contempt and defiance of the law?
Of course, people did at times run unlicensed houses. In 1837 the
commission discovered that William Moseley had been doing so in London "for
a considerable time". They successfully prosecuted, but after release from
prison (3S.6) he again
advertised for patients without a licence.
The 1838 Return showed only "about 80" county houses, the majority small.
As several large counties, and all of Wales , made no return, the
commission inferred houses existed but were not licensed (1838 Report)
The commission's inference seems to have been wrong. Parry Jones counted
eighty three county houses in the 1838 return and ninety in an 1842
return (Parry Jones, 1972, p.-). There were ninety-eight in 1844 (1844
Report, p.2, corrected copies).
Comparing the 1844 Report with the 1842 Return, I found the net addition
mostly due to small (two to thirteen lunatics) houses in counties with
other houses listed in 1842.
Haydock Lodge
and
Britten
Ferry, two larger houses listed in 1844 and not 1842, are
known to have opened in 1843 and 1844. I see no reason to believe that the
smaller houses were not also new, although I would agree that any
unlicensed houses were likely to be small ones.
Only one English county
(Buckinghamshire) made no return in 1842 but
had a house listed in 1844. The house
(Denham Park, near Uxbridge) appears to have
been open in 1838 (Parry Jones, 1972, p. 86). It was so well known and well
reputed that I find it inconceivable it operated in "contempt and defiance
of the law", and suspect Buckinghamshire simply neglected to send a return.
The uneven distribution of houses was a reality, not a result of counties
allowing unlicensed houses. Ten of the forty-one English administrative
counties excluding Middlesex had no house listed in the 1844 report, and
the first to open in Wales was Britten Ferry in 1843.
3.13
Hereford Lunatic
Asylum
Conflict between the Middlesex JPs and vestries and the
White
House
had focused political attention on London houses in 1827 (See
3.1.2 and
the biographies of Gordon
and
Conway).
In
1839
conflict between Herefordshire JPs and the proprietors of
Hereford Lunatic
Asylum focused it on the County houses. The
1839 Select Committee of the
House
of Commons on Hereford Lunatic
Asylum
attracted attention not only to the problems of
policing County houses, but also to the new methods of treating the insane.
Hereford Quarter Sessions petitioned Parliament for an inquiry into the
affairs of the Asylum, which was one of two
English
Hospitals
founded in
the 18th century that had been privatised (the other being
Newcastle
Lunatic Asylum). The County JPs maintained an influence over
the
asylum by means of the licensing procedures.
In 1835 two brothers, John and W.L. Gilliland, took over the asylum and the
Visitors:
"ascertained to their great satisfaction, and to the great
credit of Dr. Gilliland, the resident physician, and Mr Gilliland the
resident surgeon, that under their judicious treatment a system of unusual
mildness has ben adopted towards the unfortunate inmates ... and no
personal punishment, coercion or restraint ... has been practised."
(Visitors minutes 13.9.1835 Quoted
Parry-Jones, W.L. 1972
p.274)
Over the next few years, however, adverse reports were made by the
visitors. On 29.10.1836 they found irregularities in the admission
documents and books required by the 1832 Madhouses Act and they complained
about a failure to hold religious services and about overcrowding. The
complaints about the legal regulations were attended to, but adverse
reports on other matters continued.
On 24.5.1838 the Visitors complained that discipline was being maintained
by plunging patients into cold baths, some patients having been treated
this way at least fifty times. On 30.6.1838 they reported an investigation
into complaints of ill-treatment and neglect made by the wife of a patient
who had died shortly after being discharged, his body showing numerous
bruises and sores. The Visitors blamed this onto a serious shortage of
attendants, which had also allowed fighting to occur amongst the patients.
The Visitors frequently condemned the structure of the asylum, mainly
because it did not allow the adequate classification of patients.
In the autumn of 1838 the Visitors presented a special report to Quarter
sessions in which they came to the unanimous conclusion that:
"The Hereford Lunatic Asylum was not in that state, either as relates to
ventilation, to classification, to employment, to moral treatment, to
recreation and religious consolation of convalescents, which they would
wish to prevail." (Quoted
Parry-Jones, W.L. 1972
p.275)
In October 1838, on the basis of this report, Quarter Sessions refused to
renew the licence.
When
John Barneby, the
Chair (of what?) told John Gilliland that the
renewal of his licence was refused, he was told that
"it was not of much consequence, because he had applied to the
City Quarter Sessions."
The asylum being within Hereford City, the Recorder decided it was his
jurisdiction, and granted a licence from October 1838.
A Select Committee of the House of Commons to investigate how Gilliland
conducted his asylum was ordered on
7.3.1839 and reported on 27.6.1839.
