Bedlam Asylum

by Terry Trainor

Many authors and poets have written about Bedlam including Charles Dickins, Selected Journalism 1850-1870, in which he compares the thoughts of the insane with our own thoughts whilst dreaming. He “I wonder that the great master, who knew everything, when he called sleep the death of each day’s life, did not call Dreams the insanity of each day’s sanity”. By the 17th century Moor Fields had been successfully drained and it became a pleasure ground where people could wander and enjoy entertainments such as wrestling and boxing matches, cudgel fights, jugglers, ballad singers, Punch shows, and the public whipping of thieves. Samuel Pepys records making visits there. One of the main attractions was the lunatics, displayed in cages in The Bethlehem Hospital for Lunatics (or Bedlam, for short) at Moorgate. In the 18th century the railings round Bedlam became the centre for small businesses. Second-hand bookstalls lined the perimeter of the hospital. Broadsheets were displayed on the railings. Ballads were hung up on lines strung between trees. Ordinary people were allowed to watch the lunatics for just a couple of pence. They would poke them with sticks, watch inmates fight each other and see the brutality inflicted on the inmates. Hogarth painted pictures of inside bedlam, and it had been described as Hell on earth.

170 pages, Kindle Edition

First published May 23, 2012