OLD HOSPITALS AND ALMSHOUSES

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Watch House On The Bridge Bradford on Avon Wilts

The study of the bridges of England seems to have been somewhat neglected by

antiquaries. You will often find some good account of a town or village in guide-

books or topographical works, but the story of the bridges is passed over in silence.

Owing to the reasons we have already stated, old bridges are fast disappearing and

are being substituted by the hideous erections of iron and steel. It is well that we

should attempt to record those that are left, photograph them and paint them, ere the

march of modern progress, evinced by the traction-engine and the motor-car, has

quite removed and destroyed them.

CHAPTER XV

OLD HOSPITALS AND ALMSHOUSES

There are in many towns and villages hospitals--not the large modern and usually

unsightly buildings wherein the sick are cured, with wards all spick and span and

up to date--but beautiful old buildings mellowed with age wherein men and

women, on whom the snows of life have begun to fall thickly, may rest and recruit

and take their ease before they start on the long, dark journey from which no

traveller returns to tell to those he left behind how he fared.

Almshouses we usually call them now, but our forefathers preferred to call them

hospitals, God's hostels, "God huis," as the Germans call their beautiful house of

pity at Lübeck, where the tired-out and money-less folk might find harbourage. The

older hospitals were often called "bede-houses," because the inmates were bound to

pray for their founder and benefactors. Some medieval hospitals, memorials of the

charity of pre-Reformation Englishmen, remain, but many were suppressed during

the age of spoliation; and others have been so rebuilt and restored that there is little

left of the early foundation.

We may notice three classes of these foundations. First, there are the pre-

Reformation bede-houses or hospitals; the second group is composed of those

which were built during the spacious days of Queen Elizabeth, James I, and Charles

I. The Civil War put a stop to the foundation of almshouses. The principal

landowners were impoverished by the war or despoiled by the Puritans, and could

not build; the charity of the latter was devoted to other purposes. With the

Restoration of the Church and the Monarchy another era of the building of

almshouses set in, and to this period very many of our existing institutions belong.

Gateway of St. John's Hospital, Canterbury

Of the earliest group we have several examples left. There is the noble hospital of

St. Cross at Winchester, founded in the days of anarchy during the contest between

Stephen and Matilda for the English throne. Its hospitable door is still open. Bishop

Henry of Blois was its founder, and he made provision for thirteen poor men to be

housed, boarded, and clothed, and for a hundred others to have a meal every day.

He placed the hospital under the care of the Master of the Knights Hospitallers.

Fortunately it was never connected with a monastery. Hence it escaped pillage and

destruction at the dissolution of monastic houses. Bishop Henry was a great builder,

and the church of the hospital is an interesting example of a structure of the

Transition Norman period, when the round arch was giving way to the Early

English pointed arch. To this foundation was added in 1443 by Cardinal Beaufort

an extension called the "Almshouse of Noble Poverty," and it is believed that the

present domestic buildings were erected by him.58 The visitor can still obtain the

dole of bread and ale at the gate of St. Cross. Winchester is well provided with old

hospitals: St. John's was founded in 931 and refounded in 1289; St. Mary

Magdalen, by Bishop Toclyve in 1173-88 for nine lepers; and Christ's Hospital in

1607.

We will visit some less magnificent foundations. Some are of a very simple type,

resembling a church with nave and chancel. The nave part was a large hall divided

by partitions on each side of an alley into little cells in which the bedesmen lived.

Daily Mass was celebrated in the chancel, the chapel of hospital, whither the

inmates resorted; but the sick and infirm who could not leave their cells were able

to join in the service. St. Mary's Hospital, at Chichester, is an excellent example, as

it retains its wooden cells, which are still used by the inmates. It was formerly a

nunnery, but in 1229 the nuns departed and the almswomen took their place. It is of

wide span with low side-walls, and the roof is borne by wooden pillars. There are

eight cells of two rooms each, and beyond the screen is a little chapel, which is still

used by the hospitallers.59

Archbishop Chichele founded a fine hospital at Higham Ferrers in

Northamptonshire, which saw his lowly birth, together with a school and college,

about the year 1475. The building is still in existence and shows a good roof and

fine Perpendicular window, but the twelve bedesmen and the one sister, who was to

be chosen for her plainness, no longer use the structure.

