At the beginning of the nineteenth century, there were only eight pauper Asylum throughout the British Isles, and there care was paid for by charitable bodies. The rest of the country saw their Lunatics being cared for in either the Poor Law Workhouses, or within private ‘Madhouses’ that were licensed under the 1774 Madhouse Act. This often led to the miss-treatment of many lunatics as there was little understanding of their condition and due to over-crowding, it was not uncommon for lunatics to be shackled is these early madhouses. In 1808 the first County Asylum act was passed, with a second one being passed in 1845, which made the construction of the Victorian Asylum compulsory for all Counties.
The Victorian Asylums were built to serve as a tranquil retreat for people within the county population who could not afford treatment for themselves. Their purpose served as a advantage for both the local population and the patients, it provided safety for both parties as the two were kept seperate and offered a large means of employment for the local population. The Hospitals started off serving a small population of patients, typically below five hundred patients, but as time progressed and the population grew, the Asylum were designed or extended to house populations of over two thousands patients. The largest Asylum, Whittingham, had nearly 3000 patients in 1949.
The majority of the Victorian Asylums were built between 1811 and 1914, with mental deficiency colonies being built after 1914. At the time of WW1, there was approximately 110,000 people within the system and where the backbone of the Countries mental health care system. Nearly a century later, this number had decreased significantly with many of the hospitals using less than 50% of their beds; with the Mental Health Act passed 1983, and the care in the Community Act passed 1990, many of these aging institutions closed down. By the turn of the new millennium, nearly 200 years since the first County Asylum Act was passed, less than 20 Asylum remained open to Mental Health Services. Ten years later, this number had been decreased significantly.
The Purpose of this section is to document the current condition of these of the Victorian Asylum Sites, and where possible, supply a history of the building. The authors of these pages will try to remain impartial into the views of the Asylum system and the treatment that was used within their walls; it will however attempt to cover the topic as accurately as possible. Please note that there are certain terms used throughout these pages that by today’s standards are incorrect, please note that they have only been used in their historical context, please do not contact the website if you are offended by any of these terms.

History Cardiff was initially very reluctant to spend money on building its own lunatic asylum and was boarding its patients at The County Asylum in Bridgend. By the turn of the twentieth century Cardiff had continued with this out-sourcing arrangement, but it had become problematic both for Glamorgan County and for Cardiff. During the nineteenth...
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History Originally known as the East Sussex County Asylum, Hellingly Hospital lies on the hills of East Sussex just outside Hailsham. The complex was built on 400 acres of land that was formally the Park Farm near Hellingly Village. The East Sussex County constructed their own Asylum after they ended their joint ownership of the First...
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History Severalls Hospital was the second Essex County Asylum (Severalls Hospital) - opening in 1913 to relieve pressure from the Warley Asylum; it was designed by F.Whithouse & W.H.Town and adopts the echelon layout. Severalls is an interesting site as it demonstrates the changing approach of asylum layout through the early part of the 20th...
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History The Essex County Asylum (Warley Hospital) was the first County Asylum to be built within Essex. With the passing of the County Asylums Act in 1845, the Essex County had yet to build an Asylum within their borders. The Justices of Peace for Essex met in 1846 to discuss the matter of building an...
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History Park Prewett Asylum (Park Prewett Hospital), in Basingstoke, was the second county asylum of Hampshire, it was proposed in 1898 to relieve the overcrowding of Knowle asylum in Fareham. Building work was started in 1910 but the asylum was not officially opened till 1921 having suffered a delay due to World War One when...
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History The first Asylum within the County of Leicestershire was opened on what is now the site of the University of Leicester, and was opened in 1837. A the turn of century the original buildings were deemed to small and overcrowded and a new Asylum was commissioned at Narborough and was to receive 912 patients....
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History The 5th London County Asylum (Claybury Hospital) was the final hospital to be built by Middlesex for the London County Council was formed. Before the Local Government Act was passed in 1888, Middlesex controlled most of the land to the north of the River Thames and at this time they were planning their fourth...
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History Horton Asylum (Horton Hospital) was the seventh London Borough Asylum to be built, and the second hospital in the Epsom Cluster. It was founded in 1899 and it opened its doors to patients in 1902. It was designed by G.T. Hine in the compact arrow plan and it was essentially a replica of the Bexley...
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History Long Grove Asylum (Long Grove Hospital) was the Tenth London County Asylum, and the fourth hospital to be built in the Epsom Cluster. The hospital was designed by G.T. Hine and was essentially a replica of the Horton Hospital but with the Administration building placed on the opposite side of the site. Construction started...
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History Manor Hospital was the first asylum to be built within the Epsom Cluster. Manor Hospital was designed by William C. Clifford Smith, architect to the London Borough Council, it was designed as an Irregular pavilion format due to the intention of it being a temporary site until the Hospital at Horton was finished. The...
