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Child Insanity in England, 1845-1907 pp 23–65Cite as

Palgrave Macmillan

‘Much Below Insects, and so Little Above Sensitive Plants’: Constructing the Insane Child

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Part of the book series: Palgrave Studies in the History of Childhood ((PSHC))

Abstract

The chapter begins by exploring the process of admission to an asylum in the years following 1845. Then it offers a detailed examination of the children confined inside of them that explores issues of age, gender, diagnosis, causation, and chronology. An investigation into the causative explanations is conducted that offers fresh insights into childhood and insanity during the period. This includes a discussion of the family role in the admission process before moving to an in-depth look at the most common diagnosis for children, idiocy.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    M. Foucault, Madness and Civilisation: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason (London: Routledge, reprint 2001) originally Histoire de la folie á l’age classique (1961), Chap 2; 48 Geo. III, c. 96.

  2. 2.

    J. Andrews and A. Scull, Customers and Patrons of the Mad-Trade: The Management of Lunacy in Eighteenth-Century London (London: University of California Press, 2003); W. Parry-Jones, The Trade in Lunacy: A Study of the Private Madhouses in England in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries (London: Routledge, 1972).

  3. 3.

    55 Geo. III, c.46.

  4. 4.

    The first asylums built were in the counties of Bedfordshire, Cornwall, Gloucestershire, Lincoln, Norfolk, Nottinghamshire, Staffordshire, Suffolk, and two county asylums were built in the more densely populated counties of Yorkshire and Lancashire. L. Smith, Cure, Comfort and Safe Custody: Pauper Lunatic Asylums in Early Nineteenth-Century England (London: Leicester University Press, 1999), p. 82.

  5. 5.

    A. Digby, ‘Changes in the Asylum: The Case of York, 1777–1815,’ The Economic History Review, 36/2 (1983), pp. 218–239, p. 222. A. Suzuki, ‘The Politics and Ideology of Non-Restraint: The Case of the Hanwell Asylum,’ Medical History, 39 (1995), pp. 1–17.

  6. 6.

    Foucault, Madness and Civilization.

  7. 7.

    Smith, Cure, Comfort and Safe Custody, Chap. 6.

  8. 8.

    8 & 9 Vict., c. 100.

  9. 9.

    P. McCandless, ‘Liberty and Lunacy: The Victorians and Wrongful Confinement,’ in A. Scull (ed.), Madhouses, Mad-Doctors, and Madmen: The Social History of Psychiatry in the Victorian Era (London: Athlone, 1981), pp. 339–362.

  10. 10.

    R. Hunter and I. MacAlpine, Psychiatry for the Poor: 1851 Colney Hatch Asylum—Friern Hospital 1973 A Medical and Social History (London: Dawsons, 1974), p. 17; P. Bartlett, The Poor Law of Lunacy: The Administration of Pauper Lunatics in Mid-Nineteenth-Century England (London: Leicester University Press, 1999); P. Bartlett, ‘The Asylum and the Poor Law: The Productive Alliance,’ in J. Melling and B. Forsythe (eds.), Insanity, Institutions and Society, 1800–1914: A Social History of Madness in Comparative Perspective (Abingdon: Routledge), pp. 48–67, p. 51.

  11. 11.

    LMA, Friern Hospital (Colney Hatch), Male Casebook 9, H12/CH/B/13/009, George Hamilton, Admission no. 2970, p. 92.

  12. 12.

    Bartlett, Poor Law of Lunacy, pp. 102–103.

  13. 13.

    Ibid., p. 134.

  14. 14.

    V. Skultans, English Madness: Ideas on Insanity, 1580–1890 (London: Routledge, 1979), p. 103.

  15. 15.

    Ibid.

  16. 16.

    J. Melling, R. Adair, and B. Forsythe, ‘“A Proper Lunatic for Two Years”: Pauper Lunatic Children in Victorian and Edwardian England. Child Admissions to the Devon County Lunatic Asylum, 1845–1914,’ Journal of Social History, 31/2 (1997), pp. 371–405.