Stamford can boast of a fine medieval hospital, the foundation of Thomas Browne

in 1480 for the accommodation of ten old men and two women. A new quadrangle

has been built for the inmates, but you can still see the old edifice with its nave of

two storeys, its fifteenth-century stained glass, and its chapel with its screen and

stalls and altar.

Stamford has another hospital which belongs to our second group. Owing to the

destruction of monasteries, which had been great benefactors to the poor and

centres of vast schemes of charity, there was sore need for almshouses and other

schemes for the relief of the aged and destitute. The nouveaux riches, who had

fattened on the spoils of the monasteries, sought to salve their consciences by

providing for the wants of the poor, building grammar schools, and doing some

good with their wealth. Hence many almshouses arose during this period. This

Stamford home was founded by the great Lord Burghley in 1597. It is a picturesque

group of buildings with tall chimneys, mullioned and dormer windows, on the bank

of the Welland stream, and occupies the site of a much more ancient foundation.

There is the college at Cobham, in Kent, the buildings forming a pleasant

quadrangle south of the church. Flagged pathways cross the greensward of the

court, and there is a fine hall wherein the inmates used to dine together.

As we traverse the village streets we often meet with these grey piles of sixteenth-

century almshouses, often low, one-storeyed buildings, picturesque and impressive,

each house having a welcoming porch with a seat on each side and a small garden

full of old-fashioned flowers. The roof is tiled, on which moss and lichen grow, and

the chimney-stacks are tall and graceful. An inscription records the date and name

of the generous founder with his arms and motto. Such a home of peace you will

find at Quainton, in Buckinghamshire, founded, as an inscription records, "Anno

Dom. 1687. These almshouses were then erected and endow'd by Richard

Winwood, son and heir of Right Hon'ble Sir Ralph Winwood, Bart., Principal

Secretary of State to King James y'e First." Within these walls dwell (according to

the rules drawn up by Sir Ralph Verney in 1695) "three poor men--widowers,--to

be called Brothers, and three poor women--widows,--to be called Sisters." Very

strict were these rules for the government of the almshouses, as to erroneous

opinions in any principle of religion, the rector of Quainton being the judge, the

visiting of alehouses, the good conduct of the inmates, who were to be "no

whisperers, quarrelers, evil speakers or contentious."

These houses at Quainton are very humble abodes; other almshouses are large and

beautiful buildings erected by some rich merchant, or great noble, or London City

company, for a large scheme of charity. Such are the beautiful almshouses in the

Kingsland Road, Shoreditch, founded in the early part of the eighteenth century

under the terms of the will of Sir Robert Geffery. They stand in a garden about an

acre in extent, a beautiful oasis in the surrounding desert of warehouses, reminding

the passer-by of the piety and loyal patriotism of the great citizens of London, and

affording a peaceful home for many aged folk. This noble building, of great

architectural dignity, with the figure of the founder over the porch and its garden

with fine trees, has only just escaped the hands of the destroyer and been numbered

among the bygone treasures of vanished England. It was seriously proposed to pull

down this peaceful home of poor people and sell the valuable site to the Peabody

Donation Fund for the erection of working-class dwellings. The almshouses are

governed by the Ironmongers' Company, and this proposal was made; but, happily,

the friends of ancient buildings made their protest to the Charity Commissioners,

who have refused their sanction to the sale, and the Geffery Almshouses will

continue to exist, continue their useful mission, and remain the chief architectural

ornament in a district that sorely needs "sweetness and light."

