The Fate of The Mentally Ill

Before the ownership of Llanbedr Hall by John Jesse, Joseph Ablett, his predecessor was the landlord and occupier of the estate; he, in fact, willed it to John Jesse although there does not seem to be a blood relationship between the two.
Joseph Ablett was very concerned by the complete lack of provision for the mentally ill and mentally disabled; indeed, the general practice was to hide the afflicted from the rest of society and even the family as a whole.

Mary Jones

I was young and lovely,

Oh, I must not be vain.

A position in service, life was mine to gain.

But no-one told me how I must condescend,

To every demand of my betters.

What were you doing?

What is this practice of the flesh,

So intrusive and painful … so making me bereft.

My person has gone, forever.

I can’t talk, I can’t move, I've become helpless.

Because no-one will listen to the likes of me.

I have shunned my provider, a mortal sin for a peasant.

Family forgiveness will never be.

(Polly Mullaney-Hinchliffe)

The case of Mary Jones of Ruthin (PP (Lords), 1844 Supplemental Report of the Metropolitan Commissioners in Lunacy relative to the general condition of the Insane in Wales, 25 august 1844, London, Bradbury & Evans:

‘In a dark and offensive room, over a blacksmith’s forge, upon opening a bolted door, we discovered the miserable object of our search. The only window was closed up by boards, between which little air could find admission, and only a feeble glimmering of light.

In the middle of the loathsome chamber was Mary Jones, the Lunatic, on a foul pallet of chaff or straw; and here she had been confined for a period of fifteen years and upwards. She was seated in a bent and crouching posture, on her bed of nauseous and disgusting filth. Near to her person, and just within her reach, was a cup into which she was accustomed to pass her excretions, which she emptied from time to time, into a chamber utensil. This last vessel contained a quantity of feculent matter, the accumulation of several days. By her side were the remnants of some food, of which she had partaken. Within a few feet of the pallet, which was on the floor, stood a large earthen jar, nearly full of fetid urine, the produce of the three other persons in the cottage. It had, as stated by the mother, been placed there in order that it might, from the warmth of the room, undergo a more speedy decomposition, for the purpose of being used in dyeing wool. The stagnant and suffocating atmosphere, and the nauseous effluvia which infected it, were almost intolerable.

Long and close confinement had produced in Mary Jones’s person the most frightful distortions. The chest bone protruded forwards five or six inches beyond its natural place; and there was an excoriation of the parts below. The legs were bent backwards, and the knee-joints were fixed and immovable. The ankles and feet were also greatly twisted and deformed.

She was emaciated in the last degree, her pulse was feeble and quick, and her countenance, still pleasing, was piercingly anxious, and marked by an expression of despair. Her garments were loathsome; and from her person was emitted a most offensive odour’.

According to Mary's mother, when interviewed by the commissioners, Mary had first been 'attacked with insanity at twenty one when a servant in the family of the late Clerk of the Peace.' She had no signs of deformity, indeed, was still as 'straight as an arrow'.

At one time she had been treated at Denbigh Dispensary, but for the last fifteen years she had been housed in the small chamber above the forge. The rest of the family occupied the other half of the building. For the first five years Mary was allowed downstairs during the day, but for the following ten years she had been imprisoned in the chamber with the window boarded up.

However, the incredible fact that the commissioners found so puzzling was that 'her pitiable situation appears to have been veiled in mysterious secrecy', despite the fact that 'her habitation was in close proximity to the church, and contiguous to the public road'. It had been said that Mary's cries had been heard from the road.

    The forge, now a pottery,where Mary occupied one half of the loft. The building is virtually unchanged.                        Through the window on the left was Mary's loft; boarded up at the time.
  

Three Kids Gripped By Evil By Polly Mullaney      
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