Glenfield Hospital

The story behind Glenfield Hospital’s Mansion House

March 2022 The Groby Road area is peppered with vestiges of Leicester’s healthcare past.  Many visitors to the Glenfield Hospital, in their hurry to get in, get treated, and get out, may not have noticed a gracious house to the right of the main entrance.  Mansion House, tucked behind the trees, is steeped in a history that provides an illuminating window on the development of mental health services in the 20th century.  Many things have changed, including the terminology and descriptions.  Expressions like “mental deficiency,” “imbecile,” and “the feeble minded” are no longer appropriate or acceptable.

There had been a house on this site since at least the 17th century.  In the early 19th century Sherman’s Lodge and the surrounding land was acquired by William Oldham,, the Leicester architect and builder.  He partially rebuilt it in 1816 and, at this point, it was called Frith House.  By 1837 his daughter Lucretia Oldham was the occupier.

The house and estate were put up for sale in 1861 but, whilst some of the land was sold the house and grounds remained in the ownership of Eleanor Mackie, who had inherited the property from her brother, William Oldham.

Three years later she married Thomas Swift Taylor, a Leicester cotton merchant or thread manufacturer.  As High Sheriff of Leicestershire he attended at Court at Windsor in the presence of Queen Victoria in March 1881.  

A new mansion was built alongside the old house and, completed in 1871, it had extensive “pleasure gardens.”   The 1891 Census shows  two gardener’s cottages, and ten years later Eleanor, now 83. is widowed and living there with her niece and servants. Thomas had died in 1899 and Eleanor survived until 1906. The entire property was put on the market, including the walled kitchen garden and its structures. The estate was purchased by Leicester Town Council.

In 1909 The Home of Rest, a charitable institution, was leased from the Corporation by a charity to provide nursing and care for “ladies and gentlemen of reduced circumstances.”  The garden was supplying all the fruit, vegetables and eggs required.

The Disabled Warriors’ Fund bought Leicester Frith House during the First World War and adapted it for use as a home for shell shocked soldiers.   It was a centre for neurasthenia, a group of symptoms, including chronic physical and mental fatigue, weakness, and generalized aches and pains, formerly thought to result from exhaustion of the nervous system and now usually considered a psychological disorder.

An annexe was built and from 1921 it was used by the Leicester Royal Infirmary as a convalescent home, until it was dedicated to a new use in 1923. This period up to the creation of the NHS makes fascinating reading, but the story really begins 20 years earlier.  

In February 1903 the After-Care subcommittee of the Leicester Education Committee, an entirely voluntary association, was founded with the aim of maintaining contact with the children who had passed through ‘Special Classes’, and to monitor their behaviour outside the care of these special classes. This was carried out by a system of home visits two or three times a year.  

Four years later a small residential home for 12 girls was established at 'Sunneyholme', 155 King Richards Road,  under the management of the After-Care Committee. The girls placed in this home usually came from Union Workhouses and were assessed ‘as being unable to take rational responsible care of their own lives.’ From 1907-1916 the home depended upon support from payments from the Guardians and private subscriptions and donations.

It was eventually handed over to the Local Authority, and in 1916 the home moved to premises in Belgrave known as 'Cross Corners' and came under the auspices of the Local Authority’s “Mental Deficiency Committee.” Leicester Frith opened on 30 August, 1923, providing for 30 male and 30 female children and 60 female adults, half of whom were transferred from Cross Corners. In 1925 the majority of the residents were transferred to Leicester Frith, where the site would be subsequently developed to provide six villas, each for 60 patients.  During the Second World War injured troops were once more cared for on the site.

 The Leicester No.3 Hospital Management Committee, after the creation of the NHS in 1948,  administered Leicester Frith, Mountsorrel Institution, Stretton Hall and hostels in Stoneygate and Billesdon, all known collectively as Glenfrith Hospital, and the Towers Hospital.  Two further hospitals,  Glengate at Desford and Kibworth Hall,  were added to the Glenfrith group in the 1950s.  As the NHS grew and developed the use of the property also evolved and by the 1960’s it was home to the Occupational Therapy Department.

In common with similar institutions part of the grounds were given over to gardens, giving patients the opportunity to grow crops. That’s a story that deserves an article of its own in a future edition.

