Stafford County Asylum opened in 1818 to accomodate 120 patients. Over the years it expanded and housed around 1000 patients. During the 1950s, it was renamed St George’s Hospital. Like so many other asylums, it closed in the mid-1990s. There are plans to convert the Grade II listed buildings into “100 distinctive dwellings”, and work should be starting in 2008.
Living in Stafford a few years ago, I would often get a tantalising glimpse of the asylum from the nearby ring-road. I sometimes wondered what it was like inside. I didn’t do anything about it, indeed almost forgetting about it when I moved away. Five years later I finally got the chance to look around. Stafford Asylum is, by far, one of the most derelict buildings I have visited. Time has not been kind to it, suffering at the hands of both vandals and nature. There are no windows and very few ceilings. Floors are squidgy and rotten, if they are there at all!
Outside
You can’t help but admire this behemoth of a building. At four storeys high and around 300m long, it would’ve made an impressive sight on the Stafford marshes in it’s heyday. Sadly it’s glory now hides behind a huge overgrown mess of trees.
Lower levels
The lower levels of the asylum are relatively interesting. Corridors, some isolation rooms (with the most colourful array of doors I have seen in an asylum), engineering rooms, a delightfully dingey pharmacy, and so on…
Chapels
There is a small double chapel in the asylum, strangely found on the second floor.
Main hall
The main hall is perculiar – it is full of scaffolding. Presumably an attempt to prevent it collapsing after previous arson attacks.
Stairs
The main staircase is rather impressive, a square-spiral affair complete with anti-suicide cages. Someone had tried to throw a door down, with no success.
Upper floors
There are huge holes in the roof, and they are slowly making their way down to ground-level. Needless to say, not much of the upper floors were explored…
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Oops! I forgot to put the written address, here it is, along with an alternative telephone number:-
South Staffordshire and Shropshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust
Trust Headquarters
Corporation Street
Stafford
ST16 3SR
tel: 01785 257888
fax 01785 258969
email: neil.carr@sssft.nhs.uk
I work for the company who presently own St Georges. I have worked on site for the last two and a half years. I have found St Georges fascinating and have only seen it in its present state of decay. I can only imagine what a wonderful building it must have been in its prime. I would be extremely grateful if anyone has any pictures that I could view, especially of the chapel, main hall, the tended grounds. I can only say that it is a truly amazing building which must hold many memories for many people.
Martyn – From what I have read on this site it sounds like the buildings gonna be used to make flats! not sure I’d buy or live in one, but……
However, there has also been talk of it being turned into shops and offices over the years, so I’d say it’s anyone’s guess, but they’d better hurry before there’s nothing left.
Kathy – I though I’d remembered Hazel mentioning you.
She died fairly suddenly, so I don’t think too many people would have known, however Herbert and Jocye Fritz and Sister Sandy amongst others were at her funeral.
I remember Ray Bennett but Have no idea of what he’s doing now, sorry
John, trisha melvin was a nursing officer there early eighties.If she is still in the stafford area, her mother Violet melvin took rolls of the old cini films of shows in the main hall, before it was turned into staff canteen/ the xmas spectacular was a great show
if you could trace these old films, put them on cd , it would be great
you could see Coreen Hollis who had a great voice. Tricia, was a bird in a guilded cage, I was jack frost;;
I have still photos of pagaent floats from st georges, in STAFFORD carnival, before such events were banned, Also cricket team from 1962, in the field , Eddie Hood, Brian Simms, Bill Murcott, Don lockett
I really am living in the past///////but happy day,s
I nearly got sacked for putting soap in the fountain, hundreds of bubbles entered the entrance///
Also one night we found a donkey wandering the corridors, he was taken away to a farm at hixon, came in to give rides at future garden parties
Trish Melvin / Ball whatever she’s called now, left there yrs ago, maybe 4 or 5 yrs after me. However, her brother Mark Melvin still works there (see Liam’s comments above), so maybe Liam could ask Mark about the cine films? Herbert Fritz, now there’s a name that made me smile, the king of Cresswell, nice bloke.
