by Susan Tarr
But nobody waited for the glorious buildings or the park-like grounds to be completed. In 1884, the women were the first to be moved from Littlebourne and crowded into those cold bleak barracks built by the inmates themselves.
And, unknowingly, the foundations for the new Seacliff Lunatic Asylum, the ample farm lands and the yet-to-be landscaped park, were being established on unstable land.
Robert Lawson, a 19th century New Zealand architect well known for his Gothic Revival style, designed the Seacliff Lunatic Asylum. Building was commenced in 1874 and the main block completed in 1884. Eventually, it was to house five hundred patients and fifty staff. The construction had cost in the region of 78,000 pounds – an enormous sum.
Some suggested Robert Lawson’s work had turned to fantasy with its excessive number of turrets on corbels projecting from nearly every corner, and the gabled roofline dominated by a magnificent tower, further turrets and a spire. The extreme Gothic architecture of Seacliff Lunatic Asylum was the culmination of many dreams and plans. The idea was to remove the mentally insane, the retarded or those who were difficult, from the outgrown Littlebourne Asylum out of the city and into the healing countryside above the refreshing waters of the Pacific Ocean.
Healing? Hopefully.
Away from the eyes of the citizens? Certainly.
When the north wing of this architecturally-designed hospital building was finally completed, those women society labelled as lunatics were, once again, the first to move in. With its stone walls, numerous turrets and high tower, the building was a testament to Victorian architecture, a picture-perfect edifice glorifying colonial aspirations of greatness. Yes, even though it was hidden in the countryside. Accolades from far and wide poured in.
Barely was the first building completed when the poor drainage of the land it was built on made it essentially unsafe. In 1885, only one year after it was finished, the trouble began. Plaster began to fall from the ceilings and cracks appeared in the walls. Ground movement was suspected.
Yet again, the women were evacuated from their latest residence into hurriedly constructed wooden wards until restorative work would allow re-occupation of the building.
Concern was focused on those numerous high turrets on the main building. They’d been built ostensibly as viewing platforms high above the countryside for when an inmate tried to escape. Primarily they were built for decoration. More importantly, they were not accommodation and thus could be sacrificed; deemed an earthquake risk, many were removed. With their removal, the beauty of the new building, so like a castle – perhaps a fortress – was totally compromised, and all within one year of completion.
In 1887, only three years after the opening of the main block, a major landslide occurred – something noted as ‘a high risk’ by the original surveyors, yet totally ignored by those in charge. Fortunately, it affected only a temporary building.
Toward the end of the nineteenth century several more wooden wards – two-storey barracks – were constructed to house the increasing numbers of the insane who had to be accommodated by the state. Later, after the Second World War, the authorities removed the highest tower and remaining turrets from the main building and that took care of any potential danger from earthquakes and slips.
The grounds were glorious, the sea air beneficial, but that building? It could no longer be termed beautiful; the plaster continued to fall and the cracks to proliferate.
Still, life goes on, and society continued necessarily to house those afflicted by insanity, and other misfits deemed unfit for ordinary society. In 1911 the name was changed from Seacliff Lunatic Asylum to Seacliff Mental Hospital, and humane care became the ideal. Only gradually did that concept seep into and begin to change attitudes and behaviour of attendants and other employees.
Psychiatric registration was introduced in 1945, and ‘Psychiatric Nurse’ replaced ‘Mental Nurse’ as a job title.
In 1959, The Building was finally demolished because of further earth movement, while other parts were closed down. Many patients were moved back into the community as improved medications relieved misery and suffering, and society decided it could tolerate those who were different in their midst. However, those unfit for rehabilitation went to other institutions – most to the new Cherry Farm Hospital, sited between Karitane and Waikouaiti, with its modern villa-styled accommodation.
Eventually, like many of my family and friends, I also left Seacliff village, initially to work at Cherry Farm Hospital.
Seacliff in all its glory is now a memory.
And Malcolm? Yes, he did marry his sweetheart, a woman who had also lived most of her life as a patient at the hospital, and, yes, they did produce a family who lived and grew up in regular New Zealand society. Not rich and famous, but regular. Something Malcolm always desired to be. And that’s why I had to write his story.
Note: Some details have been changed to protect living relatives and descendants, though, wherever possible and in most instances the correct dates, names and places have been used.
Me et the author:
Author Susan Tarr has been writing for 25 years, and she often draws from the diaries she wrote during her international travels.
Her daughters were born in Kenya, East Africa.
Although she writes mostly from personal experience, she also uses anecdotal information from conversations and other peoples’ stories, resulting in her characters taking on a life of their own, becoming larger than life.
She currently lives in New Zealand.
Author on Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Susan-Tarr-Phenomena-the-Lost-and-Forgotten-Children/432230866903602?ref=hl
RESOURCES
Christchurch City Libraries.
Sunday Star Times.
Otago Daily Times.
(1972) BLAKE-PALMER, G, MOORE, C.S., TREWEEK, E.C. & TOD, F. The End of an Era. Seacliff Hospital Final Farewell.
Dunedin, Otago Hospital Board.
University of Otago Library.
New Zealand Society of Genealogists (Dunedin Branch) Newsletter.
Google Search: ‘Seacliff Mental Hospital’ et al.
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