  17. 17.

    P. Bartlett, Poor Law of Lunacy, p. 97.

  18. 18.

    49 Vict. c. 25.

  19. 19.

    A. Wood Renton, The Law and Practice in Lunacy: With the Lunacy Acts 1890–1 (consolidated and annotated): The Rules of the Lunacy Commissioners 1895: The Idiots Act 1886: The Vacating of Seats Act 1886 (London: Stevens & Haynes, 1896), p. 777.

  20. 20.

    Ibid., p. 784.

  21. 21.

    K. Jones, Mental Health and Social Policy 1845–1959 (London: Routledge, 1960), p. 47.

  22. 22.

    Emphasis is my own. 54 Vict. c. 3.

  23. 23.

    These bodies were created by the Local Government Act of 1888.

  24. 24.

    K. Jones, Mental Health and Social Policy, p. 40.

  25. 25.

    K. Jones, Asylums and After: A Revised History of the Mental Health Services: From the Early 18th Century to the Late 1990s (London: Athlone, 1993), p. 120.

  26. 26.

    This distinction was posited by J. Haslam, A Letter to the Lord Chancellor on the Nature and Interpretation of Unsoundness of Mind and Imbecility of Intellect (London: R. Hunter, 1823); F. Winslow, The Plea of Insanity in Criminal Cases (London: H. Renshaw, 1843); E. Seguin, Idiocy: And its Treatment by the Physiological Method (New York: Brandows, 1866, reprinted New York: Teachers College, Columbia University, 1907).

  27. 27.

    Report of the Metropolitan Commissioners in Lunacy (London: Bradbury and Evans, 1844).

  28. 28.

    A. Borsay, Disability and Social Policy in Britain since 1750 (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), p. 39.

  29. 29.

    D. Wright, Mental Disability in Victorian England: The Earlswood Asylum, 1847–1901 (Oxford: Clarendon, 2001), p. 82; Wright, ‘Familial Care of “Idiot” Children in Victorian England,’ in P. Horden and R. Smith (eds.), The Locus of Care: Families, Communities, Institutions and the Provision of Welfare since Antiquity (London: Routledge, 1997), pp. 176–197, p. 183; The role of healthy children as care providers for their younger siblings is discussed by J. Parr, Labouring Children: British Immigrant Apprentices to Canada, 1869–1924 (London: Croom Helm, 1980), pp. 16–19.

  30. 30.

    S. G. Howe, ‘On the Causes of Idiocy,’ in M. Rosen, G. R. Clark, M.S. Kivitz (eds.), The History of Mental Retardation, Collected Papers (paper first published 1848, collection published Baltimore: University Park Press, 1976), pp. 34–37.

  31. 31.

    E. Seguin, Idiocy: And its Treatment by the Physiological Method (New York: Brandows, 1866 reprinted New York: Teachers College, Columbia University, 1907), p. 29; M.E. Talbot, Edoward Seguin (New York: Teacher’s College Press, 1964); H. Lane, The Wild Boy of Aveyron (St Albans: Paladin, 1979), pp. 261–278.

  32. 32.

    See P. Bartlett, Poor Law of Lunacy, pp. 88–90.

  33. 33.

    Wright, Earlswood, p. 17.

  34. 34.

    K. Price, A Regional, Quantitative and Qualitative Study of the Employment, Disciplining and Discharging of Workhouse Medical Officers of the New Poor Law throughout Nineteenth-Century England and Wales (Oxford Brookes University: Unpublished PhD thesis 2008).

  35. 35.

    Melling et al., ‘Proper Idiot’. p. 375.

  36. 36.

    H. Cunningham, The Children of the Poor: Representations of Childhood since the Seventeenth Century (Oxford: Blackwell, 1991); D. Wardle, The Rise of the Schooled Society: The History of Formal Schooling in England (London: Routledge, 1974).

  37. 37.

