Build 7 — 22 July 2026
Supporting material for House No. 1 of the Five Houses of Wandsworth Common
APPENDICES
1 A Bolingbroke House Hospital – adverts, images, interior ward pictures etc
1 B Bolingbroke House Hospital – extract from The Hospital publication, June 23, 1888
1 C Bolingbroke Hospital extract from the Lost Hospitals of London
1 D Model Arrangements for the Sick Poor – extract
1 E The Bolingbroke Academy
Bolingbroke House/hospital
An early advertisement appeared in The Times on 6 December.
A HOME in SICKNESS
BOLINGBROKE-HOUSE PAY HOSPITAL
Wandsworth Common
Trustee - The Rev Canon Erskine Clarke
This Institution is now open, and ready to receive sufferers from acute sickness upon payments according to their means, and it offers them the advantages of hospital treatment and nursing with home comforts. There is a ward for children as well as for adults, of both sexes. It is situate on the verge of one of the most healthful and extensive commons near London, and has a medical staff and resident surgeon and nurses.
Ladies and gentlemen interested in the scheme of assisting those who are willing to help themselves may view the Hospital any day but Sunday, between 12 and 4 o’clock
DONATIONS and SUBSCRIPTIONS are necessary until the Institution is sufficiently well-known to be self-supporting.
Prospectus will be forwarded by the Honorary Secretary, Mr J.S. Wood, Woodville, Upper Tooting , S.W.
Patients taking the air on the balcony of Bernard Baron ward of Bolingbroke Hospital, overlooking Wandsworth Common, c. 1927. Founded in 1880 in a large house facing the common, Bolingbroke House, the hospital was enlarged in 1927 and 1937.
The Bolingbroke Hospital ward circa 1900
Bolingbroke House, Wandsworth Common.
A vast population, consisting largely of clerks and artisans, in the last ten years has settled around Clapham Junction. The nearest hospitals are four miles distant. Those hospitals, constantly appealing for funds, are intended for the poor, and not for middle-class folk, who do not wish to receive charity, and who are ready to pay according to their means for that illed nursing and quietness which they cannot always obtain in their own homes. To meet their case, Bolingbroke House, Wandsworth Common, was opened seven years ago as a pay hospital. It has proved a great boon to nearly one hundred invalids in each year, about half of whom come from the adjacent parishes, and half from other parts of London and from the provinces. These patients have paid such sums as they could afford, averaging about a pound a-week. The cost of their treatment has been from thirty to fifty shillings per week, and the deficiency has been made up by the donations of sympathetic benevolence.
It was hoped at the outset that there would have been a sufficient number of wealthier patients, paying more than their actual cost, to balance the loss on those who paid less than their cost. This hope has not been fulfilled, owing mainly to the spread of the paying system in the more central parts of London. The result is that Bolingbroke House is doing its really beneficient work at an annual loss, which seriously threatens its continuance. It is felt that, with a middle-class population increasing, and apparently likely to increase in the districts around it with unexampled rapidity, it would be deplorable to surrender the hospital now that it is in perfect working order and has gained much publicity in the seven years of its existence.
The house is a thoroughly good hospital of twenty-five beds, with ground and capacity for ample extension. It is in a peculiarly healthful situation facing Wandsworth Common. In this year eighty-nine patients have paid no less than £926, but their treatment has involved a loss of about £250. The patients and their friends have testified their grateful appreciation of the boon which the house has been to them, in that it has spared them from resorting to the inevitable publicity and trying associations of a general hospital. Among the patients there were sixteen professional men, ten clerks, and nine governesses.
A comparatively small subscription list would enable the committee to maintain the hospital, which is most efficiently administered, and which they invite anyone to visit.
Further particulars will be given, and any donations gratefully acknowledged, by the resident medical officer, Dr. Cecil C. R. Lyster, Bolingbroke House, Wandsworth Common.
Bolingbroke Hospital - Wakehurst Road, Wandsworth Common, SW11 6HN
The Vicar of St Mary’s Church, Battersea - Canon John Erskine Clarke - was the main instigator for the establishment of a voluntary hospital in the area. In 1876 Bolingbroke House, an old red brick 3-storey mansion in Five Houses Lane (now Bolingbroke Grove) overlooking Wandsworth Common, was purchased for £4,500 for this purpose.
A Provident Dispensary, with a resident doctor, was established in the house for out-patients only until enough money could be raised to open the wards (the house was large enough to accommodate 50 in-patients).