City magnates who desired to build and endow hospitals for the aged nearly always

showed their confidence in and affection for the Livery Companies to which they

belonged by placing in their care these charitable foundations. Thus Sir Richard

Whittington, of famous memory, bequeathed to the Mercers' Company all his

houses and tenements in London, which were to be sold and the proceeds

distributed in various charitable works. With this sum they founded a College of

Priests, called Whittington College, which was suppressed at the Reformation, and

the almshouses adjoining the old church of St. Michael Paternoster, for thirteen

poor folk, of whom one should be principal or tutor. The Great Fire destroyed the

buildings; they were rebuilt on the same site, but in 1835 they were fallen into

decay, and the company re-erected them at Islington, where you will find

Whittington College, providing accommodation for twenty-eight poor women.

Besides this the Mercers have charge of Lady Mico's Almshouses at Stepney,

founded in 1692 and rebuilt in 1857, and the Trinity Hospital at Greenwich,

founded in 1615 by Henry Howard, Earl of Northampton. This earl was of a very

charitable disposition, and founded other hospitals at Castle Rising in Norfolk and

Clun in Shropshire. The Mercers continue to manage the property and have built a

new hospital at Shottisham, besides making grants to the others created by the

founder. It is often the custom of the companies to expend out of their private

income far more than they receive from the funds of the charities which they

administer.

Inmate of the Trinity Bede House at Castle Rising, Norfolk

The Grocers' Company have almshouses and a Free Grammar School at Oundle in

Northamptonshire, founded by Sir William Laxton in 1556, upon which they have

expended vast sums of money. The Drapers administer the Mile End Almshouses

and school founded in 1728 by Francis Bancroft, Sir John Jolles's almshouses at

Tottenham, founded in 1618, and very many others. They have two hundred in the

neighbourhood of London alone, and many others in different parts of the country.

Near where I am writing is Lucas's Hospital at Wokingham, founded by Henry

Lucas in 1663, which he placed in the charge of the company. It is a beautiful

Carolian house with a central portion and two wings, graceful and pleasing in every

detail. The chapel is situated in one wing and the master's house in the other, and

there are sets of rooms for twelve poor men chosen from the parishes in the

neighbourhood. The Fishmongers have the management of three important

hospitals. At Bray, in Berkshire, famous for its notable vicar, there stands the

ancient Jesus Hospital, founded in 1616 under the will of William Goddard, who

directed that there should be built rooms with chimneys in the said hospital, fit and

convenient for forty poor people to dwell and inhabit it, and that there should be

one chapel or place convenient to serve Almighty God in for ever with public and

divine prayers and other exercises of religion, and also one kitchen and bakehouse

common to all the people of the said hospital. Jesus Hospital is a quadrangular

building, containing forty almshouses surrounding a court which is divided into

gardens, one of which is attached to each house. It has a pleasing entrance through

a gabled brick porch which has over the Tudor-shaped doorway a statue of the

founder and mullioned latticed windows. The old people live happy and contented

lives, and find in the eventide of their existence a cheerful home in peaceful and

beautiful surroundings. The Fishmongers also have almshouses at Harrietsham, in

Kent, founded by Mark Quested, citizen and fishmonger of London, in 1642, which

they rebuilt in 1772, and St. Peter's Hospital, Wandsworth, formerly called the

Fishmongers' Almshouses. The Goldsmiths have a very palatial pile of almshouses

at Acton Park, called Perryn's Almshouses, with a grand entrance portico, and most

of the London companies provide in this way homes for their decayed members, so

that they may pass their closing years in peace and freedom from care.

The Hospital for Ancient Fishermen, Great Yarmouth.

Fishermen, who pass their lives in storm and danger reaping the harvest of the sea,

have not been forgotten by pious benefactors. One of the most picturesque

buildings in Great Yarmouth is the Fishermen's Hospital, of which we give some

illustrations. It was founded by the corporation of the town in 1702 for the

reception of twenty old fishermen and their wives. It is a charming house of rest,

with its gables and dormer windows and its general air of peace and repose. The old

men look very comfortable after battling for so many years with the storms of the

North Sea. Charles II granted to the hospital an annuity of £160 for its support,

which was paid out of the excise on beer, but when the duty was repealed the

annuity naturally ceased.