Its been really interesting reading everyones memories about st georges, i did my training there after working on a yts scheme placement in the psychology department in sandon villa, now michael flanagan building. I still work there 26 years on. Ive worked on many of the wards, baswich, wildwood, kingstone, giffard, hotchkiss, chebsey and brocton and am now a community nurse. I see i have a special mention from Jon C which is a bit of a shock, how long has it been? 25 years!! lol that was a rocky 18 months wasnt it|?
Really sad to see such a beautiful building in such a terrible state…i trained and lived at St Georges 1990-1993…i loved it, the atmosphere was excellent…and the socila life not bad either, lived like Kings and Queens for a week after pay day then off good will and tick fron the corner shop for the rest of the month.
Some real characters back then….both staff and patients..lots of staff related to each other if i recall…
Does anyone rememberLilian Heap? She was a patient at St Georges from the 1950s until her death in 1985. She was my grandmother and i am trying to find out anything about her.
Does anyone rememberLilian Heap? She was a patient at St Georges from the 1950s until her death in 1985. She was my grandmother and i am trying to find out anything about her.
I know she was on ward 10 and Hodgkiss (I think) ward at some point during her stay.
hi Natasha, i worked on hotchkiss ward and remember her name but im sorry i dont remember anything else about her.
hi, Natasha. I worked on ward 10 I too recall the name Lilly Heap. but also.can,t recall her face//
In the 70,s we had 99 patients on that huge unit, so this is not supprising, but let me reassure you it was a happy vibrant place, she would have been happy there
Hotchkiss ward was much smaller, ground floor ward, patients were usually sent there from larger units if they developed physical illnesses…post operative etc
hello Natasha
I can’t give you very much but I remember the name Lillian Heap -Or rather Lilly Heap, tough I never worked on Hotchkiss Ward, so I would have met her and cared for her on one of the other wards.I was at SGH from 1980 to 1990 and worked as a student nurse, did my general training and went back to SGH after as a Staff Nurse, Sister and A kind of manager with odd titles, before I ended my days in Staffordshire at the Health Authority and moved to London, only to discover that mental health care was about 10 years behind what we were about in Stafford.
I am so sorry I can’t recall your Grandma. I would tell you more if I could.
All I can tel you is St Georges was a hospital where I was proud to be a nurse and I absolutely learned to care for people with respect and to show them the dignity and care they deserved, and that was taught to me by others who were there before me … So I am sure she was cared for well.
J Watson … Lovely to see you here, along with Chis, J C, Martyn and to hear the mention of Mark Melvyn, his sister Trisha and a number of other familiar names and faces here as well.
May live be being kind to us all
John, who works on the building now, –
I am so sorry I don’t have any old photos to offer you (we were very un-technological in those days.)
But I hope you are taking care of her (the building that is) and maybe you can give us a clue about her intended use?
Thanks for posting as well – as I hit my 50′s (can’t believe I am typing that, as SGH is a part of my youth,) I can’t help but feel nostalgic about St Georges’ Hospital, all it gave me and all I owe it and the people who taught me there, for my ability to be a good nurse and to earn income on the back of all I learned back then, even today.
John thank you for caring for the old place now, as we did then.
john….any clues about what is going to happen to the old place would be welcome… what do you do there? security?
Hi, Jon Cowin. Long time. Your memory is really good. You were obviously paying attention. I was in G122 alongside you, Pete Kelly, Sue Gore, Sally Mitchell, Mel Bullivant, Sue Batty, Gemma Wong, Julie Lawson, Ian Thompson, Katie Laybourne, Magan Hughes, Richard Kermu, Phil Dodd, Lesley Wood.
Our training was exceptional wasn’t it? We all realise that now. Most of us realised when we move to other areas in the country that the stanard of care at SGH was way ahead of most places. But we had great fun as well. One memory I have is of one of the tutors coming in the classroom to roast us for the noise we were making when Eugene McGarrell’s group were next door doing their intermediate exams. We were suitably embarrased as we were hanging Katie Laybourn out of the window by her ankles at the tima, ha,ha!
I would challenge your memory on our starting date though. As far as I remember we should have started on April 1st but it was a Bank Holiday so we started the week after on the eigth. Perdantic I know. Still in touch with Mel and the two Sue’s. Woul love to here from you Jon. I am on facebook, link up x