hospital history:
The Modern Asylum Movement
In the late 18th century a new type of ‘asylum’ - the word literally means ‘a place of safety’ - was developed for the mentally ill and distressed. The birthplaces of the modern asylum movement in Britain were Montrose and York. The wellspring of the movement was a humanitarian concern to provide better living conditions for the ill, rather than medical ideas on treatment which evolved later.
The Friends Retreat,
York,by Henry Brown
Courtesy of York City Art GalleryThe Retreat was a pioneering institution, founded by the Society of Friends in 1796 - where the mentally ill were not confined. Instead, if well enough, they were set to work on the farmland which surrounded the asylum. Its regime of ‘moral treatment’ greatly influenced asylums in the early 19th cCentury.
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Royal Lunatic Asylum,
Infirmary and Dispensary
Montrose
The first modern public mental health institution in Britain opened in Montrose in 1782 - previously the local mentally ill had been confined in the town’s Tollbooth or jail. The asylum attracted inmates from up and down the East Coast. They were cared for under the supervision of a local doctor - the first resident physician superintendent was not appointed until 1834.
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