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 | WELCOME TO THE FRIENDS OF ST FRANCIS WEBSITE
St Francis Psychiatric Hospital, Haywards Heath, West Sussex opened its doors to patients for the first time in 1859. Built to house 400 patients at a cost of £46, 531. 16s. 10d, it carried on its work uninterrupted for 136 years until November 1995, when it closed to make way for modern advances in the community based care of the mentally ill.
Three factors decided the fate of St Francis : it was a bracing location, in the centre of the county and accessible to the new railway.
Designed in the Lombardo-Venetian style by the architect H Kendall, it had to be self supporting and its buildings included a farm, a brewery, a laundry, a bakery, a chapel and burial ground and a well and settling pond. The water tower, built in 1908, is still in use today.
At the time of its opening in 1859 it had to compete for financing with Lewes Jail and, like the jail and railway, employed many Irish labourers who married local girls and settled in the area.
Known for its high standards of care, its spearheading of new and innovative methods of treatment in the care of the mentally ill over many decades and its international mix of staff of all disciplines, the friendships and comaraderie continue to flourish through regular staff reunions and contact.
THE FRIENDS OF ST FRANCIS SECTION OF THE SOCIAL AND SPORTS CLUB AND THE WEBSITE aim to assist in keeping alive those longstanding relationships built up over many years. Joe Hughes
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