Identity area
Type of entity
Authorized form of name
Parallel form(s) of name
Standardized form(s) of name according to other rules
Other form(s) of name
Identifiers for corporate bodies
Description area
Dates of existence
History
Shoreditch Workhouse and Shoreditch Infirmary (later Saint Leonard's Hospital I) occupied adjoining parts of the same site which stretched from Hoxton Street in the west to Kingsland Road in the east. The buildings were erected in about 1865 to replace an earlier workhouse. The workhouse (later the institution) occupied the eastern part of the site immediately behind the Board of Guardians offices which fronted on Kingsland Road. The infirmary occupied the western portion of the site adjoining Hoxton Street. An annexe to the infirmary was built in 1884 in the north east corner of the site next to Nuttall Street.
When the functions of the Boards of Guardians were transferred to the London County Council (L.C.C.) in 1930, Saint Leonard's Hospital had certified accommodation for 556 patients, while the workhouse (by then known as Saint Leonard's House) had certified accommodation for 424. The L.C.C. Architect considered that most of the ward blocks were badly planned lacking cross ventilation (LCC/AR/CB/3/1).
On 1 April 1938 the L.C.C. completed its policy of removing its hospitals entirely from the ambit of the Poor Law by the appropriation of the remaining six institutions which accommodated chronic sick patients and which were within the curtilages of general hospitals. These included Saint Leonard's Institution which was renamed Saint Leonard's Hospital II to distinguish it from the neighbouring general hospital of the same name, which was to be known as Saint Leonard's Hospital I. By 1938 the total bed complement of the two hospitals had been reduced to 649 of which 549 were sick beds. (L.C.C. Annual Report of the County Medical Officer of Health for 1938).
Plans by the L.C.C. to rebuild the hospitals ended with the outbreak of war in 1939. The hospitals suffered considerable bomb damage with the destruction of part of the main block and one of the three nurses' homes. By 1948, when Saint Leonard's Hospital became part of the National Health Service as one of the Central Group of hospitals; the two hospitals were being managed as one general hospital, much reduced in size. In 1956 the hospital had 192 beds, with the possibility of opening additional wards to provide a total of 250 beds, if the extra nursing staff could be made available (A/KE/735/9).;Since then it has been developed as a centre for co-ordinating community services and supporting health centres. In 1992 it became part of City and Hackney Community Services NHS Trust.