Barnes Hospital, Cheadle

Coordinates: 53°23′50″N 2°13′24.7″W / 53.39722°N 2.223528°W / 53.39722; -2.223528
Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Barnes Hospital
The restored and redeveloped hospital in 2020
Barnes Hospital, Cheadle is located in Greater Manchester
Barnes Hospital, Cheadle
Location of Barnes Hospital in Greater Manchester
Former namesBarnes Convalescent Home
General information
StatusConverted into apartments
TypeFormer hospital
Architectural styleFrench Gothic Revival[1]
LocationCheadle, Greater Manchester, England
Coordinates53°23′50″N 2°13′24.7″W / 53.39722°N 2.223528°W / 53.39722; -2.223528
Construction started1871
Completed1875
Renovated1893, 1945
Design and construction
Architect(s)Lawrence Booth[1]
Designations
Listed Building – Grade II
Official nameBarnes Hospital
Designated12 November 1999
Reference no.1379609
The main building of Barnes Hospital during dereliction in 2008

Barnes Hospital in

M60 and M56 motorway.[2] The main building is Grade II listed, and lies on green belt land.[3]

The building, completed in 1875, is a noted example of Victorian Gothic Revival architecture and a prominent landmark, sitting on a mount overlooking the surrounding roads. The hospital closed in 1999, and although the building was promptly listed to protect it from demolition, it became derelict.[1]

The former hospital building has now been converted into flats and is at the centre of a new housing development called Barnes Village.[4]

History

Following the improvements to nursing inspired by the work of Florence Nightingale in the 1860s, demand for convalescent care grew in the British hospital system. The philanthropist Joseph Adshead campaigned for the construction of a convalescent hospital in Manchester; after his death in 1861, Manchester Royal Infirmary rented Cheadle Hall, to the south of the city, for use as a convalescent hospital. The rural location was selected as a recuperating atmosphere away from the industrial smog of Manchester. The site is now surrounded by major roads on all sides.[5]

A donation of £10,000 for the founding of a new

philanthropist, to purchase land for the construction of a new convalescent home. Barnes has had made his fortune in the Manchester cotton trade and had served as mayor of Manchester from 1851 to 1853. He made a further contribution to the project, bringing his total gift to the hospital construction to £26,000. Another donor, Humphrey Nicholls, gave £10,000. Barnes was also the main benefactor of Barnes's House of Recovery in Monsall, north Manchester, later known as Monsall Hospital.[5][6]

Construction of the Barnes Convalescent Home in Cheadle started in 1871 and was completed in 1875. It was constructed of bricks, the clay for which was provided locally. There were 132 beds.

Anglo-Saxon cross shaft.[7][8]

The hospital lost several thousand pounds a year and had to be subsidized by Manchester Royal Infirmary, but in 1925 the trustees accepted that this enabled more patients to be admitted to the main hospital. Electricity and a mains water supply were installed in that year. When an orthopaedic department was established at the infirmary many long-stay patients were cared for at Barnes. Lifts, a surgical theatre, an X-ray department, a physiotherapy gym and occupational therapy department were established.[9]

During

geriatric care and stroke patients. It was estimated the hospital treated tens of thousands of patients over its 115 years as a convalescent home.[11]

It closed in September 1999 while

Central Manchester Healthcare NHS Trust was undergoing a £2 million cost cut.[2] In the same year, the hospital received Grade II listed status.[12] Following its closure the hospital temporarily housed a large group of refugees from Kosovo.[3][13][14] The site was briefly occupied by around 100 Romani families in February 2007.[15]

The hospital was sold in 2001,[3] and was for a number of years owned by Realty Estates who allowed the listed building to fall into a state of dereliction.[13] It was later sold to the Irish property development group Benmore for a sum estimated to be around £12 million. The company proposed a new 128 residential unit development around the hospital building but it was never proposed to the planning authority.[16]

Architecture

Detail of the dilapidated Barnes Hospital clock tower (pictured 2011)

The Barnes Convalescent Hospital was built for the

lantern roof topped with an ornamental iron crown. Alterations to the building were carried out in 1893 by Pennington & Bridgen, and again in 1939-45 by Thomas Worthington & Son, both Mancunian architects' firms.[1]

Barnes Hospital was not given a lengthy description in

The Buildings of England; Pevsner simply described the building as "large, Gothic and grim".[17] In its state of dereliction, the building has been described as a "great gaunt pile of a building, abandoned and all dark at night, except for the lonely light in its tower-top clock."[18]

Filming location

Barnes Hospital was used as one of a number of filming locations by the Spanish director Jorge Grau for his 1974 horror film, Let Sleeping Corpses Lie, otherwise known as The Living Dead at Manchester Morgue. Grau's careful choice of locations was praised by critics for its depiction of England as "a very bleak place indeed, full of sinister quietness", and he emphasised the sense of Gothic decay in Barnes Hospital to create the fictional Manchester Morgue.[19][20]

In September 2005, the Barnes Hospital building was featured on the

Most Haunted Live.[2]

Redevelopment

Barnes Hospital during sunrise in January 2011

A redevelopment on the site, including the conversion of the hospital into apartments, commenced on site in 2015. The development is known as Barnes Village.[21][22]


See also

References

  1. ^ a b c d Historic England. "Barnes Hospital (1379609)". National Heritage List for England. Retrieved 25 September 2017.
  2. ^ a b c d "Barnes Hospital History – Abandoned Photography". opacity.us. Archived from the original on 21 April 2008. Retrieved 14 April 2008.
  3. ^ a b c "Hospital sold to mystery buyer". Stockport Express. M.E.N. Media. 28 February 2001. Retrieved 14 April 2008.
  4. ^ "Barnes Village". Retrieved 19 February 2021.
  5. ^ . Retrieved 25 September 2017.
  6. ^ "Robert Barnes (1800-1871)". Grace's Guide to British Industrial History. Archived from the original on 25 September 2017. Retrieved 25 September 2017.
  7. ^ "Cheadle Conservation Area Character Appraisal". Stockport Metropolitan Borough Council. March 2006. Archived from the original on 4 April 2012. Retrieved 5 April 2010.
  8. ^ "Cheadle Parish Church—St Mary's". Archived from the original on 4 June 2008. Retrieved 14 April 2008.
  9. ^ Brockbank, William (1952). Portrait of a Hospital. London: William Heinemann. pp. 116–164.
  10. ^ "WW2 People's War – an archive of World War Two memories". 17 January 2005. Retrieved 13 December 2014.
  11. ^ Kushner 2006, p. 73
  12. ^ "Barnes Hospital, Cheadle And Bramhall". British Listed Buildings. Retrieved 22 August 2012.
  13. ^ a b Weisgard, Jon (15 April 2005). "Ex-hospital due to become flats". Stockport Express. M.E.N. Media. Retrieved 14 April 2008.
  14. ^ "Kosovan Refugees". Manchester City Council. Retrieved 14 April 2008.
  15. ^ Skinner, Miles (28 February 2007). "Gatley counts cost of clean-up after Gypsies". Stockport Express. M.E.N. Media. Retrieved 14 April 2008.
  16. ^ "Benmore Developments". Retrieved 16 September 2012.
  17. . Retrieved 23 September 2017.
  18. ^ Kushner 2006, p. 70
  19. ^ Kushner 2006, p. 71
  20. ^ "The Living Dead". IMDB. Retrieved 18 April 2013.
  21. ^ "Barnes Village". Retrieved 25 August 2018.
  22. ^ "They dreamed of luxury living in new homes. But it's turned into a nightmare for residents of this former hospital". Manchester Evening News. 10 February 2020. Retrieved 23 September 2022.

Bibliography