St Leonard's Hospital
St Leonard’s Hospital grew out of the infirmary at the St Leonard Shoreditch Workhouse, on Kingsland Road in Hackney (see also Hackney Hospital). This consisted of two wards for sick paupers, but there was little organisation or proper treatment until the appointment of James Parkinson as parish surgeon, apothecary and man-midwife in 1813. He instigated the separation of wards into male and female, medical and surgical, with separate provision for maternity, incurable and insane cases. He also introduced the first separate fever block in a workhouse for infectious patients, particularly those with cholera. In 1817 Parkinson published a work called an 'Essay on the Shaking Palsy', which describes the condition we now know as Parkinson’s disease. Parkinson had studied at the London Hospital and also worked as an apothecary in Hoxton. He died in 1824, but his good work was continued by his son, William, who had previously worked as his assistant.
Over the years much work was done to the buildings housing the workhouse and Hospital. A great deal of the redevelopment work began because the structure was declared unsafe in the 1860s. The new accommodation was complete by 1866 and could provide care for 350 sick people. In 1871 the infirmary was made separate from the workhouse and a dispensary was added, in order to conform to the regulations of the Metropolitan Poor Act of 1867. The new building was opened in 1872 with 503 beds, and a matron was appointed for the first time.
St Leonard’s played an important role during the Second World War. By that time the workhouse had been closed and the Hospital taken over by the London County Council. The Hospital buildings had been condemned in 1934, but the outbreak of the war prevented any improvement work from taking place. St Leonard’s is thought to have been the first hospital to receive air-raid casualties and was itself bombed in 1941. The Hospitals based in Hackney faced many difficulties during the war (see also German Hospital ), as the East End suffered heavily during the Blitz, and the staff and local communities had to work together to ensure services were kept up.
The fact that St Leonard’s started life as a workhouse meant that many people other than doctors and nurses were involved in the running of the infirmary and Hospital. This included those involved with the spiritual care of patients, as well as the physical. As you can see from the page of the Chaplain’s report book shown here, he commented not only on the routines of the infirmary but on the moral and religious state of the patients. This was deemed important in the workhouse, which was meant to be assisting people in becoming better citizens.
St Leonard’s also served as a training school for nurses. As you can see from these reports on probationers, the matron would make comments on a nurse's aptitude for their duties as well as more personal remarks about their character.
St Leonard’s is the only one of the former hospitals of the City & Hackney group that remains open, albeit in a different form to its original one. It remained a general hospital until 1984, when inpatient services were closed. It then developed as a centre for co-ordinating community services and supporting health centres, as well as becoming the home for various district services including physiotherapy, chiropody, a disability resource centre and a diabetic day centre. St Leonard's is now administered by the City & Hackney Teaching Primary Care Trust.
To read the text in the images below, click on the relevant PDF document
Images from St Leonard's Hospital
Pages from the casualty admission records kept during the Second World War. This shows how many people, just from one street, were admitted as a result of a German bombing raid.
