On the whole, there are very few references to the asylum in newspapers in the C19
So far as I can tell even its opening and subsequent development was scarcely reported
But here's a very troubling story from the early years
....Mrs Boone
https://www.historyofwandsworthcommon.org/years/1844/1844-02-26-mrs-boone-looking-for-her-husbands-body-MorningAdvertiser.jpgBut of the others, several are jocular or almost affectionate
And usually refer in some way to people's prejudices, if only to subvert them...
For example
[hare and hounds]
[a visit to a theatrical performance]
[and the arrival and departure of balloon]
You can't help thinking that this was something of a PR stunt....
It's especially interesting because it involves Doctor Hugh Welch Diamond...
(Who almost certainly put the balloonists up to it)
He was deeply involved in another story of the dark side of psychiatry in the mid-century
Probably the most notorious of all, and very widely reported nationally was the case of Daniel Dolley
Diamond is largely forgotten for his role in Daniel Dolley's stoty
But he has become the most famous of C19 [psychiatrists]
Because of his remarkable photographs...
I gave a longer talk on this
Which you can see here....
Here are some sequences of photographs from that talk
He clearly loved to dress his patients - his "subjects" 0 up
Here's en extraordinary one
Some of them co
But to finish I'd like to focus on just one photograph
Ophelia...
And a possible local story [stories] that relates to it
[How best to finish evening?]
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