Cardiff was initially very reluctant to spend money from the rates on building its own lunatic asylum. The County Asylum in Bridgend. By the turn of the twentieth century Cardiff had continued with this leasing out arrangement but it had become problematic both for Glamorgan County and for Cardiff. During the nineteenth century Cardiff had expanded from a population of 1,870 in 1801 to 164,000 in 1901. The accompanying increase in the number of pauper lunatics was equally large. Thus, Bridgend asylum was overflowing to the extent that a second asylum had to be built. The source of the overcrowding was the high numbers of Cardiff paupers taking up beds. Indeed so great was the strain on the Bridgend asylum that Cardiff also sent people to Devon, Somerset and even Sussex. Cardiff council came under pressure from both Glamorgan County and the Lunacy Commissioners. This, combined with the increasing costs of sending people across the country led to a reluctant decision to build.

While Cardiff had effectively been forced into building its own asylum, the process then took an unexpected turn. The Visiting Committee of the Council charged the Clerk of the Council with putting together a viable recruitment strategy for a medical superintendent. The result was that the post was advertised for ?650 per annum rising to ?800, an unfurnished house and various other emoluments. Forty-two candidates applied and this long list was whittled down to a short list that was impressive. All of the five candidates were Doctors of Medicine and medical superintendents of existing asylums.? In other words, the calibre of candidate was high.

The person appointed was recruited. This was Dr Edwin Goodall. A student contemporary of Alois Alzheimer in T?bingen and a product of the research culture of Wakefield Asylum, Goodall?s conviction was that research in anatomy and physiology would produce benefits. He insisted from the start that the new asylum should not be titled such; it was to be a mental hospital. He made no distinction between male and female staff; male staff were to be nurses not attendants. Cure was a possibility and research vital.

The hospital opened in 1908 to great fanfare in the Western Mail and with a charabanc procession of 200 dignitaries being driven from the centre of the city to the hospital for the occasion. In a very short period of time the hospital was being portrayed as a seat of great learning and was being lauded in guidebooks to the City as one of the signs that Cardiff had come of age as a metropolitan centre.

Goodall?s tenure as medical superintendent lasted from the opening of the hospital in 1908 to 1929. In 1915 the hospital was handed over to the military under the Asylum: War Hospitals Scheme and became the Welsh Metropolitan War Hospital. Dr Goodall was given the rank of Lieutenant Colonel and remained in charge. For its first two years of operation as a war hospital it dealt mainly with orthopaedic cases but in 1917 became a centre for shell-shock victims.

After the war Goodall continued in the spirit of innovation and introduced the practice of female nurses nursing male patients. He opened one of the first outpatient clinics in the nearby King Edward VIIth Hospital and saw patients from all over Wales. He also continued to develop the infrastructure and ethos for the hospital to become known as a research institution. For example, the hospital was one of the first to employ malaria therapy in the treatment of General Paralysis of the Insane.

A phased closure of the hospital began in 2015 with the last patients leaving the site in April 2016.? Non patient services remained onsite till early 2017 when the doors were locked for the final time.

Whitchurch Hospital Historical Society

National Archives – Whitchurch Hospital

Whitchurch Green Masterplan

5 responses to “Whitchurch”

1. My Great Grandfather was residing here in 1939, occupation was General Labourer. Later he was in Cardiff Asylum, Cowbridge Rd, where he died in 1942. There are several stories I heard over the years from family, but anyone who could now tell me anything has sadly passed away.
   Is there any chance that records of patients were kept and how I could access these. I would really love to get to the bottom of this very sad story.

   Reply

   • The whitchuch society may be able to help you as they currently have collected a lot of achived records with the hospital closing at the moment. I have forwarded your email onto them to see if they can help you more.

     Reply

2. I just recently learned I had a 2nd Great Aunt who died February 1912 at this hospital, I don’t know any other details but was hoping to find any records of patients this far back.

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   • Hi Jo, see Tom’s reply below regarding the Historical society, but you can also check the Whitchurch page and find out where the records are stored.

     Reply

3. Doctor Arcangelo Distaso, my mother’s uncle. worked in Welsh Metropolitan War hospital during first world war. I’m looking for every informations about him to write a book. I found a pubblication dated 1918 called “Agglutination results with certain dysentery organisms placed against homologous and heterologous sera” written with doctor Goodall. If you have any informations or photos, please contact me

   Reply

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