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The General Lying-In Hospital was opened in April 1767 as the Westminster New Lying-In Hospital. In 1818 this name was changed to the General Lying-In Hospital. It was founded by Dr John Leake, a lecturer in Midwifery, who in 1765 obtained the site on what is now Westminster Bridge Road and made a public appeal for funds. The hospital's aim was to provide "Relief of those Child-bearing Women who are the Wives of poor industrious Tradesmen or distressed House-keepers and who either from unavoidable misfortunes or the Expences of maintaining large Families are reduced to real Want. Also for the reception and immediate relief of indigent Soldiers' and Sailors' Wives, the former being very numerous in and about the City of Westminster" (from the address of Dr Leake at the first meeting of sponsors, August 7 1765).
The leases for the hospital site expired in 1826 and so in 1825 the Governors decided to purchase a new site for the hospital in York Road, Lambeth. The hospital moved there in September 1828. It was incorporated by Royal Charter in 1830. A program of modernisation and extension was begun in 1878, and in 1879 a training school for midwifes and monthly nurses was established. Sir Joseph Lister was appointed Consulting Surgeon in March 1879 and served in this capacity until 1911. He had also been President from 1897 to 1911. Under his leadership the hospital was the first in Britain to practise antiseptic midwifery.
Extensive rebuilding of the hospital took place between 1929 and 1933, when a new Out-Patient Department and Nurses Home were opened. At the outbreak of war in 1939 the hospital was evacuated to St Albans, not returning until 1946. The Out-Patient Department stayed at York Road throughout the war. In 1948 the hospital became part of the National Health Service in the Saint Thomas' Hospital Group. It was administered centrally but the old name was retained, and it became the maternity wing of the hospital. It was closed in 1971.