    Wright, ‘“Childlike in his Innocence”: Lay Attitudes towards “Idiots” and “Imbeciles” in Victorian England,’ in D. Wright and A. Digby (eds.), From Idiocy to Mental Deficiency: Historical Perspectives on People with Learning Disabilities, pp. 118–133, pp. 122–124.

  38. 38.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Out of County Casebook 2, NCLA/6/2/2/17, Amos Tullet, Admission no. 2734, p. 236.

  39. 39.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Male Casebook 9, NCLA/6/2/2/9, Alfred Hamp, Admission no. 4677, p. 31.

  40. 40.

    BLA, Three Counties, Female Casebook 3, LF29/3, Alice Popper, Admission no. 2589, p. 310.

  41. 41.

    Ibid., p. 130.

  42. 42.

    L. Ray, ‘Models of Madness in Victorian Asylum Practice,’ European Journal of Sociology, 22/2 (1981), pp. 229–264.

  43. 43.

    Ibid.

  44. 44.

    For accuracy the total number of patients used for this calculation is 753. This is due to a number of patients having casefiles that are not accessible due to loss or damage.

  45. 45.

    S.G. Howe, ‘On the Causes of Idiocy,’ p. 34.

  46. 46.

    Seguin, Idiocy, p. 31.

  47. 47.

    D.H. Tuke, Insanity in Ancient and Modern Life with Chapters on its Prevention (London: Macmillan, 1878).

  48. 48.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Out of County Casebook 1, NCLA6/2/2/16, Ellen Wilkins, Admission no. 2749, p. 366; LMA, Friern Hospital (Colney Hatch), Male Casebook 4, H12/CH/B/13/004, William Hammond, Admission no. 12298, p. 58; NRO, St Crispin Collection, Male Casebook 7, NCLA/6/2/2/7, Frederick Tilley, Admission no. 3950, p. 182.

  49. 49.

    xxx.

  50. 50.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Male Casebook 3, NCLA/6/2/2/3, Stephen Webster, Admission no. 1306, p. 205.

  51. 51.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Male Casebook 9, NCLA/6/2/2/9, William Brazier, Admission no. 4813, p. 77.

  52. 52.

    BLA, Three Counties, Male Casebook 7, LF31/7, Bertram Waring, Admission no. 4346, p. 80.

  53. 53.

    BLA, Three Counties, Male Casebook 3, LF31/3, Ernest Morgan, Admission no. 2554, p. 206; BLA, Three Counties, Female Casebook 15, LF29/15, Agnes Reeve, Admission no. 2194, p. 8399.

  54. 54.

    BCA, All Saints Asylum, Male Casebook 29, MS344/12/29, Samuel Gardiner, pp. 621–622; BCA, All Saints Asylum Female Casebook 46, MS344/12/46, Florry Wright, pp. 669–672.

  55. 55.

    BCA, All Saints Asylum, Male Casebook 11, MS344/12/11, George Avery, pp. 69–70.

  56. 56.

    GMCRO, Prestwich, Female casebook, ADMF/2/2, Ann Kelly, admission no. 9341.

  57. 57.

    C. Smith, ‘Living with Insanity: Narratives of Poverty, Pauperism and Sickness in Asylum Records 1840–1876,’ in A. Gestrich, E. Hurren, and S. King (eds.), Poverty and Sickness in Modern Europe: Narratives of the Sick Poor, 1780–1938 (London: Continuum, 2012), pp. 117–142.

  58. 58.

    Price, Regional, Quantitative and Qualitative, has suggested long-term patients could be considered a nuisance by medical men, p. 315; Also see A. Suzuki, “Enclosing and Disclosing Lunatics within the Family Walls: Domestic Psychiatric Regime and the Public Sphere in Early Nineteenth-Century England,’ in Bartlett and Wright, Outside the Walls of the Asylum: The History of Care in the Community 1750–2000 (London: Athlone, 1999), pp. 115–131.

  59. 59.

    Ray, ‘Models of Madness,’ p. 237.