The Bolingbroke Self-Supporting Hospital and House in Sickness opened in 1880 and became a small general hospital with 30 beds and an Accident and Emergency Department. It was one of the first to cater for both the artisan and middle classes. (While the rich could afford private treatment in their own homes and the poor received medical care in workhouse infirmaries, the middle classes could not afford private nursing care but did not want to be admitted to infirmaries. By the late 19th century hospitals for those who could afford to pay a moderate fee began to be established). As with other voluntary hospitals, patients with infectious or contagious diseases, the mentally ill, the incurable, epileptics and maternity cases were not eligible for admission.
In 1893 a ward specifically for accident cases was opened, with casualties receiving free treatment.
At the end of the century plans were drawn up for the complete rebuilding of the Hospital, including demolition of Bolingbroke House.
The first phase was completed in 1901, when the Hospital was extended by a single-storey wing in
Wakehurst Road, at the northeastern part of the site. The new building housed the Out-Patients Department and was named the Victoria Memorial Wing after Queen Victoria, who had recently died.
The second phase began in 1906, when Princess Louise laid a foundation stone for another wing to be added to the north of Bolingbroke House. It was named the Canon Erskine Clarke Wing and contained wards, an operating theatre and a mortuary. The 3 storey building also had a basement. Its flat roof was used as an airing ground for patients and staff.
Another 3-storey ward block - the Bolingbroke Wing - was added just before the outbreak of WW1 in
1914. During the war 20 beds were reserved for military cases transferred from the Third London Hospital. By 1917 this number had been increased to 25 beds. A pre-fabricated X-ray room was built (this was later converted into a chapel).
In 1925 the foundation stone was laid for a new wing by Princess Mary, Viscountess Lascelles. It opened in 1927 and was named the William Shepherd Memorial Wing after William Shepherd, a “philanthropically minded builder”. An imposing stair-tower divided the wing into two parts. The ground floor of the southern part contained an 18-bed ward. On the first and second floors were single rooms for private patients and a 4-bedded ward. A corridor connected the building to the Canon Erskine Clarke Wing.
The Hospital then had 120 beds, including 20 cots in a children’s ward on the first floor of the Shepherd Wing. The Anne Carmichael Children’s Ward was decorated with picture tiles of nursery rhymes and animals.
In 1928 the weekly charge for a private room was 6 guineas (£6.30) or 4 gns (£4.20) for a bed in a 5-bedded ward. This fee included provision of care by the Resident Medical Officer and nurses, board and lodging, medicine, certain stimulants, surgical dressings and the use of the operating theatre. The cost of a special nurse, laundry, massage, pathology and X-ray examination was extra. The attending clinician was paid separately.
In 1928 the average weekly cost of an in-patient was £2 13s 2d (£2.66), compared to £3 13s 6d (£3.67) in 1927. The average length of stay was 17 days.
Following the addition of the new wings, Bolingbroke House itself was hemmed in on three sides, with its front facing the back of the Shepherd Wing. In 1937 the old mansion was demolished and work began to build a central administration block to unify the frontage on Wakehurst Road and to create a main entrance for the Hospital. The Battersea War Memorial Committee provided a scheme by which the new entrance would include a War Memorial for the fallen of Battersea during WW1.
The lobby of the new entrance was lined with marble and comprised a vestibule with a reception booth and an octagonal hall. The hall was made into a Hall of Remembrance. Along the three corridors which ran from the hall were various offices and the Board Room. On the first floor were 6-bedded wards, while the second floor contained accommodation for nursing staff. The top floor contained the main kitchen.
In 1938 the average weekly cost of an in-patient was £3 8s 2d (£3.41).
At the outbreak of WW2, it joined the Emergency Medical Service and was affiliated with St Thomas’s Hospital. It received bomb damage in 1941 and was hit by a V1 flying bomb in 1944.
In 1946, of its 135 beds, only 118 were open due to a lack of nursing accommodation and the deep cleaning of wards. The average length of stay was 22 days and the average weekly cost of an in-patient was £7 6s 7d (£7.33), compared to £6 9s 7d (£6.48) in 1945. In the same year an X-ray apparatus was installed for radiation treatment of certain skin disorders.
Despite misgivings from the Hospital Board, the Hospital joined the NHS in 1948 with 135 beds under the control of the Battersea and Putney Group Hospital Management Committee, part of the South West Metropolitan Regional Hospital Board.
