Morpathia: The latest article about the Morpeth Dispensary

The annual meeting of the Dispensary was held on January 12, 1877, when the accounts showed a healthy balance of £67 10s 11½d. They resolved to advertise for a House Surgeon in the Newcastle Journal, Newcastle Chronicle, Lancet and BMJ.

Testimonials to be read on February 5th, election on the 12th. Applications were received from Banbury (Miss Wilson, M.D.), Beverley, Bradford and Liverpool, and from the House Surgeon pro tem, George R. Chadwick.

Having examined the testimonials, the committee decided not to hold interviews because, “from the knowledge which they have acquired of Mr G. Chadwick as to the attendance to his duties which he has exhibited during the period of his having acted as House Surgeon pro tem, they beg most respectfully and recommend him as the fittest candidate to fill the vacancy”.

He was formally elected on the 12th, at a salary of £120 p.a. Mr McKay was appointed to go over the house and property with him to make an inventory and report back to the House Committee.

George Richard Chadwick was MRCS Eng and LSA. He must have begun work soon after Dr Barrow’s resignation, so that his tenure perhaps commenced as much as six weeks earlier than his formal appointment.

Throughout 1877, the Medical Officer of Health for Morpeth Dr Clarkson – himself a former house surgeon – frequently referred in his reports to the Local Board of Health to the incidence of contagious disease, or its absence, in the books of the Dispensary. In April, however, something unusual cropped up.

Amongst his other positions, Dr Clarkson was Surgeon to Pegswood Colliery and it was in this capacity that he gave evidence at an inquest on the body of James Waters, a pitman, aged 59.

Inquests were normally held in public houses, but this took place in the colliery office – there being, presumably, nowhere else in Pegswood suitable.

Mr Waters’s son Robert, and his housekeeper Mrs Oliver, claimed that his toe had been injured by a prop falling on it, which led to his death. If so, it would be an industrial injury and there would be compensation.

Dr Clarkson, however, having seen the deceased, did not think so and refused to sign the papers, telling the court that a post-mortem should be carried out, hence Dr Chadwick and Dr Skrimshire – yet another former house surgeon – being called upon.

At the adjourned inquest, Dr Skrimshire said that he and Dr Chadwick had made the examination, that the deceased had died from natural causes and the injury to his toe was unconnected. The jury found accordingly.

“The coroner,” the Herald said, “commented strongly on the manner in which Mary Oliver, the housekeeper, and the son of the deceased had given their evidence. He said that in his opinion the evidence given by them was a mass of falsehood and the injury to the toe was a bumped-up story.”

Dr Chadwick’s medical report for 1877, given at the Annual Meeting in January 1878, gives a good idea of the illnesses that most afflicted the poor, stating as follows:

“During the year there have been 489 patients admitted to the benefits of this Institution. Of these, 431 were cured, 20 relieved, 18 died and 20 remain on the books.

“The causes of death were – Senile Decay, 3; Chronic Bronchitis, 1; Apoplexy, 1; Marasmus, 2; Pertussis and Pneumonia, 1; Pertussis and Capillary Bronchitis, 2; Phthisis, 6; Cirrhosis and Obstruction of the Intestines, 1; Acute Bronchitis and Convulsions, 1. ... The following is a list of the most important illnesses attended – Scarlet Fever, 2; Erysipelas, 3; Ophthalmia, 7; Diarrhoeia, 26; Rheumatism, 15; Heart Disease, 3; Phthisis, 9; Accidents, 25; Dyspepsia, 41; Pneumonia, Bronchitis and Pleurisy, 58; Apoplexy and Epilepsy, 2.”

Phthisis is another word for tuberculosis, so of the 18 deaths, 11 were due to this or other diseases of the chest.

Erysipelas usually shows as a bright red rash and can be very painful. Marasmus is severe malnutrition – effectively dying of starvation – and particularly affects children under one year.

Unlike many of the house surgeons, we have only one notice of Dr Chadwick’s social life, namely in September 1878 he played cricket for Morpeth against Longhirst. The house, however, must have become very shabby since it was refurbished for Dr Skrimshire in 1870.

At the AGM in January 1879, it was ordered that the kitchen be papered and the ceiling whitewashed. Nor was it any better outside.

Reporting to the Board of Health in August, Dr Clarkson said: “During the late rainy weather, I have noticed several of the lanes stand sadly in need of repaving – notably the Dispensary one. I need scarcely remind this Authority that sound sanitary principle tolerates no pools of stagnant water in the midst of a civilised community.”

That December, Dr Chadwick was allowed to take three weeks holiday when it was resolved that “a woman be paid 6/- for cleaning the house.”

At that time it was the house surgeon who employed the housekeeper and until the end of the century it was never properly established who was responsible for every part of the house, let alone the garden.

In 1879, he gave evidence at Morpeth Police Court in a case of unlawful wounding that took place on February 25th. The accused was Hugh Devitt, labourer, the prosecutrix Mrs Hindson, a widowed lady who kept a private lodging-house in Newgate Street.

The report was as follows: “About half-past four o’clock on the evening of the day mentioned, the prisoner came to the door and said he wanted his pipe lighted. Prosecutrix told him to go away as she had some respectable lodgers in the house, and could not allow him to go in.

“The prisoner was then drunk and came back to the door four or five times, and succeeded in getting upstairs once. He left, and returned again about a quarter to eight, and knocked at the door ... but prosecutrix kept him back with a broom, until he caught hold of it, and struck her a severe blow on the forehead, inflicting a serious wound.

“The prisoner followed this up by striking the prosecutrix several blows on the head, both with the broom and his hands. He also kicked and attempted to strangle her.

“Dr Chadwick, of Morpeth Dispensary ... found she was suffering from a contused wound over the left eye; a wound on the upper part of the nose; both eyes were blackened; a bruise on the outer part of the right thigh; and there were also symptoms of erysipelas.

“Sergeant Robertson spoke to the apprehension of the prisoner, who denied having used the broom. The prisoner had been no less than twenty times previously before the court and the Bench, characterising the assault as a most unprovoked one ... committed him to prison for three months with hard labour, and an additional month in default of paying costs.”

Books by Roger Hawkins are available at Newgate News and the Old Herald Office in Morpeth, or from Amazon.