This article has been compiled from internet sources, some of which are contradictory. For a definitive history of Mansion House in pictures just Google Mansion House Pictorial History to watch Wendy Pell’s video. Wendy was an assistant librarian at the Leicestership Partnership NHS Trust, and knows the building well. “It was a modest effort made on a zero budget,” she explained , “and in the end I simply ran out of time. I loved the building with it’s ghosts and quirks and I was trying to capture something of it’s years as a learning disability hospital.”

The cardiac Centre of Excellence on your doorstep

March 2016 It can come as a shock if you are unfortunate enough to suffer a heart attack or find yourself opposite a consultant who tells you that you need heart surgery. Relatives and friends will rally around and will invariably re-assure you that if it needs to be done, you can’t find a better place to have the procedure than at Glenfield Hospital with its reputation as a centre of excellence. Not only is the quality of care high, the hospital is also home to the University of Leicester British Heart Foundation Cardiovascular Research Centre (CVRC).

Cardiovascular disease kills more than 160,000 people in the UK every year and the CVRC further strengthens and consolidates Leicester’s position as a leading international centre for heart research. It aims to bring together scientists, doctors and patients to improve the diagnosis, prognosis and treatment available. The team at the CVRC is led by Professor Gavin Murphy, British Heart Foundation Professor of Cardiac Surgery at the University of Leicester.

“People who undergo heart surgery currently have a risk of suffering organ failure of up to 30 per cent,” he explained. “This is caused by the inevitable trauma and stress the body undergoes during these operations, which can lead to organ damage. Current research is focused on finding new treatments that could be used to try to prevent this organ failure.”

The most affected organs are the heart, kidney and lungs. Clinical trials have taken place to look at the causes of kidney complications in adults and children. These include the preventative effects of certain medications and also the detection of specific particles in the blood released which may help identify patients at risk of kidney damage.

Blood transfusions can play a critical role in heart surgery and the team has identified that microscopic particles may be released from the blood cells during storage. The research involves the washing of blood cells immediately before transfusion to prevent the particles being transferred to the patient.

Research such as this needs patient involvement and to help facilitate this, a Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) group dedicated to the cardiac research project has been formed. The group meets to receive and comment on updates from the research teams and to help the professional staff by giving the patient and public perspective. Members also help make sure communication with patients is clear and easily understood and spread the word about the research that is going on at Leicester’s Hospitals.

Commenting on the part played by the PPI group Professor Murphy said: “By making the PPI part of our research strategy we will ensure that our research best reflects the needs and concerns of the community which it aims to help. We would be unable to deliver our current research strategy without the commitment and time kindly given by the previous patients and members of the public who make up the group, which is directly making a difference to both patient experience and research success to an unprecedented extent.”

Those who get involved in volunteering for such groups often have first-hand experience themselves and one such member recalled how he provided practical help to the Cardiac

Rehabilitation Team to re-develop a website called 'Activate Your Heart', which provides a self-management tool for people who are getting themselves back on track after a heart attack or other cardiac event. “Having been through the experience myself, I was able to give my perspectives on what information people in that situation benefit from knowing, including increasing their activity levels to build confidence,” he said. “A few years on it is extremely rewarding to see the website helping so many people to get through what can be a tough time.”

Terry is well aware that events could have gone the other way. His gratitude for such a lifesaving intervention and the extra years of active life it has given him have found expression in the tireless volunteer work he does for Leicester’s Hospitals. Not only is he a member of the PPI but he also relishes his involvement in the Take Heart Adult Cardiac Patient Support Group which meets for 2 hours at the Education Centre at Glenfield Hospital at 10.00am on the first Saturday of each month. It also provides him with the opportunity to talk to patients on the cardiac wards.

“For over 13 years I have been a Leicester’s Hospitals’ volunteer and member of Take Heart which supports the cardiac wards in all three hospitals, though primarily at Glenfield where I visit the cardiac wards,” he said. “I am able to talk to them while looking healthy and can therefore reassure them.” And with a background as a semi-professional entertainer in Leicester he knows just how to put patients at ease and even put a smile on an anxious face. “I got involved with the PPI group a few years ago and so far am 'spreading the word' regarding Professor Gavin Murphy and the wonderful benefits of his research.”

If you would like to be involved in the PPI group or want more information you should contact the Department of Cardiovascular Sciences at Glenfield Hospital on 0116 258 3021 or email sp504@le.ac.uk.

To contact the Take Heart Support Group telephone Volunteer Services on 0116 258 7221, email thl@takeheartleicester.co.uk, or drop in to one of their monthly meetings.