For Coronation Day in 1953 Mr KM Hubbard, a local radio and electrical engineer, loaned 20 TV sets to the Hospital so that the patients could watch the ceremony. By this time work had begun on a new wing. Between 1953-1954 the cost per in-patient was £16 4s 4d (£16.22) per week.
In February 1957 a new X-ray Department was officially opened by Sir Zachary Cope, a former surgeon to the Hospital. It was situated in a new £35,000 single-storey block, perpendicular to the main building, which had been built so that additional floors could be added in the future to create a new wing.
In the same year installation of overhead lights for each bed was completed in the last two wards, so that patients could control their own lighting.
Part of the old X-ray Department was converted into a chapel at a cost of £2,000. When it was completed, a dedication service was held on 21st September 1957 by the Bishop of Kingston, the Rt. Revd. W.P. Gilpin.
In 1959 the Hospital had 129 beds.
A new Coronary Care Unit opened in 1967 and was enlarged in 1972 with more convalescent coronary care beds.
In 1974, following a major reorganisation of the NHS, the Hospital came under the control of the Merton, Sutton and Wandsworth Area Health Authority, part of the South West Thames Regional Health Authority.
In 1974 the Accident and Emergency Department was closed, despite protests from the local population, and the option was mooted of completely closing the Hospital because of low bed occupancy.
During the 1980s the Hospital began to focus on services for older people. By 1989 it had five wards for acute admissions, treatment and rehabilitation, six beds for respite care and a Day Hospital. The issue of fire safety was raised, as the elderly patients were housed on the upper floors and the buildings were deteriorating, but no remedial action was taken at that time.
In 1993, following the introduction of the “marketplace” system in the NHS, the Hospital became part of the newly formed St George’s Healthcare NHS Trust.
In 2004 the Trust reviewed the question of fire safety and sought the advice of the London Fire
Brigade. An independent fire safety report was then obtained and, on the basis of that, in 2005, the Trust decided to close the remaining 54 beds, with in-patients being transferred to nearby nursing homes or community hospitals, despite more than £2.5m having been spent on refurbishing the wards the previous year.
The Bolingbroke became a community hospital, with Out-Patient clinics and various health care services, and a Day Hospital for 15 elderly patients, but St George’s Healthcare NHS Trust, which owned the site, and Wandsworth Primary Care Trust, which funded the services located there, jointly agreed that the Hospital was run-down and underused, being 80% empty. It was proposed that the facilities would move to the new St John’s Therapy Centre, less than a mile away in St John’s Hill.
There was immense opposition from the local community to the closure and Wandsworth
Councillors managed to block the plan. The issue was referred to the then Secretary of State for Health, Alan Johnson, who agreed in July 2007 to the closure of Bolingbroke Hospital and the transfer of clinical services to St John’s.
This situation was seen by Wandsworth Councillors as “closure by stealth”, whereby services were gradually withdrawn (so fewer patients attended) and the real estate deteriorated to the point that it was “uneconomical” to repair and modernise the buildings (despite the Trusts having spent £2.5m in ward refurbishment).
In 2009 the buildings were Grade II listed.
In 2011 Wandsworth Council acquired the site from St George’s Hospital Trust. It was planned to use the buildings as the Bolingbroke Academy, a secondary school which is due to open in September 2012.
MODEL ARRANGEMENTS FOR THE SICK POOR.
SOURCE: https://biblicalstudies.org.uk/pdf/churchman/os/06-32_113.pdf https://biblicalstudies.org.uk/pdf/churchman/os/06-
32_113.pdf?fbclid=IwAR1tPAe4IkIVkkPLLdi_psa8HTblqPvG8TLRevQ2i_BLCt65uQVXJVccPWc
It is now about half a century since the Provident system of medical relief was first tried in this country.
For some time it made little or no progress; but during the last few years it has taken a fresh start.
The vast increase in the numbers, in the wealth and in the political power of the working classes, renders every subject which affects their well-being a matter of importance to the nation at large.
In particular it is felt to be most desirable to cultivate habits of prudence, forethought and self-reliance.
For these reasons the Provident system now stands high in public favour. It has been adopted by some of our most eminent social reformers.
Provident dispensaries, and kindred institutions, have been opened in many towns and villages; and at the present time a great scheme is being developed, under the name of “The Metropolitan Provident Dispensaries Association,” with the view of giving the working people, in every district of London, the means of insuring themselves against the expenses of sickness through the agency of Provident Dispensaries.
