Mason’s Madhouses in Old Fishponds

An illustrated talk about a notorious madhouse run as a private business for 120 years, with some startling revelations. Based on the BRHG publication No Cure, No Fee, Boarding excepted.

Long before the NHS, those who did not fit ‘the norm’ were consigned to workhouses or to private lunatic asylums. The latter provided a profitable business opportunity, as the wealthy were only too keen to offload family members whose behaviour was inconvenient. It was a system open to abuses that Daniel Defoe and others were keen to expose.

In the Fishponds area of Bristol, one family lived off the proceeds for more than a century. The revealing tale of ‘Mason’s Madhouses’ explains what life was like in such institutions, uncovers the techniques employed to cure or control the inmates, tells the stories of the main players, and recounts the sensational public inquiry that brought a dynasty down.

Organised by Fishponds Library.