Rauceby Hospital

Rauceby Hospital
South Lincolnshire Community & Mental Health Services NHS Trust
Geography
Location Sleaford, Lincolnshire, England
Coordinates 52°59′02″N 0°27′03″W / 52.9839°N 0.4509°W / 52.9839; -0.4509Coordinates: 52°59′02″N 0°27′03″W / 52.9839°N 0.4509°W / 52.9839; -0.4509
Organisation
Care system NHS
Funding Government hospital
Hospital type Mental
History
Founded 1897
Closed 1998
Links
Lists Hospitals in England

Rauceby Hospital, originally called Kesteven County Asylum, is a now-defunct mental institution in the parish of Quarrington, Lincolnshire, England. Building work was commenced in 1897, the facility was completed and opened in 1902.[1] After changing hands and names several times the main hospital building was closed in 1998 and abandoned for several years. From 2004 parts of the site underwent redevelopment to convert it into private housing.

Layout

The hospital buildings included a chapel (now deconsecrated), two graveyards, a mortuary and various tunnels connecting wards (under the corridors).

History

The hospital was designed by GT Hine,[2] construction began in 1897 and was completed in 1902. Operated by the Kesteven County Council the facility was renamed to Kesteven Mental Hospital in 1924 and to Rauceby Mental Hospital in 1933.

In 1940 the building was taken over by the Royal Air Force, renamed as No.4 RAF Hospital Rauceby it became a crash and burns unit under the control of nearby RAF Cranwell. During its tenure as a burns unit plastic surgeon Archibald McIndoe worked at the facility, along with other members of the "Guinea Pig Club".[3]

The wartime Burns Unit was situated in Orchard House, built alongside the hospital orchard [4] - one of the last remaining parts of Rauceby Mental Hospital to remain in NHS use as offices for the former Lincolnshire South West PCT following the Mental Health Hospital's closure in 1998.

An isolation hospital, built on the western edge of the site was never used as such; instead it housed those residents working on the farm[5] and now functions as a 12-bedded in-patient unit for age 12–18 years within the child and adolescent mental health services under the control of the Lincolnshire Partnership NHS Foundation Trust).[6]

The main hall burnt down in 1947 marking the end of RAF control, the NHS took over the site the following year renaming it to Rauceby Hospital and returning patients that had previously been displaced.

The South Lincolnshire Community & Mental Health Services NHS Trust closed the main hospital building in 1997, whilst retaining Orchard House as the Trust's headquarters and Ash Villa on Willoughby Road as a Special School.

After standing unused and, with the main building in a deteriorating state of repair, David Wilson Homes began redevelopment work on the site in 2004. Following public consultation, the site and its surroundings (including Rauceby railway station) was officially renamed as Greylees.

References

  1. ↑ "HOSP/RAUCEBY". LINCOLNSHIRE ARCHIVES (incorporating Lincoln Diocesan Record Office). Retrieved 3 March 2011.
  2. ↑ "Kesteven County Asylum (Rauceby Hospital)". Pete Cracknell. 2005. Retrieved 3 March 2011.
  3. ↑ Johnston, Philip Ralph. "No 4 RAF Hospital Rauceby". Retrieved 3 March 2011. Known formally as No 4 RAF Hospital Rauceby, the hospital acted in many ways as a satellite to the Cranwell unit,with 1000 beds, focussing through its Crash and Burns unit on supporting aircrew injured on operations. Most famously the pioneering plastic surgeon Archibald McIndoe was part of this team, many of his early patients forming a drinking club known as the 'Guinea Pig Club'.
  4. ↑ "Town and Country Planning Act 1990 - Refusal of Planning Permission" (PDF). Sleaford, Lincolnshire: North Kesteven District Council. 22 January 2009. Retrieved 3 March 2011. Historic records sourced by the District Planning Authority confirm that the application site, which is currently an Orchard, is one of the last vestiges of the original parkland grounds designed by Landscape Architect William Goldring in 1900 to serve the former Kesteven County Asylum. The grounds were carefully designed to serve as both a parkland setting for the architecture of the Asylum buildings whilst also providing for horticultural activities to aid the ongoing therapy of Asylum residents, including through the provision of fruit trees in an Orchard.
  5. ↑ "History of Rauceby Hospital". Retrieved 23 January 2012.
  6. ↑ "Ash Villa". Lincolnshire Partnership NHS Trust. Retrieved 23 January 2012.
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