  60. 60.

    British Library, London County Council, ‘A review of the work of the council during the year ended 31st March, 1894 an address by Mr John Hutton, Chairman of the Council,’ L.C.C. 108, p. 10.

  61. 61.

    F. Galton, Hereditary Genius (London: Macmillan, 1869); F. Galton, Inquiries into Human Faculty and its Development (London: J.M Dent & Company, 1883); M. Bulmer, Francis Galton: Pioneer of Heredity and Biometry (Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 2003).

  62. 62.

    Ibid., p. 369.

  63. 63.

    H. Maudsley, Body and Mind (London: Macmillan, 1873), p. 276; and Responsibility in Mental Disease (London: S. King & co., 1874).

  64. 64.

    ‘Facts of Insanity’ is a section of the casebooks used to record the symptoms of patients on their admission to the asylum. The section usually has space for both medical and lay observations.

  65. 65.

    A. Kleinman, The Illness Narratives: Suffering, Healing and the Human Condition (New York: Basic Books, 1988), pp. 3–5.

  66. 66.

    Wright ‘Childlike’; Melling et al., ‘Proper Lunatic,’ p. 377.

  67. 67.

    BLA, Three Counties, Male Casebook 4, LF31/4, George Canfield, Admission no. 2949, p. 92.

  68. 68.

    LMA, Friern Hospital Colney Hatch, Male Casebook 46, H12/CH/B/13/046, Sydney Virtue, ad no. 12863, p. 25.

  69. 69.

    Wright, ‘Childlike’.

  70. 70.

    A. Scull, Museums of Madness: The Social Organization of Insanity in Nineteenth-Century England (London: Allen Lane, 1979); Scull, The Most Solitary of Afflictions: Madness and Society in Britain 1700–1900 (London: Yale University Press, 1993).

  71. 71.

    Wright, Earlswood; Wright, ‘Getting Out of the Asylum: Understanding the Confinement of the Insane in the Nineteenth Century,’ Social History of Medicine, 10/1, pp. 137–155.; C. Smith, ‘Living with Insanity,’ p. 119.

  72. 72.

    Wright, Earlswood, p. 82; R. Smith, ‘Some Issues Concerning Families and their Property in Rural England, 1250–1800,’ in Smith (ed.), Land, Kinship and Life-Cycle (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), pp. 1–86, pp. 68–69; Parr, Labouring Children, Chap. 1.

  73. 73.

    Scull, Museums; C. Smith, ‘Family, Community and the Victorian Asylum: A Case Study of Northampton General Lunatic Asylum and its Pauper Lunatics,’ Family and Community History, 9/2, pp. 109–124.

  74. 74.

    Phthisis was often used interchangeably with other terms such as consumption and tuberculosis.

  75. 75.

    This view was first put forward by the noted Edinburgh psychiatrist, and from 1898 President of the Child Study Association, Thomas Clouston and is examined in depth by G. E Berrios, ‘Phthisical Insanity,’ History of Psychiatry, 16/4 (2005), pp. 473–495.

  76. 76.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Male Casebook 8, NCLA/6/2/2/8, John Scott, Admission no. 4193, p. 39.

  77. 77.

    BCA, All Saints, Male Casebook 13, MS344/12/13, Tom Skirrow, Admission no. 8621, pp. 429–430.

  78. 78.

    Again this figure is most likely more than the 103 stated. There are 104 cases that have unknown causes of death. These are mainly due to data protection embargos and case notes being recorded in continuation books that have been lost or are not fit for public viewing. The second largest cause of death was epilepsy which accounted for 63 deaths within the sample.

  79. 79.

    C. Smith, ‘Living with Insanity’.

  80. 80.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Male Casebook 9, NCLA/6/2/2/9, Walter Quinnell, Admission no. 4863, p. 108.

  81. 81.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Male Casebook 8, NCLA/6/2/2/8, Sidney Carrington, Admission no. 4501, p. 188.

  82. 82.

