MIDDLESEX DISTRICTS JOINT SMALLPOX HOSPITAL BOARD: CLARE HALL HOSPITAL

Identity Statement

Reference code(s)	: HL/B/MXJ
Held at	: London Metropolitan Archives   Click here to find out how to view this collection at https://www.cityoflondon.gov.uk/lma ›
Full title	: MIDDLESEX DISTRICTS JOINT SMALLPOX HOSPITAL BOARD: CLARE HALL HOSPITAL
Date(s)	: 1905-1929
Level of description	: Collection
Extent	: 1 linear metre
Name of creator(s)	: Middlesex Districts Joint Smallpox Hospital Board

Context

Administrative/Biographical history:

In 1740 Dr Robert Poole was instrumental in creating a charity for the relief of poor persons suffering from smallpox. In 1746 subscriptions were raised for erecting a hospital at Cold Bath Fields, Clerkenwell, on the site of a house that was already used by the charity for the treatment of infected persons.

The trustees had owned land in Saint Pancras since 1765, when they had moved the inoculation hospital there from a house in Old Street. In 1793-1794 the hospital was rebuilt there and subsequently received patients from the Cold Bath Fields Hospital. By 1850 the land in Saint Pancras was redeveloped as Kings Cross Station and the hospital moved to a site on Highgate Hill.

In 1896 the hospital made its final move to Clare Hall, South Mimms, Middlesex. At this time the hospital was still privately run by a Board of Management and administered by a house committee. In 1905, the councils of 14 districts of the County of Middlesex combined to form a Joint Board, which purchased Clare Hall Hospital. In 1907 the Joint Board took over the administration of the hospital.

In May 1911, the Local Government Board made an order, permitting the admission to Clare Hall of patients with pulmonary tuberculosis. Under a special order of the Minister of Health in 1928, the Hospital became a Middlesex County Council Institution. This came into effect on 1 April 1929 and the Joint Board was dissolved.

During the Second World War as part of the Emergency Medical Service, a hutted hospital was built in the grounds. By December 1942, all 540 beds in the hospital were devoted to tuberculosis patients.

In 1948 on creation of the National Health Service, the hospital was transferred to the North West Metropolitan Regional Hospital Board. In 1949 non-tuberculosis patients were admitted for treatment. The hospital was closed in 1975.

Content

Scope and content/abstract:

Papers of the Clare Hall Hospital, 1905-1929, including minutes of the meetings of the Board, Finance Committee, General Purposes and House Committee, Visiting Sub-committee and Farm Sub-committee; annual reports; finance reports; financial papers and papers relating to superannuation.

Access & Use

Language/scripts of material:
English

System of arrangement:

These records are arranged according to a classification scheme for hospital records: General Hospital Administration (A), Patients' Administration (B), Finance Office (D), Endowments (E), Related Documentation (Y) and Prints and Photographs (PH).

Conditions governing access:

These records are open to public inspection, although under section 5(4) of the 1958 Public Records Act administrative records are closed for 30 years and patient records for 100 years.

Conditions governing reproduction:

Copyright: City of London

Finding aids:

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

Archival Information

Archival history:

Immediate source of acquisition:

Deposited by Mr Nixon, Steward of Clare Hall Hospital, South Mimms, 23 Feb 1951. ACC/2357.

Allied Materials

Related material:

See also H/NW/1/SP for records of the Smallpox Hospital 1808-1903.

Publication note:

For further information see FAH Simmonds, A History of Clare Hall Hospital, 1962.

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:
January 2009