The Medical Officer's Report - 1854 North Wales Lunatic Asylum

Gentlemen,

'The season has again arrived when we are expected to report upon the state and progress of the Asylum during the past year.

The mortality has been increased beyond the usual amount by a variety of causes; amongst the most prominent of which, we are again concerned to remark, has been the cruel and thoughtless manner in which many parochial officials have sent patients into the Asylum, when the poor creatures have been in so reduced a state of bodily health as to render speedy death inevitable. Another cause has been the admission of several cases of that most fatal disease, general paralysis.

Thanks to the liberality and benevolence of Mr. Townshend Mainwaring, the house has at length been most efficiently supplied with gas, and at a comparatively small cost to the Counties in Union. This is a boon which none can duly estimate, but those who have witnessed the former gloom of the Asylum during the long winter nights, and contrasted it with its present bright and cheerful aspect.

A barrel organ has been purchased for the amusement of the patients during the winter evenings. Considerable increase has taken place in the amount of useful occupation amongst the patients, both male and female, during the past year. 

The same entire freedom from mechanical restraint, which has always marked the management of the Asylum since its opening, continues to be followed up with decidedly good results. We wish that we could say that this humane and rational plan found favour beyond the precincts of the Institution.

One most atrocious case of an opposite kind of treatment has fallen within our notice during the past year. It is most deplorable to contemplate, after the repeated generous efforts made by the press, both Welsh and English, to diffuse useful knowledge upon the subject of insanity, that in a Christian country and in a populous district, and with the knowledge of most of the neighbouring inhabitants, a fellow creature should have been permitted to be chained by both his legs in a miserable shed for seven long years.. The case is so painfully interesting, that we will add to this report the document which was sent to the Lord Chancellor, who, at the instigation of the Commissioners in Lunacy, issued an order for visiting the poor sufferer.

The Commissioners, with a laudable alacrity, ordered a prosecution to be instituted, and the principal offender was tried at the Carnarvonshire Autumn Assizes, convicted, and sentenced to be imprisoned. The determination of the Commissioners to protect the helpless lunatic, and the punishment awarded to the offender in this case, will, we hope, serve to teach others that they cannot inflict such cruel injuries upon their insane relatives with impunity. 

Denbigh, June 16th 1853)
(extract)

Sir,
I found the alleged lunatic, Evan Roberts, in a small shed, 6 feet wide, and 9 feet 4inches long, which had been built for the purpose. The room had a small sky-light in the roof and a window about a foot and a half square in the gable, just above the bed, which admits of being partially opened, but which was closed at the time of my visit; and as he (Evan Roberts) stated was seldom opened.

The room felt very close and damp. There was no fireplace, or any other means of ventilation except the door and window. The approach to the room was through a sort of scullery and very dark and obscure. Evan Roberts was lying on a chaff bed on a wooden bedstead, to which both his legs were chained, by fetters fastened and riveted, just above his ankles. In a recess in the wall at the bottom of the bed appeared a seat, covered by a lid, with hinges attached to it, which upon examination I found was a sort of privy, by which he was enabled to obey the calls of nature the chains which fastened him to the bedstead being just sufficiently long to enable the poor man to sit upon this contrivance. I found this internal privy emptied itself into a hole in the adjoining garden.

The room had been recently coloured, and the floor washed. The poor man’s body and bed linen were clean, and as Mr. Lloyd Jones, who kindly accompanied me, stated, in a very different and improved condition to what he found them on his two former visits. The appearance of the poor man was pale and pasty, like a plant long deprived of air and solar influence. His bodily health is tolerably good, and his condition rather inclined to be fat and stout; he said his appetite was good, and that he was not stinted in his food such as it was.

During a lengthened interview, and a very close examination, I failed to discover the existence of any hallucination or delusion of any kind; on the contrary, he was very sensible and intelligent

I collected from his mother and sister, that Evan Roberts was 48 years of age that he had been liable to periodical mania for 27 years, and which the mother attributed to some injury to his head, received in a rural affray, that at first the maniacal paroxysms were infrequent, but that they became more violent and frequent as he advanced in life. About seven years ago, his violence became so great, that he threatened to murder his father and brother; and it was at that time that he was first chained to the bed.

This restraint has never been relaxed, although both mother and sister admitted that he was perfectly sane and harmless for many weeks and months continuously. For the first five years he was confined upstairs, and it was only about two years ago that he was carried into the shed he now occupies.

During the examination, Evan Roberts frequently, but mildly and with much temper, contradicted the mother when she advanced anything which he deemed too highly coloured in extenuation of the treatment pursued towards him, and desired meekly she would adhere to the strict truth.

Finding that the poor fellow was awed by the presence of his mother and sister, I requested them to retire, as I wished to examine the alleged lunatic free from their presence and interference. The mother for some time refused to comply with my request; but upon being told that I would report her refusal, she very doggedly complied. The poor man then became less reserved, he complained bitterly of the state in which the privy had long been suffered to remain. For more than twelve months he had been obliged to pass all his urine as well as his excrements into this receptacle, and it became at last so full as to reach to within a foot of the room. The heat of the sun produced so much fermentation, that the stench became intolerable, and it caused him severe illness. Since this period, he has been allowed a chamber- pot. The soil has only been removed twice in two years, the last time about six weeks ago. It has however been less offensive since he has ceased to pass his urine into the privy.

In reference to the alleged threats to murder his father and brother, he denies the fact, and says his brother attempted to strangle him about twelve months ago.

The poor man complained that the chaff in his bed was never changed, or even shaken, except once, since his confinement in the shed; and from the dampness of the room, and the warmth of his body, it had become rotten, and like a wet sod. He said he was now shaved once a week, whereas his beard was allowed to grow for months before Mr. Lloyd Jones’s first visit.

In regard to the property, I found the Tenement was only worth about £20 a year, as it only consisted of five acres of land. The mother and sister alleged that the father had made a will, leaving the property to the younger brother in trust for the support of Evan Roberts and his mother for life. This he contradicted, and said he was the owner, and that £500 had once been offered for the Tenement. Mr. Lloyd Jones kindly promised to search the register at Bangor for both the father and grandfather’s wills, and report to me; the result of which I will communicate to you.

I remain, Sir,
Your obedient servant,
R. Lloyd Williams.

The Commissioners in Lunacy applied to the Lord Chancellor for an order to visit the farmer’s wife mentioned in one of our former reports, as having been tied to her bed by a cart rope, and her hands secured by a muff. She was accordingly visited, and a report upon her case sent to the Commissioners, who directed an enquiry to be made with a view of her removal to an asylum. The family obtained information of this investigation, and considerable amendment in the treatment of the lunatic took place before the Justices and the Medical Officer appointed to visit her arrived, and no order for her removal was made. We have reason to know that that poor creature is still under restraint, and her hands being secured, she is strapped to a chair, which is fastened to the leg of a strong table. 

Three Kids Gripped By Evil By Polly Mullaney     
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