The latter part of the document describes in more detail the Mossend Fever Hospital. There is reference in the document to an earlier building being used for fever patients opposite Stewart's farm near Mossend. The first mention of Mossend Fever Hospital was in 1902 so I was curious to know when the hospital was built or started. Further research led me to the Burgh of Stornoway Local Authority Public Health minute book. In 1872 Sir J. Matheson gave land for the site of the hospital in Olivers Brae or Widows Park as it was known but it was not until 1876 that the Feu charter was agreed.

In January 11th 1875 the minute mentions the hospital for the first time with approval of additions to the hospital. Mr Munro, Chamberlain, was to prepare the title deeds to the site of which the draft could be submitted for approval by Sir J. Matheson. On January 12th 1875 Donald Maclean was paid £9-2/- for making a road to the hospital.

More mention in the minutes of the hospital was on September 1876 when a committee was formed to examine a report on the state of the building and furnishings. They also discussed the management of the hospital and provision of a nurse. From the ledger titled Public Health Letter Book, a Mrs Bain, hospital nurse, Sandwick was engaged by town & parish at the rate of £20 per annum with £5 allowed for fuel.

Also in 1876 the Parishes of Uig, Barvas and Lochs were asked to contribute £5 each towards expenses on account of the privilege of permission to send patients to the hospital and 4/- per week for lodging, fire and light for each person sent by them to the hospital. The parochial boards of the above parishes agreed to the terms of the local authority for use of the hospital in January 1877. In 1879-80 the hospital received from the Parishes of Uig, Barvas and Lochs £7-10/- to account for the nurse's wages. Reference is made in 1879 to repairs to the hospital costing £12-7-4d and furnishings £1-7-11d but there is no reference to a hospital being built just repaired. Was the building already there and turned into a hospital? (Any information regarding this would be most welcome.)

Also in 1879, Mrs Bain, Nurse, resigned but two years later asked to be reinstated but the landward part of the parish recommended she be not appointed. Wouldn't we love to know why?

Mrs Sharp, Newton, was appointed as nurse in 1881 and she appears in the 1881 census as Mary Sharpe, aged 26. There were also plans for alterations and additions to the hospital that year and there was a dispute with the contractor responsible for building additions to the hospital regarding the bill of £13- 10-3d.

In 1882 there is mention of a typhoid fever outbreak in the town with one patient hospitalised and one fatality. It was thought this was due to defective drainage in the house where the outbreak took place. Also in 1882, Mrs Macleod, nurse, was paid £9-11-Sd. What happened to Mrs Sharp, I wonder? There was a request from the nurse for a piece of ground to plant potatoes but this was refused.

In July 1883 the following articles were purchased for the hospital:

• 3 small tables,
  
• 3 plain wooden chairs,
  
• 1 bedpan
  
• 6 tablespoons at 6 pence 1/2 dozen
  
• 6 teaspoons at 3 pence 1/2 dozen
  
• 6 knives and forks
  
• 1 dozen unbleached towels

Cost of above to be divided between town and the parishes.

The hospital nurse resigned in 1884 and Mrs Catherine Macdonald was appointed with the stipulation that no dependent or relative was to live with her! In April 1884 there was quite a discussion in the minutes and mention is made in the document about the need for a hospital ambulance and it was agreed that a horse drawn wagonette with portable curtains and a roof was required and agreed that a suitable vehicle could be made up in Stornoway and the cost was £9-4-11d.

In 1885 and 1886 there is reference to repairs to the interior and exterior of the hospital. There was a request in October 1888 that a family in Uig ill with fever be admitted to the hospital while their house is cleaned and fumigated. The parochial board was asked to pay for this.

In October 1890, Dr Charles Macrae was appointed as Medical Officer of Health for the Burgh of Stornoway. At his request it was decided to make application for a trained nurse and knowledge of Gaelic would be helpful.

The payment of hospital expenses to be divided between local authorities, Burgh of Stornoway and Lewis District Committee was moved but not seconded at a meeting of the Public Health Committee. At a later meeting the Lewis District Committee agreed to provision the hospital but only for patients in the landward area of Lewis.

