First hospital building for Adelaide opens in 1841, part of governor George Gawler's spree of unfunded projects
The original 1841 Adelaide Hospital building, designed by George Strickland Kingston, one of the public buildings ordered by secondSouth Australia governor Groeg Gawler. The site elected was about six acresl in the east Adelaide city parklands north of Botanic Road (later part of the Botanic Garden).
Image courtesy State Library of South Australia
Adelaide’s first purpose-built permanent hospital, opened in 1841, came mainly from South Australia’s second governor George Gawler (1838-41) embarking on a splurge of spending on public buildings with virtually non-existent funds – except for an unexpected windfall from the government speculating in flour.
In 1839, Dr. J.P. Litchfield, an English practitioner with dubious credentials, was soon appointed inspector of hospitals and became the chair of the board overseeing the colony’s infirmary, moved from Hindley Street/North Terrace to Emigration Square in the west parklands. Litchfield tried to make the infirmary self supporting and even advocated breeding leeches in the Botanic Garden to sell to local doctors.
Dr. J.G. Nash, who succeeded Thomas Cotter as colonial surgeon in 1839, also pushed progress towards a purpose-built hospital.
Surveyor general Colonel William Light had designated a location for a hospital on the northeast parklands on his City of Adelaide Provincial Plan A 1837. Near this site in 1840, colonial architect George Strickland Kingston, who was "slightly acquainted with the profession of architect and civil engineer", selected about six acres to build the hospital in the east parklands north of Botanic Road (later part of the Botanic Garden.)
Despite a severe downturn in the economy, and thus little hope of the £2,260 cost of construction (by Benjamin Fiuller) being partly funded by public subscription, governor Gawler, after several attempts, laid the foundation stone in July 1840, for “a substantial and an ornamental erection”.
Kingston’s hospital building, ready in 1841, had two wards designed to hold 30 patients (12 medical, 12 surgical, six female) with room for another 10 if necessary, and four smaller rooms for the board, the surgeon’s assistant, a dispensary and a store. A strip of about two acres extending to the first creek leading to the Torrens River, was ordered by the governor to be set aside as a garden for convalescing patients.
Patients were charged £2 2shillings a week, although destitute were admitted free (or turned away to the infirmary at Emigration Square). Hospital patients who were well enough were expected to help with cleaning and possibly even work in the garden.
A room about 16 feet square acted as reception area, dining room, board room and operating theatre. This room led to the wards but there was no kitchen. All cooking was done in the wards. It was considered to be one of the best furnished and most substantial buildings in the city.