    LMA, Friern Hospital (Colney Hatch), Female Casebook 33, H12/CH/B/11/033, Henrietta Lamb, Admission no. 11047, p. 192.

  83. 83.

    Percentage breakdown by institution of admissions of idiots and imbeciles; Birmingham 52 %, Colney Hatch 71 %, Manchester 61 %, Northampton 93 %, Three Counties 74 %. Issues of regional difference will be explored in Chap. 5.

  84. 84.

    G. Grabham, BMJ, 16 January 1875, p. 74.

  85. 85.

    G. E. Shuttleworth, BMJ, 30 January 1886, pp. 183–186.

  86. 86.

    M. Jackson, ‘Institutional Provision for the Feeble-Minded in Edwardian England: Sandlebridge and the Scientific Morality of Permanent Care,’ in D. Wright and A. Digby (eds.), From Idiocy to Mental Deficiency: Historical Perspectives on People with Learning Disabilities (London: Routledge, 1996), pp. 161–183.

  87. 87.

    M. K. Simpson, ‘Othering Intellectual Disability: Two Models of Classification from the Nineteenth Century,’ Theory Psychology, 22/5 (2012), pp. 541–556.

  88. 88.

    A. Borsay, Disability and Social Policy, p. 71.

  89. 89.

    D. Wright, ‘Learning Disability and the New Poor Law in England, 1834–1867,’ Disability and Society, 15/5 (2000), pp. 731–745, p. 742.

  90. 90.

    Ibid.; also see C. Cox and H. Marland, ‘“A Burden on the County”: Madness, Institutions of Confinement and the Irish Patient in Victorian Lancashire,’ Social History of Medicine, 28/2 (2015), pp. 263–287.

  91. 91.

    LMA, Friern Hospital (Colney Hatch), Male Casebook 2, H12/CH/B/13/002, John Harvey, Admission no. 628, p. 82.

  92. 92.

    BLA, Three Counties, Female Casebook 1, LF29/1, Sarah Ann Goodman, Admission no. 340, p. 121.

  93. 93.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Female Casebook 5, NCLA6/2/1/5, Mabel Adkins, Admission no. 2403, p. 228.

  94. 94.

    Wellcome Library, G.E. Shuttleworth, ‘On the Treatment of Children Mentally Deficient. An Address to the Union of Teachers of the Deaf and Dumb on the Pure Oral System,’ (1895), MS. 4579, p. 10.

  95. 95.

    LRO, Prestwich, Male Casebook 1, QAM6/6/1, Edward Ridings, Admission no. 68.

  96. 96.

    BLA, Three Counties, Female Casebook 20, LF29/20, Jane Denifer, Admission no. 10295, p. 8.

  97. 97.

    BLA, Three Counties, Female Casebook 19, LF29/19, Eliza Perry, Admission no. 9852, p. 16.

  98. 98.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Male Casebook 5, NCLA/6/2/2/5, Arthur Harry White, Admission no. 2427, p. 141.

  99. 99.

    BLA, Three Counties, Female Casebook 15, LF29/15, Constance May Watson, Admission no. 8100, p. 94.

  100. 100.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Out of County Casebook 2, NCLA/6/2/3/2, John McCormack, Admission no. 3095, p. 378.

  101. 101.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Male Casebook 5, NCLA/6/2/2/5, John Tanner, p. 51, was asked and knew the days of the week; NRO, St Crispin Collection, Male Casebook 5, NCLA/6/2/2/5, Sidney Bishop, p. 96 knew his family and the days of the week.

  102. 102.

    LRO, Prestwich, Male Casebook 32, QAM6/6/32, Jacob Gaffey, Admission no. 7628, did not know the names of his family members.

  103. 103.

    LMA, Friern Hospital (Colney Hatch), Louisa Barley (Female Casebook 1a, H12/CH/B/11/001a, Admission no. 923), Rhoda Key (Admission Register 6, H12/CH/B/01/006, Admission no. 4189), and Frederick Lawrence (Male Casebook 2, H12/CH/B/13/002, Admission no. 687) were all judged on their ability to read and write.

