From Bonner to bombings: a history of the old London Chest Hospital
An operating hospital for 167 years, the London Chest Hospital saw the golden years of the ‘white plague,’ World War II and major medical breakthroughs.
Do you ever wonder about the old London Chest Hospital? The castle-like red brick building stood hauntingly vacant for years after it stopped operating as a hospital in 2015.
Inevitably, the building was sold to develop into new flats. But before that, the London Chest Hospital operated for 167 years, spanning the tuberculosis endemic, the Second World War, the birth of the NHS and major improvements in cardiovascular health.
The London Chest Hospital is preceded by the famous black mulberry tree on its grounds, its oldest and most stubborn feature, thought to be more than 400 years old. It is thought to have been on the home grounds of the notorious Edmund Bonner, aka ‘Bloody Bonner,’ during his lifetime in the 16th century.
Bonner was a powerful villain, entrusted by Queen Mary I with the task of torturing and burning ‘heretic’ Protestants. He sent roughly 200 people to their deaths, and it is said he decided who to burn while sitting under his mulberry tree.
Fast forward to the 13th of March, 1848. Bonner’s grounds have been dismantled to make way for Victoria Park, and the site of the London Chest Hospital is acquired by one of the many groups of East End philanthropists. This particular group was largely made up of Quakers, a Protestant sect, which likely caused Bonner to turn in his grave.
The group chose to build a specialised hospital to address the ‘great white plague,’ aka tuberculosis, which was killing an astonishing one in four people in England at the time.
Tuberculosis spreads quickly in poor and crowded urban areas, so death rates were likely even higher in the East End. We now know it’s a bacterial infection, but at the time there was no reliable treatment or understanding of its cause.
The hospital opened after seven years of construction in 1855, costing £30,000. Adjusted to modern-day inflation that’s just over £2.7 million (according to the Bank of England). Prince Albert and Queen Victoria contributed and Prince Albert laid the foundation stone in 1851.
The City of London Hospital for Diseases of the Chest (as it was originally known) was designed by architect FW Ordish in the Queen Anne style, instead of the Gothic style that was in vogue at the time. Defining elements include the building’s bilateral symmetry and contrasting red brick and cream-coloured stone.
The hospital was praised for its modern design by Charles Dickens in his popular weekly magazine ‘Household Words,’ in December of 1855. Dickens wrote ‘It is fitted carefully with apparatus […] replete with ingenious contrivances, and, indeed, wanting in no essential thing. Nobody doubts all the while— it is taken for granted— that, as such a hospital was really wanted in that quarter of London, the voluntary contributions will suffice for its support.’
Dickens was right – the chest hospital had no lack of patients or donors, and by 1881 additional construction had increased the number of beds available from 80 to 164. A chapel was also built on the grounds in 1858.
There was still no reliable treatment available for tuberculosis, which slowly consumed the patient with persistent fever, cough and weight loss. The best strategy doctors had was to keep patients nourished and comfortable.
In 1900, tuberculosis treatment had advanced slightly with the advent of open-air treatment. Fresh air was seen to improve symptoms and slow the spread of disease, so it became common for patients to be treated outdoors. In hindsight, scientists think Vitamin D may have also helped fight the disease.
Balconies were built onto the chest hospital for open-air treatment, and the hospital also opened a sanatorium for women and children in Buckinghamshire for the same purposes. Patients were lined up outside in their beds and cared for by nurses in the fresh air, looking like modern-day glampers.
As the hospital gained prominence, so did its staff. Joseph Lister, the pioneer of antiseptic surgery was a consulting surgeon at the chest hospital from 1896 – 1905. Lister realised that disease and infection could be prevented by sterilising equipment and disinfecting hands before surgery. This simple discovery has saved countless lives since.
By 1937, the hospital had been renamed several times and was known as the London Chest Hospital, the name by which it is best known today. The same year, a surgical wing opened, to perform (among other specialist chest surgeries) rib removals which targeted symptoms of tuberculosis.
As the Second World War dawned, half the hospital’s beds were made available to treat air raid casualties. In 1941, the hospital was badly bombed, leaving the north wing needing to be rebuilt, destroying the chapel and reducing the ancient mulberry tree to a charred stump.
