Accident!

It was near the Bull Ring when Will was about fifteen that he was involved in a tragic accident. He had gone down to the markets to try to get some cheap meat, and was pushing his way past the crowded stalls in the steep, narrow street when he heard a lot of noise and shouting behind him.

The street was so thronged with people that Will could not understand what was happening until he saw a horse careering down the street in panic. The horse's head was raised in terror and it was foaming at the mouth. Will's first instinct was to get out of the way, but there was nowhere to run to.

Before he had even had time to press himself against the wall, the horse was upon him and Will fell to the ground under its hooves. He heard people screaming and shouting, then everything faded away as he fell unconscious. He was vaguely aware of great pain in his head, and of being lifted up and carried.

When he became fully conscious he realised that the room he was in was not his home. Will had been taken to the new hospital. He was treated for his injuries - broken ribs, a broken leg, and a great gash on his head - and one of the nurses told him that he had been very lucky. The old woman who had been standing next to Will had just died of terrible injuries.

General Hospital

Although Will did not appreciate it at the time, he had been very fortunate to have been injured when he was ! The hospital had only opened a few weeks earlier, in the September of 1779. It had been built with money raised by the richer people of Birmingham.

The hospital had been the idea of Dr. John Ash, an eminent doctor in the town, who had become very worried by the increase in the town's population and the lack of a hospital. True, there was a type of a hospital (an infirmary) inside the workhouse on Steelhouse Lane, but the only people who could be treated there were those who had actually been born in the parish of Birmingham.

The Knight family and the many others who were to double the town's population between 1750 and 1800 had been born outside the parish and so could not be treated. As Will began to recover he had the chance to see what was happening in the hospital. Will knew how to read and count now, for a friend of his at Mr. Lanyard's nailmaking workshop had been teaching him.

This friend had been lucky enough to go to the Bluecoat Charity School in the town. Will proudly counted forty beds as he hopped painfully around the hospital on crutches. He noticed that there were not always doctors there, and if one was needed a nurse would send a message to one of the several doctors who gave their services free.

There were only four nurses and they always seemed to be very busy feeding the patients, keeping them clean and helping them to recover. One day a barber turned up to shave all the men patients and they felt much better after that.

There was a room in the hospital that was used for operations, and from what Will heard from the other patients, he was glad that he did not have to be operated upon.

The doctors didn't like doing operations as the patients nearly always died. As operating was such a messy business, the doctors turned up in their oldest and dirtiest clothes and used knives that were often rusty.

During the first day he had been in the hospital Will vaguely remembered an old woman walking around with an enormous stomach. The woman had seemed to be in a lot of pain, for her face had been grey. Will had not seen her since, and he soon found out why when he asked the man in the next bed.

She had had an enormous growth in her stomach and had been taken to have surgery. She had been given a lot of gin to deaden the pain of the knife, but she had still been fully awake when the doctors cut her open. She had been strapped down and then held down by two assistants and, so the man said, had screamed in great pain.

Although the doctors had worked very quickly, she had died before they had managed to cut out the growth. Will shuddered as he heard the story and made up his mind that he would rather die than go through a dreadful experience like this.

Will was anxious to leave the hospital, for every day he spent there meant that the Knight family had to go without Will's wages. Will's job did not have an insurance scheme attached to it, as his father's job at Matthew Boulton's did. Will even found himself wishing that his father had been hurt instead of him, for then the family would have received money every week whilst he was away from work.

After five days in the hospital Will hobbled back to Needless Alley and began work at Mr. Lanyard's the following week.

The fear people had of doctors, hospitals and medicine in general is clearly shown in this cartoon which shows people being inoculated against 'cowpox'.