The old hospital at King's Lynn was destroyed during the siege, as this quaint

inscription tells:--

THIS HOSPITAL WAS

BURNT DOWN AT LIN

SEGE AND REBULT

1649 NATH MAXEY

MAYOR AND EDW

ROBINSON ALDMAN

TREASURER PRO TEM

P.R.O.

Norwich had several important hospitals. Outside the Magdalen gates stood the

Magdalen Hospital, founded by Bishop Herbert, the first bishop. It was a house for

lepers, and some portions of the Norman chapel still exist in a farm-building by the

roadside. The far-famed St. Giles's Hospital in Bishopsgate Street is an ancient

foundation, erected by Bishop Walter Suffield in 1249 for poor chaplains and other

poor persons. It nearly vanished at the Reformation era, like so many other kindred

institutions, but Henry VIII and Edward VI granted it a new charter. The poor

clergy were, however, left out in the cold, and the benefits were confined to secular

folk. For the accommodation of its inmates the chancel of the church was divided

by a floor into an upper and a lower storey, and this arrangement still exists, and

you can still admire the picturesque ivy-clad tower, the wards with cosy ingle-

nooks at either end and cubicles down the middle, the roof decorated with eagles,

deemed to be the cognizance of Queen Anne of Bohemia, wife of Richard II, the

quaint little cloister, and above all, the excellent management of this grand

institution, the "Old Man's Hospital," as it is called, which provides for the

necessities of 150 old folk, whose wants are cared for by a master and twelve

nurses.

Inscription on the Hospital, King's Lynn

Let us travel far and visit another charming almshouse, Abbot's Hospital, at

Guildford, which is an architectural gem and worthy of the closest inspection. It

was founded by Archbishop Abbot in 1619, and is a noble building of mellowed

brick with finely carved oak doors, graceful chimneys with their curious "crow-

rests," noble staircases, interesting portraits, and rare books, amongst which is a

Vinegar Bible. The chapel with its Flemish windows showing the story of Jacob

and Esau, and oak carvings and almsbox dated 1619, is especially attractive. Here

the founder retired in sadness and sorrow after his unfortunate day's hunting in

Bramshill Park, where he accidentally shot a keeper, an incident which gave

occasion to his enemies to blaspheme and deride him. Here the Duke of Monmouth

was confined on his way to London after the battle of Sedgemoor. The details of

the building are worthy of attention, especially the ornamented doors and

doorways, the elaborate latches, beautifully designed and furnished with a spring,

and elegant casement-fasteners. Guildford must have had a school of great artists of

these window-fasteners. Near the hospital there is a very interesting house, No. 25

High Street, now a shop, but formerly the town clerk's residence and the lodgings

of the judges of assize; no better series in England of beautifully designed window-

fasteners can be found than in this house, erected in 1683; it also has a fine

staircase like that at Farnham Castle, and some good plaster ceilings resembling

Inigo Jones's work and probably done by his workmen.

The good town of Abingdon has a very celebrated hospital founded in 1446 by the

Guild of the Holy Cross, a fraternity composed of "good men and true," wealthy

merchants and others, which built the bridge, repaired roads, maintained a bridge

priest and a rood priest, and held a great annual feast at which the brethren

consumed as much as 6 calves, 16 lambs, 80 capons, 80 geese, and 800 eggs. It was

a very munificent and beneficent corporation, and erected these almshouses for

thirteen poor men and the same number of poor women. That hospital founded so

long ago still exists. It is a curious and ancient structure in one storey, and is

denoted Christ's Hospital. One of our recent writers on Berkshire topography,

whose historical accuracy is a little open to criticism, gives a good description of

the building:--

"It is a long range of chambers built of mellow brick and

immemorial oak, having in their centre a small hall, darkly

wainscoted, the very table in which makes a collector sinfully

covetous. In front of the modest doors of the chambers

inhabited by almsmen and almswomen runs a tiny cloister with

oak pillars, so that the inmates may visit one another dryshod in

any weather. Each door, too, bears a text from the Old or New

Testament. A more typical relic of the old world, a more

sequestered haven of rest, than this row of lowly buildings,

looking up to the great church in front, and with its windows

opening on to green turf bordered with flowers in the rear, it

could not enter into the heart of man to imagine." 60

We could spend endless time in visiting the old almshouses in many parts of the

country. There is the Ford's Hospital in Coventry, erected in 1529, an extremely

good specimen of late Gothic work, another example of which is found in St. John's

