Lady Bowen Hospital is a heritage-listed former maternity hospital and now social housing and office complex at 497–535 Wickham Terrace, Spring Hill, City of Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. It was designed by John H. Buckeridge and built from 1889 to 1890 by John Quinn. It was also known as Brisbane Lying-In Hospital and the Lady Bowen Hostel. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 23 April 1999. The complex consists of the former hospital and nurses' quarters buildings; a third building which had been contained in the heritage listing (Anzac House & Club) was demolished 2005–2008.
The hospital was named after Lady Diamantina Bowen, the wife of the then Queensland Governor Sir George Bowen. Lady Bowen had been the first patron of the Ladies' Committee of the Lying-In Hospital, whose mission was to provide safe maternity facilities for women in Brisbane.
The complex was redeveloped as social housing and office space between 2005 and 2008. The former hospital is now known as Diamantina House and the former nurses' quarters now known as Roma House, while Anzac House & Club was demolished and replaced by a new five-storey building, Quentin Bryce House.
History The former Lady Bowen Hospital, on Wickham Terrace is a complex originally consisting of three (now two) buildings, the earliest of which was constructed as the second purpose built home of the Brisbane Lying-In Hospital in 1889–1890. In 1938 the Lady Bowen Hospital was superseded by the Brisbane Women's Hospital and the site on Wickham Terrace was leased for a variety of purposes. The buildings are currently occupied by various arts related organisations.
During the nineteenth century childbirth frequently resulted in the death of mother and or baby. Usually, babies were delivered in the family home with the assistance of midwives, of varying degrees of experience and training. During the time of the Moreton Bay penal settlement, care for those women who could not afford the expense of a midwife, was available from the female prison, firstly located in Queen Street and later at Eagle Farm Women's Prison. Following the closure of the female prison, destitute women were unable to find medical attention during childbirth until the formation of the Queensland Lying-In Hospital in 1864.
A committee was formed for the establishment of a lying-in hospital following a report in The Brisbane Courier of 16 August 1864 requesting those interested in the establishment of such an institution to attend a meeting at the Armoury on 19 August at 4.00pm. The committee formed as a result of this meeting lobbied the colonial government of the time for partial funding, under the provisions Hospitals Act 1862 which allowed funding to be used to assist the establishment of hospitals. Previously Queensland hospitals were established solely by public donation. The Queensland colonial government, under Governor Bowen allocated toward the establishment of the first public lying-in hospital.
From the outset, the Ladies' Committee of the Lying-In Hospital sought to achieve three aims: firstly to improve midwifery standards in the state, secondly to change community attitudes toward accepting childbirth in hospitals and thirdly to promote moral reform in unwed mothers. To achieve the first aim, the training of midwives was conducted from the earliest days of the hospital in the 1860s.
On 1 September 1864, a joint committee of ladies and gentlemen of the proposed Lying-In Hospital was held to consider the objectives of the new hospital. At this meeting a Ladies' Committee was appointed in which the management of the institution was vested and comprising the wives of many early prominent Brisbane citizens. The Ladies Committee were supported by a men's committee who provided advice and reference as required. The hospital, officially called, the Queensland Lying-In Hospital was, opened on 2 November 1864 in a house, Fairview, in Leichhardt Street, Spring Hill. This was described in an advertisement in the Brisbane Courier as having six large rooms, detached kitchen and servant's room, with tank and yard. The Ladies' Committee rented Fairview for per annum.
The hospital remained in this rented accommodation in Leichhardt Street until 1866 when the Lying-In Hospital was moved to a new purpose designed building in Ann Street, between Edward and Albert Streets and adjacent to the Servants' Home (later known as the Brisbane School of Arts). This was an eight roomed building with beds for twelve patients and ancillary rooms. In August 1867, this building was renamed the Lady Bowen Lying-In Hospital in recognition of the wife of Governor George Bowen, Lady Diamantina Roma Bowen. During her life in Queensland, Lady Bowen was an avid participant and organiser of charitable and social activities.
The Lady Bowen Lying-In Hospital remained in Ann Street for about twenty-five years until 1889 when a larger hospital was built, on the outskirts of the central business area of Brisbane and overlooking Albert Park. A bill was passed in parliament to allow for the sale of the hospital in Ann Street to allow the Ladies' Committee to procure land elsewhere for reasons that:The situation is not by any means healthy, as the aspect is wrong for both breeze and sun; the situation is noisy; the present institution cannot be thoroughly cleaned without closing; and it is quite impossible to separate married women from single women, which separation is of course most desirable.The Ann Street property was sold for and patients were transferred to a property in Wharf Street, awaiting the opening of the Wickham Terrace Hospital. In October 1888 the Ladies Committee acquired the Wickham Terrace property, where formerly the house of Reginald Heber Roe, Head Master of Brisbane Grammar School was sited. Roe moved from his Wickham Terrace residence, known as Winholm, to a boarding house on the Brisbane Grammar site. Winholm is thought to have been demolished to make way for the lying-in hospital, certainly neither documentary or physical evidence suggests that the house has been retained within the hospital complex.