Tuberculosis became properly treatable for the first time in 1943, with the development of streptomycin, an antibiotic. The discovery was practically a miracle – tuberculosis had been incurable for thousands of years, with the earliest known incidence 9000 years ago.
The following year, the charred and left-for-dead mulberry tree sprouted a new canopy and bore healthy leaves, another miracle for the chest hospital.
By 1948, the London Chest Hospital had become part of the newly formed NHS and celebrated its 100th birthday. The East End was reinventing itself with a boom of post-war construction and migration.
The London Chest Hospital of the next few decades is fondly remembered by locals of the East End. One reader, Veronica Sheen, recalls how she broke down laughing while waiting for the results of her dad’s heart surgery. Her sister-in-law, shaky with nerves, had brought over a tray of tea with hardly any tea left in the cups. Sheen’s father recovered well and lived until he was 90.
Another reader, author Anthony Brady, worked in the hospital and told of a patient admitted late at night who was at first thought to have attempted suicide. The patient had a healed tracheotomy, and when he suddenly stopped being able to breathe had re-opened the hole in his neck himself. He was easily treated, as he’d already gotten started.
With a dramatic decrease in tuberculosis cases, the specialist skills developed at the chest hospital were turned to treating ailments of the heart. By the 70s, the chest hospital was a pioneer in the development of open-heart surgery and coronary artery disease bypass surgery.
In 1994, the chest hospital became part of the Royal Hospitals NHS Trust, amalgamating with two other hospitals. It was renamed the Barts Health NHS Trust in 2012, and in 2015 the hospital closed after the trust reshuffled its specialist services.
Although the site of the chest hospital was quickly sold off to housing developers Crest Nicholson, their plans to relocate the four-hundred-year-old mulberry tree caused a local uproar.
Experts from the East London Garden Society argued that the move would likely kill the tree. Backed by celebrity Dame Judi Dench and local campaigners they took the developers to the high court. The battle lasted until 2021 when the court blocked the plans completely.
In 2022, developers Clarion submitted new plans to redevelop the site of the old London Chest Hospital which were approved in 2024. The new plans preserve the listed portions of the site, including the iconic castle-like red and cream face of the old hospital. Plans will also preserve the old mulberry tree, keeping it accessible to the public.
The history of the London Chest Hospital is long and troubled. It was founded to combat tuberculosis in 1848 but the disease wasn’t curable until 1943 – by which point the hospital had been harshly bombed.
However, the effort put in by local supporters and dedicated staff meant the hospital was able to re-open and re-focus. Using the expertise developed in the Sisyphean task of treating tuberculosis for nearly a century, the hospital spent the following years making major advancements in open-heart and artery-bypass surgery, a lesson in real resilience.
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Thanks for having me on your mailing list, although I was brought up in Hackney and lived there until 1971 when I had my first marriage and then moved to the London borough of Redbridge, where I still live.
My real connection with the East End is through my Jewish parents, who lived in Cable Street and other relations who were brought up in the area.
I love the history of the place.
From Bonner to bombings: a history of the old London Chest Hospital, Many personal Compliments to the editors and subscribers who created this engrossing article. I am proud you were able to use a fragment from my Contribution. Sometime, you might return to the London Chest Hospital Surgeons and Physicians. Mine would be from the 1960’s. There was Thomas-Holmes Sellors Head of Pulmonary Surgery, John Belcher Cardiologist with Dr. Rusby. The TB specialists Drs.Wheeler and Kaplan. They opened and supported a house in Commercial Road sheltering post- TB treated homeless alcoholics in co-operation with The East End Methodist Mission. Then Maghdi Yacoub – Surgical Registrar – who eventually became to the most widely lauded heart-surgeon in the UK. I was several times his elbow assistant in the operating theatre. Also brilliant John Beaver – anaesthetist – who built the innovatory Beaver Respirator. Then women in happy memory: the Principal Nursing Sisters. Wynne. Wise, Night Superintendent Hinds (Joan Collins lookalike.) Then Swiss Nurse Piana. N. Rosemary Knapp. N. Carlos. N. Mary O’Reilly (eventually my wife). Miss Card spinster Matron whose annoying corgi I looked after – when she was away.