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Home » Health, Welfare and Charity » Hospitals and medical care » Medicine

Displaying results 1 to 6 out of 6

Page 1

A set of prescriptions for the poor, 1761, frontispiece [image 1 of 38]
  • This is a volume of recipes, herbal remedies and household hints, compiled during the mid-nineteenth century (c.1845) and owned by Lady de Rutzen of Slebech Hall (near Haverfordwest, Pembrokeshire). It contains an interesting assortment of recipes, including 'calves feet jelly', 'hare soup', goosebery wine and the intriguingly-named 'Staffordshire Yeomanry Pudding'. The herbal remedies include cures for 'corns', 'gnat bites' and 'sea sickness' as well as a medicine which was believed to alleviate whooping cough. Among the 'household hints' we find advice on the cleaning and varnishing of pictures, how 'to take spots out of Marble', how to 'prevent water penetrating boots or shoes', as well as recipes for homemade soap and the removal of iron mould from linen. Prior to the advent of modern, manufactured products, housekeepers and housewives had to devise their own cleaning agents, often using 'recipes', such as these, which had been handed down through the generations.
Recipe Book owned by Lady de Rutzen, Slebech Hall, c.1845 [image 1 of 31]
  • This journal was kept by the surgeon at the County Gaol, Haverfordwest, during the period 1820-35. Each entry notes the prisoner's name and ward, whether the prisoner was a 'debtor' or a 'criminal', the nature of the illness or disease, the dates entered on and discharged from the 'sick list' and, most interestingly, whether any extra food or clothing was prescribed. In many instances, additional 'observations' are also noted in the right-hand column. The County Gaol was built in 1779 but in 1820 a new purpose-built building was built and remained in use until 1878, when it became the headquarters of the Pembrokeshire Constabulary. It now houses the Pembrokeshire Record Office, where this journal is currently deposited. The entries on this particular page refer to prisoners who were entered on the sick list during the winter of 1820-21and the surgeon expresses concern about the inadequacy of the prisoners' clothing: 'The Trousers which the Criminals have, I think are too thin for the Winter and will be the means of injuring their Health. The most proper will be woollen'.
Journal kept by the Surgeon at the County Gaol, Haverfordwest [1820-35, 18 October-24 November 1820, image 1 of 147]
  • Humphrey Jones writes to his parents on 20 October 1850 from Chester where he is apprenticed to William Higgins, chemist and druggist. He tells them that his hands are much better - they healed quickly after he applied a liniment which he prepared. He says that the others in the shop do not know what ingredients he put into the liniment, but he is willing to pass on the recipe to his parents. Humphrey gives an account of a dispute which occurred in the shop on the previous Friday. A man came into the shop to pay from some gold leaf which a boy had acquired there in the morning. However, there was no record of this transaction and William Higgins came looking for Humphrey in the warehouse, believing that he was to blame. As a word of warning to his young apprentice, he told Humphrey: 'If you had sold them, you should not have stopped a minute in the shop. I would have sent you home directly'.
Letter from Humphrey Jones, apprentice chemist in Chester, to his parents in Llangollen, 20 October 1850 [image 1 of 2]
  • An opening page from a personal notebook begun in 1836 and containing a strange assortment of mostly medical potions and recipes recorded by James Williams of Brecon. He seems to have been fond of adding flourishes and doodles to some of his notes.
Book of practical recipes entitled 'Bleed, Blister and Purge', 1836 [image 1 of 6]
  • An alphabetical list of the medicinal and topical remedies referred to in the foregoing sheets.
A set of prescriptions for the poor, 1761, page 25 [image 22 of 38]