The twenty-second report of the Committee of Visitors of the County Lunatic Asylum at Hanwell : January quarter sessions, 1867 / [Middlesex County Lunatic Asylum].

  • Middlesex Lunatic Asylum at Hanwell.
Date:
1867
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The twenty-second report of the Committee of Visitors of the County Lunatic Asylum at Hanwell : January quarter sessions, 1867 / [Middlesex County Lunatic Asylum]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    REPORT of the VISITING COMMITTEE on the Complaint made hy the Visiting Justices of the Lunatic Asylum at Hanwell. Your Committee report that they made the necessary inquiries in reference to this case. They examined the Master and the two paid Male Nurses, Welch and Newman. From their statements it appeared to your Committee, that Thomas Matthews, an aged and infirm pauper, had become a lunatic, and the attention of the Medical Officer had been called to the case with a view to determine whether he ought not to be removed to an Asylum. The Doctor having examined him, deemed him a lunatic and a proper person to be placed in an Asylum; and it appears that Welch on getting the lunatic ready to go discovered that he had a sore on his back, and that he mentioned it to Newman, but neither of them considered it of sufficient importance to mention it to the Medical Officer. Your Committee were of opinion that in this particular the Nurses had neglected their duty, inasmuch as the regulations for their guidance at the Workhouse expressly enjoins them to report such an occurrence to the Medical Officer. Your Committee were of opinion that the sore as described to them was not of any magnitude, but they thought it necessary to caution the Nurses not to omit in future so important a part of their duty. (Signed) j J. CORNISH, JOHN J. RUFFELL. * c