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History The St Ebba's Colony was the third hospital to be built within the Epsom Cluster; it was originally known as the Ewell Epileptic Colony and was first opened to patients in 1904. The colony was designed by William C Clifford Smith in a dispersed colony format containing nine villas. It was built to the...
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History In 1889 the London County Council (LCC) inherited land from the Middlesex, Surrey and Kent Counties in accordance with the 1888 Local Government Act. This served the purpose of eliminating the Metropolitan Board of Works and creating a body that would take their place. With this, the LCC took over the problem of the...
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History West Park Hospital was the eleventh London Borough Asylum and was the last of 5 establishments to be built on the Horton estate and was known as Epsom cluster number 5. (the other hospitals in the cluster being Manor Hospital #1, Horton Hospital #2, St Ebba's #3 and Long Grove Hospital #4). Construction was started in 1912 and the...
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History The Mental Deficiency act of 1913 created three categories of mental patients, they were imbecile, idiot and the feeble-minded and gave local authorities power to certify and segregate them from the local populace. World War I interrupted any new building work and in 1919 the Middlesex County Council looked for old sites that could be used...
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History Originally, the second Middlesex Asylum (Friern Hospital) was to be built close to the existing Middlesex Asylum at Hanwell, but due to the size and demand placed upon the Asylum system, the new Asylum was to be built at Colney Hatch. The hospital was designed by Samuel Daukes under the guidance of John Conolly,...
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History With the Lunatic Act passed in 1808 every county in the country was to provide an institute for the mentally ill, but by 1840 North Wales was still without such an institution because the poor rural communities could not afford to erect one. This meant that the most seriously ill pauper lunatics were sent...
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History Before the opening of the St Crispin Hospital in 1876, the paupers of Northampton were admitted to theNorthampton General Asylum to the East of Northampton. With the Lunacy Commission pushing for every county to have their own asylum and not send paupers out to other Asylums, this arrangement was deemed unworthy and the county encourage...
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History Before Shelton Hospital was constructed, the local Lunatic population were sent to the Kingsland Workhouse. In 1841, a committee was formed to look at the provision of an Asylum for the county. The finding of this study was that Shropshire and the Welsh county of Montgomery should share an institution to help ease the...
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History During the 1840s the Somerset Justices, along with many other counties, decide to enact the 1808 County Asylums Act and levy a rate to build an Asylum. This was also in response to the incoming 1845 Act that required every County to provide an Asylum. In 1844 the County made the decision to buy...
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History In 1898, Surrey Council realised that their asylum at Brookwood had exceeded the statutory population limit. Surrey Council decided to extend the Asylum to the West and construct a new one in the East. For this they selected Netherne, a farming estate, as the site for a new Mental Hospital to relieve an overcrowding problem The ...
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History With over-crowding becoming an increasing problem for the 1st Surrey County Asylum at Springfield, the Surrey Magistrates started the plans to build a second Asylum within the County. In 1863 plans were drawn up by the consulting architect to the Lunacy Commissioners, CH Howell for the new asylum to be built in 150 acres...
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History It was clear to the Surrey Magistrates in 1875 that the two County Asylums at Springfield and Brookwood were unable to provide the number of beds needed for the pauper lunatics. This caused the County to place their lunatics either within the Poor Law Unions, or within other County Asylums and private asylums around the country, with much...
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History The Surrey Magistrates decided that it was time to follow suit of other counties and construct their own County Asylum. The First Surrey County Asylum was built upon the Springfield Park in Wandsworth, originally owned by the Second Earl Spencer who leased the site to Henry Perkins from 1823. In 1834 the Third Earl...
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History With the passing of the County Asylums Act in 1845, the counties of England and Wales were required to provide accommodation for their pauper lunatics. It took nine years for the Sussex county to begin planning there asylum, being the last county in the country to do so, due to the political wrangling between...
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History The first Welsh asylum for the mentally ill was opened in Swansea at May Hill in 1815, followed in 1844 by Vernon House in Briton Ferry. The Glamorgan County Asylum in Bridgend opened twenty years later to serve the whole of the county of Glamorgan. But with the 1891 Public Health Act required each...
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History Originally known as The Stotfold Three Counties Asylum (Fairfield Hospital), building of the hospital commenced in 1856 on a 253-acre (230 acres cultivated) site between Letchworth, Arlesey and Stotfold, the land was purchased for £11,000. The new hospital was to replace the Bedford Lunatic Asylum in Ampthill Road in Bedford, which had been built...
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History Before the creation of West Ham of a borough in 1886, the county paupers within the West Ham area were sent to the Essex County Asylum in Brentford. One West Ham had become a borough it was immediately decide by the council to construct their own Asylum as they did not feel that the...
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History In 1893, West Sussex left the union with East Sussex and the running of the joint Asylum at Haywards Heath due to the passing of the local government act. The county purchased the Graylingwell Farm in the Summersdale area on the outskirts of Chichester, which used to be the home of Anna Sewell, author...
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