Charles Gouldthorpe, a patient at the West Riding Lunatic Asylum, Wakefield, Yorkshire. Photograph attributed to James Crichton-Browne, 1872.

  • Crichton-Browne, James, 1840-1938.
Date:
[1872]
Reference:
35107i
Part of:
West Riding Asylum, Wakefield, Yorkshire: photographs of patients.
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About this work

Description

A man, grimacing and frowning, identified as Charles Gouldthorpe Attercliffe Road, Sheffield. He was admitted to the West Riding Asylum in June 1872 as a fifty-one year old married labourer. His photograph is dated that same month. He was accompanied to the Asylum by a police officer who had this to say: "Patient has been in the workhouse about a fortnight and while there was at times depressed and refused his food and at other times excited. At times he has been very suicidally inclined but it is not known whether he has made any direct attempt on his life. He is thought to have been a steady and sober man. Nothing is known of his family history. The present attack is said to have lasted 6 weeks, but no reliable information can be obtained." In November, 1872 Charles was removed to the recently opened South Yorkshire Ayslum at Wadsley near Sheffield. He passed away there in November the following year. -- records in the West Yorkshire Archive Service, Wakefield, Yorkshire, identified by David Scrimgeour, op. cit.

Publication/Creation

Wakefield : West Riding Asylum, Photographic Studio, [1872]

Physical description

1 photograph : photoprint, albumen ; sheet 9 x 5.5 cm

Lettering

Organic dementia Lettering hand-written in black ink on mount

References note

David Scrimgeour, 'Wellcome Library's "Anonymous patients" become proper people', David Scrimgeour blog http://www.davidscrimgeour.co.uk , 22 September 2016

Reference

Wellcome Collection 35107i

Creator/production credits

The photograph may have been taken by James Crichton-Browne (1840-1938), the medical superintendent at West Riding Asylum 1866-1876. Crichton-Browne sent a similar set of photographs to Charles Darwin in or around 1869

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