The Infirmary of the Wandsworth Union is an admirable specimen of its class.
Thus the sick poor of Battersea, who have occasion to ask alms of the ratepayers, are met in a kind and liberal spirit. The charity, which the Poor Law affords them, is dealt out with no grudging hand.
So that, as far as this class of the population is concerned, the arrangements are all that could be desired.
But it is a more difficult matter to know how to provide during the time of sickness for the class who are immediately above the paupers.
It has been the custom hitherto to provide for the medical wants of this class by charitable dispensaries and hospitals; and there can be no doubt that these institutions have done much good.
Whatever alterations may now be required, in consequence of the altered state of society, we must never forget to give the charitable dispensaries and hospitals the need of praise which they deserve.
The dispensaries not only receive patients at their consulting rooms, but they also undertake to visit the sick poor at their own homes.
This has always been a very valuable feature in the work of the dispensaries and must have brought an infinite amount of relief and comfort into many a poor man’s family.
But it is obvious that cases must constantly arise of such a serious, or of such a chronic character, that they cannot be adequately treated in a working man’s home. Hence arose the need for charitable hospitals.
At first these institutions confined themselves to receiving in-patients; but gradually they developed out-patient departments as well.
Let us now see what provision has been made for the working people of Battersea on the Provident system.
In 1844, a charitable dispensary was founded in the parish.
This mode of administering medical relief might be well enough in a village, where every really poor person was known; but in a populous suburb, such as Battersea was even then becoming, it was calculated to develop serious abuses.
And not only was the principle upon which the dispensary was founded a faulty one, but the institution itself could hardly be said to have a very vigorous existence.
Accordingly, in 1876, it was converted into a Provident Dispensary. From that time to the present it has gone on growing in extent and in usefulness.
Among so many members it will easily be understood that cases not unfrequently arise which require in-patient treatment.
But the two nearest hospitals, St Thomas’s and St George’s, are both about four miles distant.
Moreover, both of these institutions rest upon a charitable basis. The former was founded by endowment for the sick poor, and the latter is supported by voluntary contributions for the benefit of the same class.
Neither the one nor the other contain an element of self-help, such as it was the desire of the Battersea Committee to promote.
Apart from this objection, four miles is a long distance to convey people who are so ill as to require in-patient treatment, and it is a long distance for their friends to go on visiting days.
What could be more natural than that the managers of the Provident Dispensary should think of starting a new hospital in their own district, and placing it, as far as possible, upon a self-supporting basis?
Just at this time the fine old mansion, called Bolingbroke House, was offered for sale.
It stood in a very healthy situation on the edge of Wandsworth Common, so that the principal frontage could never be injured.
It was originally built for Mr Willis, the banker, and though only four miles from Charing Cross, it was then a country seat, surrounded by a well-wooded park, with a lake and many acres of demesne.
Already, in 1878, the extensive grounds around the house had been laid out for streets, and it was a question whether the mansion itself should be demolished to give place to small tenements.
At this point Canon Erskine Clarke, the Vicar of Battersea, stepped in, and bought Bolingbroke House for £4,000, with the view of its being converted into a pay-hospital.
The mansion itself, substantial and spacious, is well adapted for the purpose; and, as it occupies the entire space between two roads which have been cut at right angles to Wandsworth Common, it has a frontage on three sides, while the pleasure grounds which surround it secure an open space at the back.
There is, therefore, a free circulation of air; and as the house looks out upon the fine elms of Wandsworth Common, it is likely for many a day to retain something of its rural character.
When the house had been secured, an appeal was made for donations, in order that it might become a public institution; and the late Mr. Philip Cazenove headed the list with £500.
Other donations have since been received, bringing up the total to £6,000.
About the same time that Bolingbroke House was purchased, it was thought desirable to open a second Provident Dispensary for the Wandsworth Common district, as the Battersea Dispensary was too far off for the convenience of the residents in that neighbourhood.
A local committee was formed, and the Wandsworth Common Provident Dispensary was opened in 1879.
Some good basement rooms in Bolingbroke House, as well as apartments for a resident medical officer, were placed at the service of the Committee; and there the Wandsworth Common Provident Dispensary has been carried on ever since.
It forms, in fact, a provident out-patient department for Bolingbroke Pay-Hospital. This second dispensary has also steadily advanced in numbers.
