Southport General Infirmary

Southport General Infirmary
Christiana Hartley Maternity Hospital
Southport General Infirmary, circa 1960's
Geography
Location	Southport, Merseyside, England, United Kingdom
Organisation
Care system	Was private then NHS
Hospital type	General Hospital
Affiliated university	Edge Hill College
Services
Emergency department	Until 1988
Beds	205+
History
Founded	1895
Closed	1999
Links
Lists	Hospitals in England

Southport General Infirmary was a Victorian hospital that was Southport's first major hospital. The first construction of the building started in October 1892, with the first patients being seen at the hospital in September 1895.

Southport Infirmary was the first hospital in Southport, it was constructed on Virginia Street in 1870 and opened in 1871 to accommodate six male patients and six female patients. It also had two sidewards by where patients with infectious diseases were isolated. The hospital proved so popular that a new site was sought for the construction of a new and bigger hospital.

The Scarisbrick family who resided at Scarisbrick Hall gave a five-acre site on which the Infirmary once stood. The foundation stone was laid on 27 October 1892 and the hospital opened on 26 September 1895. The buildings were erected at a total cost of £25,000 this then provided accommodation for 60 patients in the men’s, women’s and children’s wards.

In 1899, following expansion of the local area it served to include Ainsdale, the Infirmary merged with The Eye, Ear and Throat Hospital. The three years leading up to the outbreak of the First World War saw the growth of the hospital building with a new ward and the opening of a new Massage Department and X-ray Department. During World War I, a further 120 beds for wounded soldiers where needed and saw the construction of yet another ward, a new Anaesthetic Room and Pathology Department in 1916. The services were stretched during the war as by 1918 a total of 1,173 wounded and invalided British soldiers had been seen at the hospital. After the First World War an Artificial Sunlight Department was added to the facilities as well as further accommodation for the staff and the construction of more wards and minor improvements to the hospital services as the town grew.

In June 1939 construction began on a new Women’s Surgical Ward followed by the outbreak of war in the September. The hospital therefore built an extra 117 emergency beds to add to the 150 general beds the hospital already had. In 1943 the hospital services were becoming stretched due to the demand of health care, this was when the Appointments System for outpatients was introduced, this provided follow-up clinics for the 173 wounded soldiers which were admitted during the year. In 1944 a new Rehabilitation Department was opened to help the injured soldiers from the war. In the Infirmary’s silver jubilee year, plans were made for an additional 178 beds.

In 1928 Christiana Hartley, the daughter of Sir William Pickles Hartley the founder of Hartley's Jam, proposed to construct a Maternity Hospital for the town. The plans were accepted and the Maternity Hospital opened in May 1932 on the Curzon Road side of the site. The Maternity services where independently managed, although the Infirmary provided the nursing, food, medicine, laundry and other requirements. The Christiana Hartley maternity unit remained on the Infirmary site until it was moved over to the new District General Hospital in 1999.