Following the acquisition of the land, the Ladies' Committee commissioned Brisbane architect, John Hingestone Buckeridge to design the new two storeyed hospital. Buckeridge arrived in Brisbane in February 1887 to take up his appointment as the Diocesan architect for the Bishop of Brisbane, Dr William Webber. Previously, Buckeridge worked in London as an architect following his training with prominent British ecclesiastical architect, John Loughborough Pearson and studied at the Royal Academy of Arts and the Architectural Association. His appointment to the Diocese of Brisbane was to assist Webber on an ambitious church building program. Following the death of his wife, Buckeridge accepted the position in Queensland where one of his principal jobs was the supervision of the St John's Church of England Cathedral, designed by his former principal, JL Pearson. Buckeridge worked in the position of Diocesan Architect officially until 1902 although for many of the later years he lived in Sydney. He designed about 60 timber churches throughout south east Queensland, including Christ Church, Milton (1891); along with a number of public and commercial buildings including the Gresham Hotel.
The design Buckeridge provided for the Lady Bowen Hospital was for a two storeyed brick building with substantial basement level and with capacity for fifty patients. The building was constructed by local contractor, John Quinn who won the tender for construction of the building for . The ground floor of the building housed an entrance hall, a sewing room for nurses and wards with bathrooms and linen rooms, Above on the first floor, were a number of wards, and below in the basement were the nurses' dining room and kitchens. A separate building to the rear of the hospital was used for septic cases.
The foundation stone of the new hospital was laid by Lady Alice Norman, wife of Queensland Governor Henry Wylie Norman, on 29 May 1889. The hospital was officially opened on Saturday 28 December 1889 by Lady O'Connell. The first patients were admitted to the hospital on 1 January 1890. No major additions or alterations were made to the complex until 1923 when the government approved the expenditure of for the construction of a Nurses' Quarters to the west of the original building.
The introduction of the Hospitals Act 1923 established an alternate structure with regional hospital boards for the management of Queensland hospitals. The management of the Lady Bowen Lying-In Hospital was vested in the Brisbane and South Coast Hospital Board from 1924. This brought about standardised practice throughout Queensland hospitals and official government contributions to the funding of hospitals. The Queensland Government took over full responsibility for the running of hospitals in 1945. The Ladies' Committee officially disbanded in 1924, although they retained an advisory role on the new board of management.
By the 1920s, the Lady Bowen Hospital was seen to require upgrading and repairs. With growing concern over the high incidence of infant mortality, legislation was passed in the form of the Maternity Act 1922 to provide support and care for children and mothers. The Hospitals Board commissioned a report from the Professor of Obstetrics at the University of Sydney who recommended the construction of a new obstetrics hospital in the grounds of the Brisbane General Hospital at Herston. The Hospitals Board were given government approval and funding in line with government platform, increasing support for women's and children's healthcare. The construction of a new obstetrics hospital, known as the Brisbane Women's Hospital was approved in 1929 and was opened in 1938. During this period Lady Bowen continued to operate and an operating theatre was constructed and sewerage system installed.
The Lady Bowen Hospital was closed and staff and patients were transferred to the new women's hospital which opened on 26 March 1938. This heralded an era of short term leasees and alterations to the buildings of the former Lady Bowen Hospital which continues to the present day. The many tenants who have occupied the buildings since 1938 include the Bridge Board, the Social Service League, Essential and Emergency Services of the Civil Defence Organisation, the Australian Army Canteen Services, the Stanley River Works Board, the Returned Sailors, Soldiers and Airmen's Imperial League of Australia, the Queensland State Archives, Agricultural Project (later the Agricultural and Environmental Education Branch and later, the Brisbane Urban Environmental Education Centre), the Australian Music Examination Board, Apprenticeship Board of Queensland, Department of Health (Chest Clinic for the Division of Health and Medical Physics) and the Queensland Writers Centre.
Of the tenants who have occupied the buildings since the relocation of the hospital, the various Army related tenants during World War II were most significant. The obvious impact of this tenancy was the construction of the two storeyed timber framed and fibrous-sheeting clad building on the corner of Wickham Terrace and Robert Street. In the early stages of the War the site was occupied by the Air Raid Warden's Organisation which became later the Civil Defence Organisation. In 1943 the site was acquired for use as a serviceman's club, known as Anzac House (now demolished). During this occupation the Royal Australian Engineers Unit were responsible for the conversion of the hospital into a hostel with dining and other recreational facilities. Across Wickham Terrace, in Albert Park, a related dance pavilion was constructed. This has since been demolished.
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