The nineteenth report of the Committee of Visitors of the County Lunatic Asylum at Hanwell : January quarter sessions, 1864 / [Middlesex County Lunatic Asylum].

  • Middlesex Lunatic Asylum at Hanwell.
Date:
1864
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The nineteenth report of the Committee of Visitors of the County Lunatic Asylum at Hanwell : January quarter sessions, 1864 / [Middlesex County Lunatic Asylum]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    tendent on the Female side, acting for both, refused in the first instance to deliver up the Patient. After considerable demur on his part and an endeavour to obtain specific instructions for his guidance, which instructions from accidental circumstances reached him too late, he suffered the Police Officer to remove the Patient, who was accordingly taken to Newgate for Trial. When arraigned before Baron Channell, the Patient was found by the Jury to be of insane mind, and unable to plead, whereupon he was ordered to be kept in custody during Her Majesty’s pleasure. The instructions which had been sent to Dr. Sankey, were, that the Patient was not to be removed from the Asylum. No blame is however imputed to Dr. Sankey for the course taken by him in the absence of specific directions, because upon a former occasion, a Patient some years back had been removed, as he was aware, to Newgate on the Warrant of Magistrates of the County on a charge of Murder, and he had accordingly acted upon that precedent. The Committee, however, were of opinion, that a Patient legally in their charge could not be removed from it, except in the mode prescribed by the Statute under which they act, and for their own government and for that of their Officers, therefore they determined to take the opinion of Counsel upon the general subject. A case was accordingly submitted to Mr. Welsby in which he