99: Bethel Hospital, Norwich

Wednesday, April 14, 2010
4:08 PM

At a time when mental illness was treated with inhumane brutality, in Norwich an enlightened woman had ideas ahead of her time.

Who was she?

Mary Chapman was the daughter of John Mann, a Norwich alderman, and later became wife of the Rev Samuel Chapman, rector of Thorpe. Born in 1647, she became his second wife at the age of 35. Her interest in mental illness was probably born of tragic personal experience. Both she and her husband had family who suffered thus, and it became a matter of conscience for the couple. She later declared: It has pleased Almighty God to visit and afflict some of my nearest relations with lunacy, but has blessed me with the use of my reason and understanding. As a monument of my thankfulness for this invaluable mercy, I set little Bethel for that purpose. On Samuels death in 1700 he left in his will money to build a hospital for the habitation of poor lunatics, and not for natural born fools or idiots. His widow gladly took on the job and work got under way on an empty city centre site.

Why was it empty?

In 1648, when Mary was just one year old, Norwich erupted into violence. With England still in the grip of civil war, an armed Royalist crowd, estimated at 2,000 strong, broke into a building known as the Committee House where the citys Parliamentary authorities had stored arms and ammunition. In the violence and confusion that ensued the powder magazine ignited with disastrous results. Up to 40 people were killed and the house, along with many neighbours, was destroyed; even the windows of nearby St Peter Mancroft Church were smashed. As a result of the Great Blowe, this part of Norwich stood derelict for half a century. Nice spot for a hospital. Mary took out a 1,000-year lease for a nominal rental fee on the site of the old Committee House, and the Bethel Hospital (the name means house of God) received its first patients in 1713.

Carpenter Richard Starling and mason Edward Freeman took on the building work. The hospital admitted only curable lunaticks; those who could pay did so, but there was no obligation. At the time there was little understanding of, or sympathy for, mental illness. William Hogarths A Rakes Progress (1735) illustrates the harshness of 18th century attitudes, when lunatics were exposed to ridicule and cruelty at worst, neglect at best, at such hellholes as the Bethlehem Hospital in London, which entered legend as Bedlam. As late as 1814 visitors were encouraged to prod inmates with sticks for fun. Even King George IIIs mental affliction in the 1780s was treated with physical brutality. The Norwich Bethel was, for its time, a progressive place; believed to be the first purpose-built asylum of its kind in the country.

Was it a success?

The first recorded patient to be admitted free was carpenters apprentice Philip Lewis. He had previously been looked after by his brother, who could no longer afford his upkeep. Patients were given medical attention by physicians such as Dr Benjamin Wrench, who treated patients from 1725 to 1747. He gave back his whole salary a total of 352. Many Norwich citizens made generous donations, including George Englands 2,700 in 1897. Provision was made for religious worship the master and matron reading prayers after breakfast by the 19th century and some recreation, which later included bowls, croquet and tennis. Make no mistake, this was no holiday camp. Inmates had cells, like prisoners, and many wore leg irons. Norwich author Amelia Opie recalled how in the 1780s inmates would beg at the windows for snuff. Amelia frequently threw money over the high garden wall for a patient she had got to know called Giddings. She also saw a new inmate, a girl whose hair is not yet cut off.

An up-to-date facility?

Bethel had decent amenities, several extensions being added to the building over the years. In 1848 gas lighting was installed, telephone and electricity before the turn of the century. By that time the hospital reported a recovery rate of more than 60pc. Whites 1845 Directory of Norfolk recorded the hospital as a commodious building with 70 patients, half of whom were treated for free, while friends and local parishes paid small weekly sums varying from 3s to 8s for others. Bethel had seven trustees, including a physician, Dr Wright, a surgeon, Mr Nichols, and a master, Mr King. By that time another asylum had opened outside the city, St Andrews Hospital at Thorpe St Andrew. A celebrity patient was boxer Richard Cricknell who, after one punch too many, lost his reason in 1840; he died two years later.

Any unfortunate incidents?

In 1813 the master, James Bullard, was killed by patient Jonathon Morley, who had been mowing the lawn with a scythe, while 20 years later the unfortunate Elizabeth Westbury hanged herself from a beam with a pocket handkerchief. In 1899 a female criminal escaped through a window. Despite this, throughout its 260-year life, the Bethel was seen as a well-run, decent sort of place where the sick were treated more gently than elsewhere. Following the second world war it became an annexe to Hellesdon Hospital. It was used as an outpatient unit until 1974, when it continued as the Centre for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry but closed in 1994, and has been converted for residential and office use. The original boardroom still exists.

And Mary Chapman?

She died aged 87 in 1724, and is buried in the churchyard of Thorpe St Andrews Church. Her tombstone reads: She built wholly at her own expense the house called Bethel... to which and other charitable uses she gave all her income while she lived and her estate at her death. Its fair to say her name is not as well known as it deserves to be, although there is a Mary Chapman Court off Duke Street and a UEA students accommodation block of the same name, a Mary Chapman Close on Dussindale estate at Thorpe St Andrew, while the NHS Bethel Child and Family Centre, off Dereham Road, is in Mary Chapman House.