  104. 104.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Male Casebook 5, NCLA/6/2/2/5, Ernest Cross, Admission no. 2404, p. 134.

  105. 105.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Male Casebook 4, NCLA/6/2/2/4, Joseph Albert Harris, Admission no. 1550, p. 190.

  106. 106.

    NRO, Sidney Bishop, p. 96.

  107. 107.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Female Casebook 7, NCLA/6/2/1/7, Ellen Tarry, Admission no. 3167, p. 6.

  108. 108.

    BLA, Three Counties, Female Casebook 3, LF29/3, Alice Popper, Admission no. 2589, p. 310.

  109. 109.

    W.A.F. Browne, ‘What Asylums Were, Are, and Ought to be,’ 1837, in A. Scull (ed.), The Asylum as Utopia: W.A.F. Browne and the Mid-Nineteenth Century Consolidation of Psychiatry (London: Routledge, 1991), pp. 7–8.

  110. 110.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Female Casebook 6, NCLA/6/2/1/6, Annie Clarke, Admission no. 2720, p. 89; Male Patient Casebook 6, NCLA/6/2/2/6, George Buckby, Admission no. 3390, p. 211; Out of County Casebook 1, NCLA/6/2/3/1, Kate Robinson, Admission no. 2726, p. 358.

  111. 111.

    NRO, George Buckby, p. 211.

  112. 112.

    BLA, Three Counties, Female Casebook 18, LF29/18, Dorothy Maud Humphrey, Admission no. 9773, p. 218.

  113. 113.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Out of County CaseBook 2, NCLA/6/2/3/1, James Lidstone, ad no. 2529, p. 174.

  114. 114.

    LMA, Friern Hospital (Colney Hatch), Male Casebook 11, H12/CH/B/13/011, George Griffin, Admission no. 3744.

  115. 115.

    LRO, Prestwich, Female Casebook 25, QAM6/5/25, Edith Brown, Admission no. 6436; BCA, All Saints, Male Casebook 4, MS344/12/4, William Stanley, Admission no. 5219; LMA, Friern Hospital (Colney Hatch), Male Casebook 20, H12/CH/B/13/020, Thomas Eastsmith, Admission no. 5268; LMA Friern Hospital (Colney Hatch), Female Casebook 1b, H12/CH/B/11/001b, Matilda Wood, Admission no. 960; NRO, St Crispin Collection, Out of County Casebook 2, NCLA/6/2/3/2, Charles Charlwood, Admission no. 2413, p. 134; NRO, St Crispin Collection, Female Casebook 10, NCLA/6/2/1/10, Florence Randall, Admission no. 5019, p. 45; BLA, Three Counties, Male Casebook 5, LF31/5, George Pugh, Admission no. 3285, p. 58; BLA, Three Counties, Female Casebook 17, LF29/17, May Inskip, Admission no. 9305, p. 230.

  116. 116.

    LMA, Friern Hospital (Colney Hatch), Male Casebook 2, H12/CH/B/13/002, John Collyer, Admission no. 1029.

  117. 117.

    BCA, Birmingham Union Infirmary Sub-Committee 1882–1883, GP/B/2/4/1/1, 3 November 1882.

  118. 118.

    LMA, Friern Hospital (Colney Hatch), Male Casebook 15, H12/CH/B/13/015, Thomas Woodcock, Admission no. 4441.

  119. 119.

    LMA, Friern Hospital (Colney Hatch), Male Casebook 23, H12/CH/B/13/023, Alfred Ringrose, Admission no. 6218.

  120. 120.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Male Casebook 5, NCLA/6/2/2/5, Frederick Henson, Admission no. 2650, p. 190.

  121. 121.

    Borsay, Disability and Social Policy, p. 71; Wright, ‘Learning Disability and the Poor Law,’ p. 742.

  122. 122.

