Cheadle Royal Hospital
Cheadle Royal Hospital, (also known as the Priory Cheadle Royal), originally the Manchester Royal Lunatic Asylum, is a psychiatric hospital on Wilmslow Road in Heald Green, Greater Manchester, England. Built between 1848–1849, the main building is Grade II listed and was designed by Richard Lane in the Elizabethan style. Coordinates: 53°22′29″N 2°13′16″W / 53.3748°N 2.2211°W
History
The hospital was founded in 1763, when only three other similar institutions existed in England, next to the Manchester Infirmary, in what later became Piccadilly Gardens. The building was opened on 26 September 1765. It had room for 22 patients. It cost £1510 to build and equip. By 1773, there were rooms and attendants for 40 patients. In its first 11 years, 361 patients had been admitted. 179 were cured, 99 relieved and 24 died. In 1776, the annual running expenses were £444, or which £83 were wages and gratuities. In 1802, the running costs had increased to £1600. 54 patients were admitted that year.
By 1788, twenty new single rooms had been added and there were facilities for about 60 patients in all. By 1825, the number of patients had reduced from 80 or 90 to 45 because there were now more private asylums for those who could pay, and more county asylums for paupers.
In May 1846, it relocated to a new, 58 acre site in Cheadle, ten miles to the south. The building in Manchester was sold to the trustees of the Manchester Royal Infirmary for 5,000 guineas, and the land belonging to the asylum for £2,700. The patients were accommodated in temporary buildings until the main block was completed in 1850. By purchase or gift, 220 more acres were acquired and additional facilities built.
The new hospital was called Manchester Royal Hospital for the Insane. There was a wing for men and one for women. Each was divided into three sections according to the mental state of the patients, and each section had a separate garden. Recreation and entertainment, including, later, a cinema, were provided. From the 1860s, voluntary patients were accepted.
In 1851, there were 18 men and 7 women patients. By 1862, there were 62. George William Mould was appointed Medical Superintendent. In 1866, three villas for patients were built in the grounds, and, later, also in ordinary houses. Some which were a distance from the site (one at the seaside in North Wales), were leased for convalescent patients. In 1880, more than half the patients were living outside the main building. St Ann's Hospital was established by Mould as a private venture, providing for 40 epileptic children, and was bought by the Committee in 1887. North House—with accommodation for 80 additional patients—was opened in 1903.[1] In 1878, a convalescent hospital, The Hall, Glan-y-Don in Colwyn Bay, North Wales was opened, and it was extended in 1911. It had an estate of 35 acres In 1928; the hospital had provision for the treatment of 400 patients.[2] In 1947, 370 new patients were admitted. The main site was 280 acres, mostly laid out as gardens.
Famous patients
England spin bowler Johnny Briggs died in Cheadle Royal Hospital in 1902.
Actress Margot Bryant was an inpatient from 1976 until her death in 1988.
It is now part of the Priory Group.