Hospital at Rye. The Corsham Almshouses in Wiltshire, erected in 1663, are most

picturesque without, and contain some splendid woodwork within, including a fine

old reading-desk with carved seat in front. There is a large porch with an immense

coat-of-arms over the door. In the region of the Cotswolds, where building-stone is

plentiful, we find a noble set of almshouses at Chipping Campden in

Gloucestershire, a gabled structure near the church with tall, graceful chimneys and

mullioned windows, having a raised causeway in front protected by a low wall.

Ewelme, in Oxfordshire, is a very attractive village with a row of cottages half a

mile long, which have before their doors a sparkling stream dammed here and there

into watercress beds. At the top of the street on a steep knoll stand church and

school and almshouses of the mellowest fifteenth-century bricks, as beautiful and

structurally sound as the pious founders left them. These founders were the

unhappy William de la Pole, first Duke of Suffolk, and his good wife the Duchess

Alice. The Duke inherited Ewelme through his wife Alice Chaucer, a kinswoman

of the poet, and "for love of her and the commoditie of her landes fell much to

dwell in Oxfordshire," and in 1430-40 was busy building a manor-place of "brick

and Tymbre and set within a fayre mote," a church, an almshouse, and a school.

The manor-place, or "Palace," as it was called, has disappeared, but the almshouse

and school remain, witnesses of the munificence of the founders. The poor Duke,

favourite minister of Henry VI, was exiled by the Yorkist faction, and beheaded by

the sailors on his way to banishment. Twenty-five years of widowhood fell to the

bereaved duchess, who finished her husband's buildings, called the almshouses

"God's House," and then reposed beneath one of the finest monuments in England

in the church hard by. The almshouses at Audley End, Essex, are amongst the most

picturesque in the country. Such are some of these charming homes of rest that time

has spared.

The old people who dwell in them are often as picturesque as their habitations.

Here you will find an old woman with her lace-pillow and bobbins, spectacles on

nose, and white bonnet with strings, engaged in working out some intricate lace

pattern. In others you will see the inmates clad in their ancient liveries. The

dwellers in the Coningsby Hospital at Hereford, founded in 1614 for old soldiers

and aged servants, had a quaint livery consisting of "a fustian suit of ginger colour,

of a soldier-like fashion, and seemly laced; a cloak of red cloth lined with red baize

and reaching to the knees, to be worn in walks and journeys, and a gown of red

cloth, reaching to the ankle, lined also with baize, to be worn within the hospital."

They are, therefore, known as Red Coats. The almsmen of Ely and Rochester have

cloaks. The inmates of the Hospital of St. Cross wear as a badge a silver cross

potent. At Bottesford they have blue coats and blue "beef-eater" hats, and a silver

badge on the left arm bearing the arms of the Rutland family--a peacock in its

pride, surmounted by a coronet and surrounded by a garter.

Ancient Inmates of the Fishermen's Hospital, Great Yarmouth

It is not now the fashion to found almshouses. We build workhouses instead, vast

ugly barracks wherein the poor people are governed by all the harsh rules of the

Poor Law, where husband and wife are separated from each other, and "those

whom God hath joined together are," by man and the Poor Law, "put asunder";

where the industrious labourer is housed with the lazy and ne'er-do-weel. The old

almshouses were better homes for the aged poor, homes of rest after the struggle

for existence, and harbours of refuge for the tired and weary till they embark on

their last voyage.

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