The era of the asylum 

Throughout the 17th and 18th centuries, there were minimal legislative provisions for individuals with mental illness. Those who were deemed mentally ill were either left to fend for themselves or were housed in local gaols or in the House of Industry (or workhouses), which was intended by the Act of 1771-1772 to serve as an asylum for the distressed, and as a house of correction (see Henry, 1989; Conlon, 1943; and Kelly, 2012). However, this position changed during the 19th century.

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“The period between 1820 and 1898 was to be a time of intensive legislative activity in relation to public psychiatric institutions in Ireland” (Kelly, 2012: para. 3). The need for systematic reform was highlighted by “a Select Committee of the House of Commons, which recommended the establishment of provincial asylums so as to minimise the numbers of mentally ill residing in prisons and houses of industry” (ibid.). A bill to establish a nationwide network of asylums was presented in 1817. This was known as the Asylums for Lunatic Poor (Ireland) Act 1817, which was amended by the Lunatic Asylums (Ireland) Act 1820 and repealed by the Lunacy (Ireland) Act 1821 (there were two more amendments in 1825 and 1826) (Kelly, 2016). On the heels of the 1817 provision, the creation of Ireland’s district asylums commenced with “four district asylums were rapidly completed during the remainder of the 1820s (Armagh, Belfast, Derry and Limerick) and five more by 1835 (Ballinasloe, Carlow, Waterford, Maryborough (Portlaoise) and Clonmel)” (ibid.: p. 43). 

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Among the other pieces of mental health legislation passed during the 19th century, the Dangerous Lunatic Act of 11 June 1838, formally titled ‘An Act to make more Effectual Provision for the Prevention of Offences by Insane Persons in Ireland’, formed the basis of the committal procedure which became a key contributor to the overcrowding that blighted Irish asylums (Kelly, 2016: p. 48). The primary purpose of the Act was to ‘protect’ the public from the dangers allegedly posed by people deemed mentally ill. It empowered the court to commit a person to the gaol, who could then be removed to an asylum by warrant of the Lord Lieutenant (Prior, 2012). The act was amended in 1867 to allow for direct admission to the asylum and provided no safeguard, leaving the system wide open to abuse by institutions, particularly workhouses and gaols, as well as families who saw the admission pathway as “respite from the demands of care” (Walsh, 2005: p. 25) [1]. Despite the act being fundamentally flawed, it remained in place until the advent of the Mental Treatment Act 1945 (see Kelly, 2016).

The extensive developments concerning psychiatric institutions in Ireland represented significant changes for the poor, the ill and the excluded in 19th-century Ireland: “Social problems were pressing; institutions were the answer; and the mentally ill were among those most desperately in need of care” (Kelly, 2016: p. 43).  It was the ultimate endpoint for people who were often already victims of poverty, illness, and abandonment, explains Professor Linda Connolly (Walking Borders, 2018).

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Cork Lunatic Asylum

A limited network of private asylums also emerged parallel with the expansion of Ireland’s public asylum system. In Cork, a pioneering psychiatrist, Dr William Saunders Hallaran, established the Cork Lunatic Asylum during the late 1780s and early 1790s, and Citadella, a private asylum in Douglas, County Cork in 1799 (‘Bulls Asylum’) (Kelly, 2016; see also Kelly, 2012). Located at Old Blackrock Road, adjacent to the Victoria Hospital, the proceeds of a charity concert funded the Cork Lunatic Asylum’s construction. Edward’s Cork Remembrance records that in 1791, when the asylum began to be built, nearly £200 was collected by “a charity play, owing to the very active exertions of Richard Harris”, the then Mayor of Cork (Edwards, 1792: p. 275). This was followed by a steady expansion in private asylum capacity, with the opening of private facilities in “Bloomfield, Donnybrook (1810), Farnham House, Finglas (1814) and Hampstead House (1826)” (Kelly, 2012: para. 2). 

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Although Cork Lunatic Asylum remained outside the formal District Asylum System, it was still subject to inspection by an Inspectorate of Lunacy, which oversaw the standard of care throughout the system. By the 1840s, the Asylum had reached a dire state. At this time, reports on District, Local and Private Asylums in Ireland described the asylum as poorly ventilated and overcrowded; as one report noted, the wards were “disproportioned to the number of patients confined in them” (HC: PP, Lunatic asylums--Ireland. Report on the district, local, and private lunatic asylums in Ireland, 1846: with appendices, 1847: p. 34; see also the reference list for more HC: PP - House of Commons: U.K. Parliamentary Papers). 

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It was recommended that Cork Asylum be absorbed into the District Asylum System after it was deemed insufficient in meeting the district's requirements. Rather than spending money on alterations and repairs, the existing Cork Asylum would be entirely abandoned, and a new asylum would be built upon a more eligible site (HC: PP, Lunatic asylums--Ireland. Report on the district, local, and private lunatic asylums in Ireland, 1846: with appendices, 1847). 

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One of Ireland’s largest psychiatric institutions 

Hanora Henry (1989), a former nurse tutor at Our Lady’s Hospital, wrote that in 1846, following an inspection of sites within 2 miles of Cork City (Shanakiel, Belvedere, Dodges Glen and Springville), it was determined that the lands of Shankiel would become the site used for the erection of the new asylum. Daniel Leahy offered the land on behalf of Lord Cork. William Atkins was appointed architect, and Alex Deane was the builder. Work commenced in mid-1848 (ibid.).