I would divide the Select Committee membership
(see list in chronological
bibliography)
into four groups. There are those with a local (county) interest in the
issues relating to providing and regulating provision for lunatics
(including those from Hereford, but other counties as well), those with a
government interest, people involved in the
Metropolitan (London) Commission, and people with a general or medical
interest.
Consider the committee in the order in which their names were recorded in
the Commons Journal on 7.3.1839:
"Mr Barneby"
John Barneby, who
chaired the Committee, was the chairman of Hereford Quarter Sessions, the
body that was in conflict with the proprietor of Hereford Lunatic Asylum.
He was one of the MPs for Droitwich, in neighbouring
Worcestershire. The other Droitwich MP,
Pakington, was also a member of this committee.
"Lord Ashley"
Ashley had signed the (unpublished) reports of the
Metropolitan Commission to the Lord Chancellor, and was, effectively, the
commission's chair. He was a Tory.
"Mr Robert Gordon"
Gordon has as much claim as anyone to be the
founder of the Metropolitan Commission. He was a Whig.
"Lord Granville Somerset"
Somerset was a key member of the team of Robert
Peel, Tory opposition leader in the House of Commons. Somerset acted for
Peel in lunacy issues.
"Lord Seymour"
Edward
Apolphous Seymour, a young Whig, was a
Junior Treasury Lord
"Mr Gally Knight"
Henry Gally Knight (1797-1860) was Tory MP for
Nottingham North. A JP in
Nottinghamshire
and the
West Riding of Yorkshire
(his home).
"Mr Vernon Smith"
Robert
Vernon Smith was a Whig member of the Metropolitan Commission
"Mr William Miles"
William Miles was Tory MP for
Somerset East (at least, he was in
1841). He later represented the proprietors of provincial lunatic asylums
in the House of Commons.
"Mr Hawes"
Benjamin Hawes (1797-1862) was the Liberal MP for
Lambeth from 1832 to 1847. A soap manufacturer and active parliamentary
campaigner
for medical reform. With the support of Wakley and Warburton (fellow
radicals who were also on this committee) he introduced an unsuccessful
bill in 1841 to establish collective regulation and qualification for the
medical profession. His constituency included Bethlem
"Mr Estcourt (Oxford University)"
Thomas Grimstone Bucknall Estcourt (1775-1853), previously MP for
Devizes,
Wiltshire, had been since 1826 one of the MPs for Oxford University (the
other was Inglis).
He was a barrister who had been Recorder of Devizes and was (until 1837)
chairman of Wiltshire General Quarter Sessions.
In 1827 (Hansard 14.6.1827 col. 1265) "Mr Estcourt wished the hon.
gentleman" [Robert Gordon] would move for a general bill; which having been
introduced, might be circulated through the country during the recess; the
result of which step would be the production of much more information than
could be obtained by any parliamentary inquiry during the present session"
"Mr Bolton Clive"
Edward Bolton
Clive was the Whig MP for the
Borough of Hereford. It was the JPs of the borough who had
licensed the asylum when the County JPs were averse to re-licensing. Edward
Bolton Clive had been a Metropolitan Commissioner since 1836 and remained
on the commission until the national inquiry (1842).
"Mr Pakington"
John Somerset Pakington (Russell before 1830, Lord Hampton from 1874),
(1799-1880) was Tory MP for Droitwich, in
Worcestershire (at least, he was in 1841).
In 1852 he was a member of Derby's "Whose who? government" of unknowns. It
was said of him, and several others, that they were men "whose antecedents
scarcely gave them warrant for any higher claim in public life than the
position of chairman of quarter sessions" (McCarthy, J. 1897 vol.1, p.330). I
could not, however, find him listed as a Droitwich or Worcestershire JP in
1836. In 1842, representations were made to him by the proprietor of
an asylum in Droitwich.
"Mr Ward"
Henry George Ward (probable identification) (1797-1860)
was Liberal MP for Sheffield Borough from 1837 to 1849, previously for St
Albans. Before and after his parliamentary career, he was a diplomat. One
author says he was a cousin of the Marquis of Normanby (Minister for War
and the Colonies, soon to swap post with Lord John Russell at the Home
Office), but I have not been able to confirm this.
"Mr Gaskell"
James Milnes
Gaskell Tory MP for Wenlock in Shropshire.
