The Royal Hospital Haslar in Gosport, Hampshire, was one of several hospitals serving the local area. It was converted into retirement flats between 2018 and 2020. The hospital itself is a Grade II

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

History

Formation and operation

The

Admiralty Admiralty most often refers to: *Admiralty, Hong Kong *Admiralty (United Kingdom), military department in command of the Royal Navy from 1707 to 1964 *The rank of admiral *Admiralty law Admiralty can also refer to: Buildings * Admiralty, Traf ...

acquired the site selected for the hospital, Haslar Farm, whose name came from Anglo-Saxon ''Hæsel-ōra'' ( en, Hazel Bank), in 1745. The building was designed by

Theodore Jacobsen Theodore Jacobsen (died 1772) was an English merchant in London, known also as an architect. Life Jacobsen was a merchant in Basinghall Street, London. He was the London-born son of Sir Jacob Jacobsen, a north German merchant, of a family closel ...

and construction of the main building was completed in on 23 October 1753. On completion it was the largest brick building in Europe. Building works cost more than £100,000, nearly double the cost of the Admiralty headquarters in London. In its early years it was known as the Royal Hospital Haslar. Patients usually arrived by boat (it was not until 1795 that a bridge was built over Haslar Creek, providing a direct link to Gosport). Built on a peninsula, the guard towers, high brick walls, bars and railings throughout the site were all designed to stop patients, many of whom had been press ganged, from going absent without leave.Brown 2016 Dr

James Lind James Lind (4 October 1716 – 13 July 1794) was a Scottish doctor. He was a pioneer of naval hygiene in the Royal Navy. By conducting one of the first ever clinical trials, he developed the theory that citrus fruits cured scurvy. Lind ...

(1716–1794), a leading physician at Haslar from 1758 till 1785, played a major part in discovering a cure for scurvy, not least through his pioneering use of a double blind methodology with Vitamin C supplements (limes). The hospital included an

asylum Asylum may refer to: Types of asylum * Asylum (antiquity), places of refuge in ancient Greece and Rome * Benevolent Asylum, a 19th-century Australian institution for housing the destitute * Cities of Refuge, places of refuge in ancient Judea ...

for sailors with psychiatric disorders, and an early superintending psychiatrist was the phrenologist, Dr James Scott (1785–1859), a member of the influential

Edinburgh Phrenological Society The Edinburgh Phrenological Society was founded in 1820 by George Combe, an Edinburgh lawyer, with his physician brother Andrew Combe. The Edinburgh Society was the first and foremost phrenology grouping in Great Britain; more than forty ph ...

. The hospital treated casualties between 1803 and 1815 during the

Napoleonic Wars The Napoleonic Wars (1803–1815) were a series of major global conflicts pitting the French Empire and its allies, led by Napoleon I, against a fluctuating array of European states formed into various coalitions. It produced a period of Fren ...

. The hospital established the country's first

blood bank A blood bank is a center where blood gathered as a result of blood donation is stored and preserved for later use in blood transfusion. The term "blood bank" typically refers to a department of a hospital usually within a Clinical Pathology laborat ...

, treated casualties from the

Normandy landings The Normandy landings were the landing operations and associated airborne operations on Tuesday, 6 June 1944 of the Allies of World War II, Allied invasion of Normandy in Operation Overlord during World War II. Codenamed Operation Neptune and ...

and deployed clinicians to field hospitals in Europe and in the Far East during the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

. It was renamed the Royal Naval Hospital Haslar to reflect its naval traditions in 1954. The hospital's remit became tri-service in 1996 when it reverted to being called the Royal Hospital Haslar. A hyperbaric medicine unit was established at the hospital at that time. To mark the handover of control to the

National Health Service The National Health Service (NHS) is the umbrella term for the publicly funded healthcare systems of the United Kingdom (UK). Since 1948, they have been funded out of general taxation. There are three systems which are referred to using the " ...

in 2007, the military medical staff "marched out" of the hospital in 2007, exercising the unit's rights of the freedom of Gosport.

Closure

All remaining medical facilities at the site were closed in 2009. After services were transferred to the Ministry of Defence Hospital Unit at

Queen Alexandra Hospital The Queen Alexandra Hospital (commonly known as QA Hospital, QAH or simply QA) is a large NHS hospital in Portsmouth, Hampshire. Located in Cosham, it is run by Portsmouth Hospitals University NHS Trust and has a Ministry of Defence Hospital U ...

Cosham Cosham ( or ) is a northern suburb of Portsmouth lying within the city boundary but off Portsea Island. It is mentioned in the Domesday Book of 1086 along with Drayton and Wymering (mainland) and Bocheland ( Buckland), Frodington (Fratton) and Co ...

Portsmouth Portsmouth ( ) is a port and city in the ceremonial county of Hampshire in southern England. The city of Portsmouth has been a unitary authority since 1 April 1997 and is administered by Portsmouth City Council. Portsmouth is the most dens ...

, the hospital closed in 2009. The 25-hectare hospital site was sold to developers for £3 million later that year. On 17 May 2010 an investigation of the hospital's burial ground, by archaeologists from Cranfield Forensic Institute, was featured on

Channel 4 Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a fourth television service ...

's television programme ''

Time Team ''Time Team'' is a British television programme that originally aired on Channel 4 from 16 January 1994 to 7 September 2014. It returned online in 2022 for two episodes released on YouTube. Created by television producer Tim ...

''. It established that a large number of individuals (calculated as approximately 7,785) had been buried in unmarked graves. Plans were released in 2014 for a £152 million redevelopment scheme involving housing, commercial space, a retirement home and a hotel. The hospital was converted into retirement flats to the designs of Graham Reid Architects and Heber-Percy and Parker Architects between 2018 and 2020.

Gallery

File:Royal Naval Hospital Haslar - geograph.org.uk - 593470.jpg, The oldest section of the hospital includes the pediment frieze, with figures of navigation and commerce flanking the royal arms (1752). File:Bandstand - geograph.org.uk - 1585527.jpg, Sentry post (with Medical Officers' Mess and Nursing Sisters' Mess behind). File:Haslar hospital - geograph.org.uk - 1517934.jpg, Hospital Church of St Luke (1762). File:Remembrance garden - geograph.org.uk - 1517926.jpg, Hospital burial ground. File:Highest Protest in the World 13th May 1999.jpg, Former Gurkha officer Mike Trueman, who was born in Gosport, "protesting" on the summit of Everest, 13 May 1999.

References

Bibliography

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External links

Haslar Heritage Group
{{authority control Buildings and structures completed in 1753 Defunct hospitals in England Gosport History of Hampshire Hospital buildings completed in the 18th century Hospitals disestablished in 2009 Hospitals in Hampshire Military history of Hampshire Military hospitals in the United Kingdom Royal Navy Medical Service 1753 establishments in England 2009 disestablishments in England