Hi everyone
Here's a place with some history - it was originally built in 1839 as a Union workhouse to house 150 inmates. It was designed according to the popular 'square' layout with a central hub overlooking the exercise yards. The 1881 census shows a list of the inmates or 'patients' from the age of 9 months to 85 years old. As well as occupations such as shoemaker or slate miner, in the days before asylums also included for example
Ellen Edwards; Age 50; Servant (Domestic); Lunatic.
John Roberts; Age 19; No Occ; Idiot.
In 1894 a commission report found that the only paid staff were the Master and Matron who were responsible for everything including treating the sick. Obviously conditions were horrific.
In 1954 it became a council-run home for the elderly and then became a community hospital until closure in 2008. Since then it has lain empty, awaiting the next chapter - if there is one.
The pics are a combination of a few visits and a result of perseverance, calculated risk and good old fashioned luck. :-D The main building is in pretty good shape due to the working motion sensors and very loud alarm!!
The next few shots are in the small morgue
Finally, there's was a separate 'vagrants ward' with cells where the inmates slept on wire beds without mattresses whose routine was breaking rocks until small enough to be passed through a metal grid. Anyone ending up here must really have hit rock bottom (pardon the pun)
Its fascinating that this building feels almost unchanged since its original use and is partly due to housing a rare colony of Lesser Horseshoe bats.
At the entrance the first thing you see on the wall on your right is an inverted cross, which has clearly been there a very long time!
I'd really be interested in knowing what that was all about....
Here's a place with some history - it was originally built in 1839 as a Union workhouse to house 150 inmates. It was designed according to the popular 'square' layout with a central hub overlooking the exercise yards. The 1881 census shows a list of the inmates or 'patients' from the age of 9 months to 85 years old. As well as occupations such as shoemaker or slate miner, in the days before asylums also included for example
Ellen Edwards; Age 50; Servant (Domestic); Lunatic.
John Roberts; Age 19; No Occ; Idiot.
In 1894 a commission report found that the only paid staff were the Master and Matron who were responsible for everything including treating the sick. Obviously conditions were horrific.
In 1954 it became a council-run home for the elderly and then became a community hospital until closure in 2008. Since then it has lain empty, awaiting the next chapter - if there is one.
The pics are a combination of a few visits and a result of perseverance, calculated risk and good old fashioned luck. :-D The main building is in pretty good shape due to the working motion sensors and very loud alarm!!
The next few shots are in the small morgue
Finally, there's was a separate 'vagrants ward' with cells where the inmates slept on wire beds without mattresses whose routine was breaking rocks until small enough to be passed through a metal grid. Anyone ending up here must really have hit rock bottom (pardon the pun)
Its fascinating that this building feels almost unchanged since its original use and is partly due to housing a rare colony of Lesser Horseshoe bats.
At the entrance the first thing you see on the wall on your right is an inverted cross, which has clearly been there a very long time!
I'd really be interested in knowing what that was all about....