Shropshire. His home was near Wakefield in
Yorkshire and he had married the daughter,
and was supported by, Charles Watkin
Williams Wynn. His son was one of the early historians of
Wakefield Lunatic Asylum
"Mr Warburton"
Henry
Warburton (1784-1858) does not seem to have any relationship to
the Warburtons of Bethnal Green. He was the son of John Warburton of
Eltham, Kent, a timber merchant. Whig/Liberal MP for Bridport, Dorset fro
1826 to 1841; and then for Kendal, Westmoreland (1843-1847);
He was Whig
On 22.4.1839, Mr William Miles and Mr Warburton were discharged from
further attendance and two other MPs added to the committee:
"Sir Edward Knatchbull"
Edward Knatchbull (1781-1849), 8th baronet, had been Tory MP for
East Kent from the death of his father in 1819, with the
exception of the Parliament of 1831. His family had owned Mersham-Le-Hatch,
Ashford in Kent since 1486. In the 1820s he had inherited Overton Hall in
Derbyshire from the widow of Sir Joseph Banks, and had sold it on to
Dr John Bright of the
Metropolitan Commission. One of Knatchbull's predecessors, Sir Edward
Knatchbull (1672-1730), the 4th baronet, was MP for Kent from 1721. He gave
his name to Knatchbull's Act
and left an important Parliamentary Diary. I could not find Sir
Edward Knatchbull listed as a Kent JP in 1836.
"Mr Wakley"
Thomas Wakley, a Liberal MP for Finsbury, was
the editor of The Lancet
Provincial appointments to the Metropolitan Commission
In September 1839
John Barneby,
the Chair of the Select Committee and
James Milnes
Gaskell, one of its members, were appointed to the Metropolitan
Commission.
(see charts). They did not replace anyone,
but were filling what were, in effect, empty places for unpaid
commissioners. It seems reasonable to ask why two county MPs should
be brought onto a London licensing authority, and I would conclude that it
was because the London commission was being seen as having a limited
national role, not only as a statistical collector and analyser, but also
as a place where good practice in licensing might be established and
promoted.
Barneby and Milnes Gaskell were both appointed to serve on the Inquiry
Commission in 1842. They, with Sykes the statistician, only ceased to be
commissioners when the commission became a national body in 1845.
It would be wrong to think of the affair of the Hereford Lunatic Asylum as
a significant national scandal. Hansard, for example, records no discussion
of it. It was, however, significant in the history of the creation of a
national Lunacy Commission. By drawing together Members of Parliament
involved in the licensing in London and the counties, by highlighting
problems of licensing, and the relationship between treatment regimes and
licensing, and by giving militant medics something to focus on, it
provide a starting point from which the Quarterly licensing authority in
London would stumble and be pushed into a national role.
3.14 The Hole and Corner Metropolitan Commission
Throughout the 1830s the affairs of the Metropolitan Commission were not a
matter of parliamentary or public interest. Someone who sought to find out
about it in 1839 using Parliament Papers could have consulted the 1829
Report (with tabulations of houses and patients annexed) and the
Commission's Accounts to 3.7.1833 (and no later). The last account would
tell the enquirer that the Commission's first Clerk had died in 1832 and
that after his death the affairs of the commission are in a bit of a mess.
In Hansard the enquirer would find nothing of interest since the debate on
the Act establishing the Commission in 1828.
The Metropolitan Commission did not publicize opinions on lunacy until
1844, when it produced a massive report on the condition of the insane
throughout the country. (4.9). In the early 1840s it was public interest
in lunacy that discovered the commission, not the commission that
stimulated public interest in lunacy. Even in the late 1830s and early
1840s
the commission's efforts at publicity were limited to the attempt to make
county administrations more aware of their responsibilities under the 1832
Madhouses Act.
For some who cared for lunacy reform, the reticence and secrecy of the
Metropolitan Commission was its major crime. The Lancet wrote about
"the hole and corner Metropolitan Commission, which has
published but one Report, and has never contributed a single useful fact to
the statistics of insanity" (Lancet 4.4.1840 p. 57).
And later:
"The state of the Metropolitan Lunatic asylums has been frequently referred
to in this Journal; and the criminal negligence of the Metropolitan
Commission in withholding from the public all information" (Lancet
5.9.1840 p. 867)
"They expend £3,000 a year ... It would be interesting to know what
they do for the money ... The paid Commissioners should draw up an Annual
report, and should only receive their salaries when the Report is delivered
in." (Lancet 6.6.1840 p.369)
The Lancet's attacks seem to have had an effect. On 21.9.1841 Ashley told
the House of Commons that:
"the commissioners had made periodical reports to the Lord Chancellor, and
it was not long ago that it was determined by the commission that he (Lord
Ashley) should be called upon to lay those reports from the year 1835 upon
the table of that House, that the country might see the progress that had
been made, and pass an opinion upon the merits of the commission."
(Hansard 21.9.1841 col. 697)
On Ashley's motion the reports were ordered to be printed on 6.10.1841.
there were six of them, occupying only 11 pages in all.
(bibliography)
© Andrew Roberts 1981-
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