Fairmile Hospital, Cholsey, Wallingford, England

The following is from the English Heritage Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest.

HISTORIC DEVELOPMENT

The Lunatic Asylum for the County of Berkshire and the Boroughs of Reading and Newbury, later known as Moulsford Hospital and today (2000) known as Fairmile Hospital, was founded on a previously undeveloped site near Moulsford Station, Cholsey, following the first meeting of the Committee of Visitors in March 1867 (Visitors' Minutes, Berkshire Record Office). The Committee appointed as architect C H Howell, who had previously designed the asylum at Woking, Berkshire (The Builder 1868). Howell was commissioned to design an asylum to accommodate 285 patients, with a chapel, medical superintendent's house, gas works, and farm (Minutes; The Builder 1868). Construction commenced in March 1868 with the appointment of Mansfield, Price and Co. of London as contractors. In September 1868 the Visitors remitted the laying out of the grounds to a sub-committee 'to order and superintend the Formation of such Plantations as may be necessary for the protection of the Grounds of the Asylum', while in January 1869 Joseph Harding, a nurseryman of Winterbrook, Wallingford, was appointed to plant hedges and trees on the newly fenced asylum boundaries (Minutes). The asylum buildings, including the chapel and farm, were completed in 1870 and were described in The Builder (2 April 1870). Accounts for July 1871 record a payment of £30 to Robert Marnock (1800-89) for laying out the asylum grounds (Accounts), while the Annual Report for 1872 notes 'the planting of the trees and shrubs on the grounds in front of the Asylum, in continuation of Mr. Marnock's plan'. Gardening and work on the asylum farm, orchard, and vegetable garden formed an important part of the patients' regime, with over fifty patients being thus employed in 1871 (Ann Rep 1871). The farm included over 3 acres (1.25 hectares) irrigated by sewage.

The original buildings were extended to the design of C H Howell in 1878 to provide accommodation for a further 500 patients. Further extensions were made by the Nottingham architect G T Hine in 1894 (detached infectious diseases hospital) and 1898 (ward wings), while in 1929-30 a new house for the medical superintendent was built to designs by Willcocks and Greenway of Reading. New accommodation for 100 female patients and an attached staff house were built to designs by C B Willcocks of Reading in 1934, while in the mid- and late 20th century further buildings have been constructed. Today (2000) the site remains in institutional use.