The following figures show the number of its members in each year: in 1879, 972; in 1880, [168?]; in [1988?], 1266.
The medical officer of the Dispensary also acts as house-physician to the hospital, taking a general superintendence of its medical arrangements, and looking after in-patients under the direction of the visiting physicians and surgeons.
In December 1880, the first in-patient was received into Bolingbroke Hospital, and from that date up to October 31, 1881, thirty-four patients have been treated in its wards.
These persons have all contributed something, in proportion to their means, towards the expense of their maintenance, it having been found the best plan not to make fixed charges, but to inquire into the circumstances of each patient, and to require such a payment as he could reasonably afford.
The individual payments have ranged from 12s. 6d. to £3 3s. per week; the latter charge being for a private room.
The majority of cases have paid £2 2s. a week.
The average weekly payment from each patient has been [£ r ros. 6d.?]; and the total paid by patients has been [£ 203 1 3s.?].
Each patient has cost, on a weekly average, £2 5s.1
[The tions had to lie made in the drainage?]; some of the internal fittings had to be modified; the grounds had to be enclosed, and the roads completed; and in due time some of the wards had to be furnished.
All this involved an expenditure of nearly £3,000 in addition to the purchase-money.
1 In arriving at this calculation certain charges have been included which are incident to the first establishment of the hospital.
It may therefore be safely concluded that the average cost will in future years be less, because a staff of attendants had to be maintained for several months to prepare the house for the reception of patients.
It is also [running page-header “120 Model Arrangements for the Sick Poor.” interrupts the text here] patients’ payments have already defrayed 67 per cent. of the expenditure; and the Secretary expresses his confident opinion that, if all the beds were filled, and the weekly average payment of [£r ms. 6d.?] were maintained, the hospital would be self-supporting.
Of the thirty-four patients admitted, twelve were men, and twenty-two women.
Many cases had, for various reasons, to be refused. Incurable cases, or cases of insanity, fits, &c., are, by the rules, inadmissible.
A considerable proportion of applicants who sought to make the hospital their last home, or who proposed an altogether inadequate payment, were also declined.
Notwithstanding the great difficulty of making known the existence and advantages of a fresh institution, which can only be done by expending a large amount in advertising, it is interesting to observe, that of these thirty-four patients, eleven came from Battersea, fifteen from other parts of London and its suburbs, five from the provinces, and three from abroad.
Of those patients who resided in Battersea, six were members of the Provident Dispensary, which may be regarded as the out-patient department of the hospital.
These six would have found ready admission to any of the charitable hospitals, and would, probably, have resorted to one or other of them, had there not been such an institution at hand as a Pay-Hospital, where they could obtain the medical assistance they required without sacrificing their independence and self-respect.
The first Annual Report of the hospital, from which these particulars are taken, gives a list of the occupations of the thirty-four in-patients; and it shows that they belonged, almost entirely, to the lower middle-class — just that class upon whom severe sickness falls the most heavily, and who would certainly, in most parts of the country, have to apply to a charitable hospital.
And yet it is highly undesirable that such persons should be led to regard themselves as “objects of charity.”
They are able and willing to pay something for themselves, if only they could turn at once, when sickness comes upon them, to such an institution as Bolingbroke Pay-Hospital, where they would receive all the medical care and attention that their case required, and where also a kindly consideration would be shown for their pecuniary circumstances.
In order that the payments may fall still [text breaks off here in the source]
Thus, we have surveyed the arrangements which have been made for the sick poor in a single parish.
If similar arrangements could be introduced into every parish, their beneficial effect upon the moral and social condition of the working classes would be incalculable.
Sooner or later sickness enters into every family, and not unfrequently drags it down into poverty.
But if a scheme of Sick Insurance could be devised, which would prevent this sad result, while at the same time it encouraged habits of prudence and forethought, there would be good reason to hope that the prosperity of the working classes would be placed upon a firmer basis.
Though fluctuations in trade must continue to occur, and seasons of commercial depression must from time to time be expected, yet, when the drain caused by sickness was removed, the working man would be able to face these periods more hopefully; and the same forethought which led him to provide against sickness would probably teach him to make provision also against the time when work was slack.
The Bolingbroke Academy did indeed open in September 2012. The children’s ward with its picturesque tiles is the school’s library. The Hall of Remembrance is still used on Remembrance Day.
