ROYAL WATERLOO HOSPITAL

Identity Statement

Reference code(s)	: H01/RW
Held at	: London Metropolitan Archives   Click here to find out how to view this collection at https://www.cityoflondon.gov.uk/lma ›
Full title	: ROYAL WATERLOO HOSPITAL
Date(s)	: 1822-1976
Level of description	: subfonds View parent record
Extent	: 7.7 linear metres
Name of creator(s)	: Royal Waterloo Hospital for Children and Women x Universal Dispensary for Children x Royal Universal Dispensary for Children x Royal Universal Infirmary for Children x Royal Infirmary for Children x Royal Infirmary for Children and Women

Context

Administrative/Biographical history:

The Royal Waterloo Hospital was founded in 1816 by John Bunnell Davis as the Universal Dispensary for Children. The name was changed in 1821 to the Royal Universal Dispensary for Children. It occupied premises at St Andrew's Hill, Doctor's Commons, in the City of London. Between 1823 and 1824 a new building was erected on the corner of Waterloo Bridge Road and Stamford Street in Lambeth. It was intended to admit in-patients and consequently the Institution was renamed the Royal Universal Infirmary for Children. Unfortunately John Bunnell Davis died suddenly before the new building was completed. With his death the hospital lost some of its influential supporters and found itself heavily burdened with debt. The plan to admit in-patients had to be postponed.

The name of the institution was again altered in 1843 to the Royal Infirmary for Children and in 1852 to the Royal Infirmary for Children and Women. This second change was as the result of the receipt of an annual bequest of £450 from the Hayles Estate on condition that the hospital admitted in-patients and treated women. The first in-patients entered the hospital in 1856. Further changes of name took place on the extension of the hospital in 1875, when the title Royal Hospital for Women and Children was adopted, and in 1903, when on the rebuilding of the Hospital the name of the Royal Waterloo Hospital for Children and Women was chosen.

In 1948 the hospital became part of the National Health Service as one of the Saint Thomas' Hospital Group, providing beds for children, general medical and surgical, skin and psychiatric patients. It was also used for the training of medical students. The Royal Waterloo Hospital closed on 27th July 1976.

Content

Scope and content/abstract:

Records of the Royal Waterloo Hospital, including Governors Minute Books, 1832-1948; Rough Minute Books, 1920-1949; Governors Attendance Books, 1932-1953; Medical Committee Minute Books, 1903-1949; House and Finance Committees Minute Books, 1903-1948; Medical Attendance Books, 1935-1969; Rules and Orders, 1925-1933; Resident Medical Officer's Reports, 1899-1948; Annual Reports, 1822 and 1875-1947; correspondence and drawings relating to Hospital buildings, 1946-1951.

Patient records including In-Patients Admission Registers, 1942-1947 and 1967-1976; Patient Statistics, 1971-1976. Also Matron' Reports, 1912-1946; Matron's Petty Cash Books, 1920-1949; Nursing Staff Registers, 1890-1923; financial accounts, 1903-1961; papers relating to endowments and subscriptions, 1927-1950; scrapbooks containing appeal literature, posters, programmes, invitations, newspaper cuttings, annual reports, agendas for annual courts of governors, correspondence, plans and prints of hospital rules and regulations for patients, staff and probationer nurses, copies of governors' letters of recommendation and other forms, 1874-1917; Friends of the Royal Waterloo Hospital Minute Book, 1948-1954; booklet Sick Children and Women 1816-99. The Origin and Progress of the Royal Hospital for Children and Women, Waterloo Bridge Road, London, 1899; appeal booklet Prince's Meadows or Poverty Corner: Being a Short Account of the Royal Waterloo Hospital for Children and Women, 1907; sixteen photographs of the hospital as rebuilt in 1905, in a souvenir booklet prepared as part of an appeal for funds; and slides, photographs and printing blocks, 1899-1957.

Access & Use

Language/scripts of material:
English

System of arrangement:

These records are arranged according to a classification scheme for hospital records: Board of Governors and Hospital Administration (A), Patients' Administration (B), Matron's Office and Nursing Staff (C), Finance Office (D), Endowments (E), Miscellaneous (Y) and Prints and Photographs (Z).

Conditions governing access:

These records are available for public inspection, although records containing personal information are subject to access restrictions under the UK Data Protection Act, 1998.

Conditions governing reproduction:

Copyright Depositor

Finding aids:

Please see online catalogues at: http://search.lma.gov.uk/opac_lma/index.htm

Archival Information

Archival history:

Immediate source of acquisition:

Records transferrred to the Greater London Record Office from St Thomas' Hospital on 19 October 1967 with additional deposits between 1971 and 1989.

Allied Materials

Related material:

Other records relating to the Royal Waterloo Hospital are included in the records of St Thomas' hospital, including deeds to the property and minutes of the Board of Governors of St Thomas' Hospital 1948-1974. There are also records relating to the Royal Waterloo in a Charity Organisation Society Department file 1873-1936 (A/FWA/C/D220/1) and King Edward's Hospital Fund for London reports and papers 1898-1966 (ref. A/KE/255/8, A/KE/530/3, A/KE/543/5, A/KE/560, A/KE/737/21 and A/KE/738/63).

Publication note:

Description Notes

Archivist's note:

Rules or conventions:
Compiled in compliance with General International Standard Archival Description, ISAD(G), second edition, 2000; National Council on Archives Rules for the Construction of Personal, Place and Corporate Names, 1997.

Date(s) of descriptions:
February 2009