At our February meeting, Lady Teviot spoke on ‘Hospitals-their records and how to find them’. She gave a brief history of hospitals and explained the different types of hospital which developed during the 18th and 19th centuries. Among them, voluntary hospitals, founded through philanthropy, took patients nominated by subscribers and were quite particular as to the patients they admitted. Asylums were opened for the mentally ill and sanitoria isolated, and attempted to treat, tuberculosis cases, whilst cottage hospitals were opened from the 1860s.
Mary explained what records, including for patients and staff, were likely to survive and where they might be found (usually county records offices, but see the National Archives database). As to how they might be accessed, whilst records are often closed for 100 years, applications by relatives, under the F.O.I. Act, could succeed. She lightened the talk with some amusing examples of odd diagnoses and misbehaviour of patients and staff.
Report by Michael Lucas Thanet Branch Chairman