had not been seen, I went early in the morning, determined to examine every place. After ordering a great number of doors to be opened, I came to one which was in a retired situation in the kitchen apartments, and which was almost hid by the opening of a door in the passage. I ordered this door to be opened; the keepers hesitated, and said, the apartment belonged to the women, and they had not the key. I ordered them to get the key ; but it was said to be mislaid, and not to be found at the moment. Upon this I grew angry, and told them I insisted upon its being found; and that, if they would not find it, I could find a key at the kit- chen fire-side, namely, the poker; upon that the key was imme- diately brought. When the door was opened, I went into the passage, and I found four cells, I think,'of about eight feet square, in a very horrid and filthy situation ; the straw appeared to be al- most saturated with urine and excrement; there was some bedding laid upon the straw in one cell, in the others only loose straw. A man (a keeper) was in the passage doing something, but what I do not know. The walls were daubed with excrement; the air-holes, of which there were one in each cell, were partly filled with it. In one cell there were two pewter chamber-pots, loose. I asked the keeper if these cells were inhabited by the patients, and was told they were at night. I then desired him to take me up stairs, and shew me the place of the women who came out of those cells that morning; I then went up stairs, and he shewed me into a room, which I caused him to measure, and the size of1 which, he told me, was twelve feet by seven feet ten inches; and in which there were thirteen women, who, he told me, had all come out of those cells that morning. Were they pauper-women ?—I do not know. I was afraid that afterwards he should deny that, and therefore I went in and said to him, Now, Sir, clap your hand upon the head of this woman, \$

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