Hi,
my 2nd great grandfather was "put away" in an asylum in March 1901 at the age of 33. He died there in December 1902, under two years later.
I was able to get a transcription (they couldn't make a copy) of his file, but it didn't say much. It just gave the date of admission, the date of death and the reason he was admitted.
Apparently, he had some anxiety issues about his job. This seems strange to me, since his business was flourishing. At the time of his death, he left the equivalent of nearly £600 000 to his widow and children, and they had several properties in London (Islington), Prittlewell (Essex) and possibly Brighton...
What I would like to know, is if the diagnosis of "anxiety" is correct, or if it could possibly have been something else? One wouldn't expect a 35 year old man to die from being nervous... Especially when he had nothing to be nervous about. Might he have had a heart condition? Or did the treatment hurt him in any way? In a 1901 medical handbook, I read that one of the treatments for anxiety was cleansing the intestants by pouring warm oil into the anus. That couldn't have helped his condition...
If anyone has more (general) information on how patients were treated and how the diagnosis were made, I would love to hear about it.
The asylum he was in, Porstmouth-borough asylum (later St James Hospital), was rather "posh". It had a ward for "private patients" and was quite expensive.
Many thanks,
Tom