Bridewell was a house of correction in Blackfriars, London. The building took its name from a holy well of medicinal water once existing between Fleet Street and the Thames, and dedicated to St Bride. Henry VIII built a palace to accommodate the Emperor Charles V on the site in 1522. This building was converted into a hospital to serve the poor and Edward VI chartered the hospital to the city. After the reformation Bridewell was made into a workhouse for the poor and a house of correction for the idle (vagrants) and vicious (unruly apprentices). The building was badly damaged by the Fire of London in 1666. Research Bridewell
Charterhouse is a celebrated school and charitable foundation in the city of London. It was built in 1371 as a priory for Carthusian monks by Sir Walter Manny. After the dissolution of the monasteries it passed through several hands until it came to Thomas Sutton who converted it into a hospital and school. In 1872 it was moved to Godalming and the premises in London sold to the MerchantTaylors' School. New buildings were erected at the original site in 1875.
The school has long had a high reputation. Among famous men who have received their education at the Charterhouse are Isaac Barrow, Addison, Steele, John Wesley, Blackstone, Grote, Thirlwall, Havelock, John Leech, and Thackeray. Research Charterhouse
The Chatham Chest (later GreenwichChest) was a fund established in 1590 on the recommendation of Sir Francis Drake and Sir John Hawkins for the relief of sick and wounded seamen. The deduction of money from seamen's pay to the fund ceased in 1829 by which time the fund was practically merged in the general relief funds of the GreenwichHospital. Research Chatham Chest
The Contagious Diseases Acts were acts for the prevention of contagious venereal diseases communicated by women, and having force only at certain naval and military stations, passed in Britain in 1864 and 1866, and amended in 1868, 1869, and 1875. They provided for the compulsory examination of prostitutes residing in or near any of the said stations, and for their detention in hospital if found to be affected with venereal disease. They were repealed in 1886. Research Contagious Diseases Acts
Foundling hospitals were charitable institutions for the care of children abandoned by their parents and found by strangers. They were first founded to reduce instances of infanticide during the 7th and 8th centuries by church authorities and their numbers increased rapidly during the Middle Ages, especially in France. In 1760 the London Foundling hospital, founded in 1739, had to restrict its intake due to the large increase in the number of abandoned children. Critics of the Foundling Hospitals argued that such institutions encouraged immorality, and argument which gained widespread support during the Victorian period in Britain. Research Foundling Hospital
The Gordon's No Popery Riots were occasioned by the zeal of lordGeorge Gordon from June the 2nd to the 9th 1780. On Friday, the 2nd of June, 1780 lordGeorge Gordon headed a mob of 40000 persons who assembled in St George's Fields, under the name of the Protestant Association, to carry a petition to parliament for the repeal of the act which granted certain indulgences to Roman Catholics. The mob proceeded to pillage, burn and bull down the chapels and houses of the Roman Catholics first, but afterwards of other persons, for nearly six days. The riot was quelled on the 8th of June by armed citizens, the horse and foot guards and various militia. 210 rioters were killed and 248 wounded of whom 75 later died in hospital. Others were tried, convicted and executed. Research Gordon's Riots
The Grey Coat Hospital is a Church of England comprehensive school for girls founded in 1698 at Westminster and reconstituted in 1873. The original school was founded in 1697, opening in 1698, by a group of citizens in response to crime in the area to educate forty street urchins and poor children. The first pupils were boys and in 1874 the old boarding school became a day school for girls. In the 20th century the school became a grammar school before in 1977 becoming a comprehensive, joining with another school (St Michael's) and in 1998 moved to new premises in Regency street. Research Grey Coat Hospital
Originally, a hospital was any building appropriated for the reception of any class of persons who were unable to supply their own wants, and were more or less dependent upon public help to have those wants supplied. Hence hospitals were of various kinds, according to the nature of the wants they supplied and the class of persons for whom they are intended. A large number of hospitals were medical; others were for the reception of incurables; others for the aged and infirm; others for the education of children of people in reduced circumstances; others for the reception of the wounded in battle; and so on.
The first establishments of this nature are believed to belong to the 4th century AD. Their primary object was to afford a shelter to strangers and travellers, and it was only occasionally that the sick and infirm were admitted. One of the earliest hospitals of which we have any satisfactory information was that established by the emperor Valens at Caesarea about the end of the 4th century, and which was conducted on a very large scale.
The Arabs in Spain, at an early period of their occupation of that country, founded a magnificent hospital at Cordova, where physicians were trained, who did a vast deal to advance the study of medicine. The Arabs have also the dubious credit of having founded the first mental hospital (then known as a lunatic asylum) in Europe, which was erected in the city of Granada. The majority of hospitals everywhere are medical, often called infirmaries. These may be divided into general and special hospitals, the former class admitting cases of all kinds; the latter class admitting only patients suffering from some special trouble. Thus there were formerly lying-in hospitals, cancer, consumption, ophthalmic, lock (for venereal diseases), fever, and small-pox hospitals. There are also hospitals for children, and for persons suffering from incurable diseases. Such institutions formerly served a double purpose, inasmuch as they not only afford the best medical advice and treatment to the poor, who otherwise were unable to obtain it prior to the formation of the national health service, but also supplied the best means of giving instruction in medicine and surgery, as in them students had the opportunity of witnessing cases of nearly every variety of disease, and observing how they it was treated by the physicians and surgeons. For this reason a good infirmary or medical hospital was considered an indispensable adjunct to every school of medicine and surgery. Research Hospital
Abbreviations
Research Bridewell