    LMA, Friern Hospital (Colney Hatch), Male Casebook 15, H12/CH/B/13/015, John Kersey, Admission no. 4421.

  123. 123.

    BLA, Three Counties, Female Casebook 3, LF29/3, Caroline Holsey, Admission no. 2194, p. 97.

  124. 124.

    BCA, All Saints, Female Casebook 19, MS344/12/61, Ada Hands, pp. 501–503.

  125. 125.

    LMA, Friern Hospital (Colney Hatch), Male Casebook 29, H12/CH/B/13/029, Frederick Farren, Admission no. 7763.

  126. 126.

    LMA, Friern Hospital (Colney Hatch), Male Casebook 32, H12/CH/B/13/032, Charles Fisher, Admission no. 8734, p. 110.

  127. 127.

    LMA, Friern Hospital (Colney Hatch), Male Casebook 28, H12/CH/B/13/02/, Robert Harris, Admission no. 7525.

  128. 128.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Male Casebook 4, NCLA/6/2/2/4, William Lack, Admission no. 1713, p. 95.

  129. 129.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Male Casebook 5, NCLA/6/2/2/5, Charles Broughton, Admission no. 2535, p. 173.

  130. 130.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Male Casebook 11, NCLA/6/2/2/11, Frederick Payne, Admission no. 5820, p. 168; LMA, Friern Hospital (Colney Hatch), Male Casebook 33, H12/CH/B/13/033, John Feltham, Admission no. 9052, p. 140.

  131. 131.

    L. Smith, ‘Your Very Thankful Inmate: Discovering the Patients of an early County Lunatic Asylum,’ Social History of Medicine, 21 (2008), pp. 237–252.

  132. 132.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Female Casebook 3, NCLA/6/2/1/3, Emma Nightingale, Admission no. 1318, p. 232.

  133. 133.

    S.J. Taylor, ‘“All His Ways are Those of an Idiot:” The Admission, Treatment of and Social reaction to Two Idiot Children of Northampton Pauper Lunatic Asylum,’ Family and Community History, 15/1, pp. 34–43.

  134. 134.

    Bartlett, Poor Law of Lunacy.

  135. 135.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Male Casebook 5, NCLA/6/2/2/5, William Gunn, Admission no. 2439, p. 146.

  136. 136.

    BLA, Three Counties, Male Casebook 4, LF31/4, James Richardson, Admission no. 2898, p. 71.

  137. 137.

    LMA, Friern Hospital (Colney Hatch), Male Casebook 44, H12/CH/B/13/044, Alfred Sowter, Admission no. 12634, p. 95.

  138. 138.

    Ibid., 20 February 1897, p. 95.

  139. 139.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Female Casebook 4, NCLA/6/2/1/4, Harriet Meadows, Admission no. 1719, p. 175.

  140. 140.

    BCA, All Saints, Male Casebook 14, MS344/12/14, Albert Stanley, Admission no. 9044, pp. 523–525.

  141. 141.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Out of County Casebook 2, NCLA/6/2/3/2, William Moore, Admission no. 2580, p. 202.

  142. 142.

    LMA Friern Hospital (Colney Hatch), Male Casebook 12, H12/CH/B/13/0012, John Cable, Admission no. 4027.

  143. 143.

    BLA, Three Counties, Female Casebook 15, LF29/15, Lilla Ward, Admission no. 8273, p. 172.

  144. 144.

    Wright, ‘Learning Disability and New Poor law’.

  145. 145.

    NRO, Female Casebook, Meadows.

  146. 146.

    NRO, St Crispin Collection, Male Casebook 11, NCLA/6/2/2/11, Albert Mitchell, Admission no. 5623, p. 70.

  147. 147.

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    Steven J. Taylor

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Taylor, S.J. (2017). ‘Much Below Insects, and so Little Above Sensitive Plants’: Constructing the Insane Child. In: Child Insanity in England, 1845-1907. Palgrave Studies in the History of Childhood. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-137-60027-1_2

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