Thames Hospital Enquiry.

Thames Star, Volume XI, Issue 3654, 11 September 1880, Page 2

Thames Hospital Enquiry.

The following is a resume of the proceedings at the Hospital enquiry yesterday afternoon :—

Mr Aitken said that from 16 or 20 lbs of potatoes were cooked every day. The average number of patients was sixteen and six attendants. There was necessarily a little waste in the preparation of potatoes.

George James, formerly a patient said he never remembered seeing ducks fed with potatoes every day. Mrs Power said that the place frequently swarmed with vermin, and said that one of the patients had been supplied with mercury to kill them. Mr Aitken admitted that they frequently had vermin and bugs in the Hospital. He knew that a patient named Laurie had found bugs in the bandages of his leg. Mrs Power said that she had never sold dripping, but Mr Aitken had. told her that all the dripping in the Hospital had been sold the day before she came. Mr Aitken said there was no scale of diet arranged for the hospital. Mrs Power said that Mrs Aitken, Cane, Mrs Laurence and her daughter, and Dan, the gardener, used to assemble in the kitchen and sing, the latter used to \ 1 ty the fiddle. These assemblages annoyed her as they disarranged and dirtied the kitchen. She also said that she had been denied the assistance of patients in the kitchen which had been allowed to the previous cook, Mr Aitken said that she was without assistance for about a fortnight. Sometimes there was not a patient in the Hospital who could assist. He made her wash the kitchen towels because she made them so dirty, and the washerwoman had spoken to him about it. Mr Plant said it had been the habit of the dispenser to extract teeth and charge for doing so. He considered the system liable to abuse. Mr Plant also wished to

give evidence concerning the election of the committee to which he ascribed all the mismanagement of the Hospital. Dr Skae said he could not take evidence on that point, and adjourned the enquiry till 10 o'clock this morning.