A cholera plague in 1832 killed 10 percent of the population of Kingston. In 1847 thousands of poor Irish people, who had left Ireland as a result of a potato famine, brought a cholera epidemic to Upper Canada. It was estimated that 1,200 people died from this epidemic in Kingston; they were buried in a mass grave near the Kingston General Hospital.
Kingston was incorporated as a town in 1818. By 1841 the town had become the capital of United Canada, the newly united Upper and Lower Canada. Three years later the government abandoned Kingston as the capital of the province in favour of Montreal. It was during this period that Queen’s University was founded.
Many immigrants who arrived in Kingston had no means to proceed any farther and joined the ranks of the unemployed. Begging, gambling, prostitution, and theft became the livelihood of many living on the fringes of Kingston society, as well as the fringes of the town.
The cholera epidemic of 1847 left many widows, orphans, elderly, and disabled persons unable to survive on their own. Kingston officials called a meeting in November of that year to establish a House of Industry (hostel). In December the House of Industry opened its doors and in the first month of operation admitted 183 persons; 175 of them were Irish-born. Of the inmates, 44 were widows (and another three originally listed as widows appear to have married before leaving the hostel), and 63 were children under the age of 10. There were some strange methods used to aid the poor. The guiding principle for charity pertained only to the “deserving poor.” Some believed that the poor had brought their misfortunes upon themselves as a result of sloth, dissipation, or other moral lapses. Therefore, the House of Industry had rules. The rules stipulated that no person of bad character, “especially unchaste women with bastard children,” should be admitted; the possession or consumption of liquor meant instant eviction.
One of the great social problems among the poor, unsurprisingly, was drunkenness. In 1842, 136 licensed taverns operated in Kingston to serve a population of 9,000. City officials saw fit to pass a bylaw to restrain and punish “Drunkards, Mendicants and Street Beggars.”
Was it surprising that some residents and officials believed that the poor were also suffering from insanity? Why else would they behave in such a manner? Toronto architect John Howard first broached the idea of an asylum for Kingston as early as 1829. At that time the mentally ill were simply tossed into county jails like criminals. In 1830 the House of Assembly in the province of Upper Canada took the first step to differentiate between criminals and the mentally ill when it authorized “provisions for the relief of lunatics.” However, it took another 11 years before the government initiated separate accommodations.
Kingston and Toronto were considered the likeliest candidates for such accommodations. Kingston had a population of 5,000; Toronto had a population of 13,000. Toronto won the deal.
At that time, a wealthy man by the name of John Solomon Cartwright was struck with the “Italian Villa” craze that had taken Kingston by storm. Cartwright built Rockwood Villa in 1841, in a style described by historian as Tuscan and Neo-Baroque. The centre of the house was an octagonal rotunda that extended up two floors, surrounded by a balcony at the second level, and crowned by a panelled dome containing a rose-glass skylight. Unfortunately, Cartwright died in 1844. A Mr. John Palmer Litchfield, thought to be a former inspector of hospitals in South Australia and the former medical superintendent of the Walton Asylum in Liverpool, rented the house in 1854, with the intention of turning it into a hospital.
Now Litchfield was quite a scoundrel, a con artist and, at the very least, was definitely of dubious character. Litchfield had at one time worked as a newspaper reporter in Europe and used this career to slip into outpatient clinics in London. Once there he masqueraded as a medical student, observing and learning enough about medical procedures to “get by” in any technical conversation.
It was reported that he had been imprisoned in Australia when it was discovered by the Australian lieutenant-governor that “Dr.” Litchfield had no medical degree. Financial support for Litchfield’s own hospital was withdrawn, which left him unable to pay his accounts and subject to a jail term. Nevertheless, he managed to leave Australia and head to Canada.
Upon landing in Canada, Litchfield was introduced to Sir John A. MacDonald, who was instrumental in his later appointment as medical superintendent of the Rockwood Asylum in Kingston. When he arrived in Kingston in 1854, Litchfield busied himself as one of the six men who were developing a medical school at Queen’s University. He actually billed himself as an instructor of midwifery and forensic medicine. He was biding his time while the province of Upper Canada was preparing to license and finance an asylum in Kingston.
In October 1856 the government finally agreed and approximately 35 acres of the Cartwright estate, including the buildings, were purchased by the crown for an asylum for the criminally insane. Since money was not immediately forthcoming, the stables were temporarily renovated to take in 24 women from the penitentiary. The stables were converted into rooms measuring 2.75 by 1.5 metres (9 by 5 feet). The only light entered through barred windows, and the patients slept on straw.
By September 1859 construction of a new building was under way. Up to 100 convicts handled almost all the aspects of the construction. The asylum was built with a view of Lake Ontario, as this was thought to have a calming effect on patients. It was built chiefly from limestone and had a tin roof. The following year Litchfield reported 40 new prisoners living in the completed east wing of the building. The female patients were still housed in the horse stables and that remained the case until 1868.
A diary kept by a caretaker named Evans read: “Their meat was cut into small bits and they ate with a spoon or with their fingers as they chose. Tin pint cups took the place of bowls. Straw ticks and straw pillows made up the bedding.
“[The new asylum] was first lighted with coal oil lamps, one at each end of the ward. With the first two medical superintendents, we had no such thing as nicely painted walls and ceilings.”
A year after the completion of the asylum, Litchfield boasted about how the death rate among patients had dropped from 7 to 3.5 percent.
With an eye to progress, Litchfield decided to expand and proposed that special accommodations be prepared for patients of a higher class, as was the custom in other countries. He also wanted to turn the stables into a home for 40 or 50 mentally challenged children.
Litchfield’s favourite treatment for patients was “a bottle of the best Scotch Ale or Dublin Stout, a medicine that will bear repetition with the best results and no straight-jacket in the world will contribute better to quietness and repose.”
The public of Kingston, even the wealthiest families, inquired about admittance despite the fact that the hospital was intended only for the criminally insane. Prominent Kingston families could bypass this technicality by first having their mentally ill relatives incarcerated in local jails.
Litchfield’s life ended in 1868 at the age of 60. He was still holding the position of medical superintendent. His charade was only uncovered by Thomas Bibson, a Queen’s professor, in the 1940s. Bibson traced Litchfield’s background and found his qualifications were completely fabricated.
Dr. John Robinson Dickson, the personal physician of John A. MacDonald, was appointed the new superintendent. Dickson attempted to rid the asylum of poor attendants and introduce a new order to the system. His work was hampered by a politically appointed assistant who believed, among other things, that good treatment involved shaving blocks of wood to different thicknesses, according to the phases of the moon!
Superintendent Dickson was instrumental in having an act passed which made Rockwood Insane Asylum available for the general public. The name of the place changed to The Asylum for the Insane.
In 1878 Dr. William Metcalf arrived as the next superintendent. He was faced with barren wards, filthy straw beds, stinking urinals, and patients who were still confined to windowless cells in the basement. There were a total of 390 patients under the care and supervision of 14 attendants. Metcalf began a series of reforms and ended the practice of using wristlets (handcuff-like shackles) and muffs (two hands bound in one boxing glove) as a means of restraint.
In 1888 a school for psychiatric nurses opened at the hospital, and in 1895,