Mrs Kate Mackenzie, an untrained nurse, was appointed in March 1891 with a salary of £20 and £5 for fuel per annum. Mrs Mackenzie was instructed to reside at the hospital, keeping the furnishings and bed linen clean and attending the patients. Obviously a trained nurse was more difficult to find. In all probability, when reading the minutes, the gentlemen of the committee were not keen to spend much on the hospital or on the salary of a trained nurse. In 1892 they discussed putting wooden partitions of a portable nature across the centre of each ward to the height of the wards. This presumably would be to make cubicles to house patients with different types of infections.

They also decided to extend the 'present' coach-house to provide a wash-house disinfecting chamber and coach-house for the ambulance. Dr Macrae had made a request for a steam steriliser for the hospital.

By March 1893 they were looking at building a house adjacent to the hospital to house healthy families of infected patients. This was to isolate, as far as possible, the infection and to enable the infected house to be cleaned and fumigated. Mr Arnold (?) was to be written to to supply straw for bedding and the estimated cost of building the house was £350. It was obvious from the minutes that Dr Macrae was having an impact in trying to improve the hospital facilities.

A letter was received from the nurse in August 1883 expressing her regret at her absence from the hospital when a patient was admitted and she stressed that it would not happen again! The poor woman was probably worked off her feet with looking after patients, washing clothes and bed clothes, cooking, cleaning, etc., for seven days a week, night and day. As far as I can see she was the only member of staff at the hospital. The previous minute states that there were 11-12 patients being treated there.

Later in 1894 Mrs Mackenzie's daughter was employed at £5 per annum and Mrs Mackenzie also got a pay rise of £5 per annum provided she kept fires in the new building when there were no patients there. She also submitted accounts for doing personal laundry for four patients - 4/11 1h 4/2 6/7 and 4/-. Four gallons of pure carbolic acid and a number of tins of sulphur candles were ordered to be used when disinfecting homes of infected patients or families.

In February 1897 a plumber and his daughter were admitted to the hospital with typhoid fever and the rest of the family were housed in the isolation building (sometimes known as convalescent unit) until there house was cleansed and disinfected. Murdo Stewart, carter, was paid 5/- to remove the remains of a person who died of typhoid fever from Pringles Court to the Mossend hospital. M. Macdonald was paid 6/for cleansing and lime washing the infected house in Pringles Court. Later on that year an account valued at £8-18/- was submitted by 8 W.G .Russell (Waverley buildings) for supplying bedding for the hospital. Also six pillows were to be ordered and it was stipulated that they must be filled with chaff. How uncomfortable that must have been for a patient with an infection perspiring profusely and lying on a pillow filled with chaff.

In April 1899 the committee discussed the appearance of phthisis (tuberculosis) which until recently was unknown in Lewis and the need for a sanatorium to nurse such patients.

The last minute in the minute book, Local Authority Public Health Stornoway Burgh regarding the Mossend Fever Hospital was dated December 1900.

The above notes make a most interesting social history of the time where medical and nursing care was basic, no antibiotics and no proper facilities for patients.

The document I am reviewing makes very little reference to Mossend Fever Hospital until 1912. There were some admissions to the hospital after an outbreak in Bernera. Notices were issued to people from Bernera not to attend communion services elsewhere without first obtaining a clean bill of health from the local doctor. This did not go down well but served to emphasise the potency of common migration in spreading infectious diseases. These instructions obviously worked because there is evidence of the people of an "infected village" being warned off by another congregation in a neighbouring village.

In the Medical OfAcer of Health's July 2012 report in 1912 he records his deep regret at the death of Mrs Macdonald, a nurse for many years who attended many fever cases with a true spirit of self sacrifice. Praise indeed from the MOH! He does not say where this dedicated nurse worked but she could have been in the villages because by then there were nurses helping fever patients in their homes and villages. The 1871 census lists a Peggy Macdonald of 14 Keith Street aged 5O and she is described as a hospital keeper but no firm link with 1912 can be established.

I think it's important to describe at this point what nursing was required for patients with fever. They have very high temperatures, perspiring continually, sometimes confused, or comatosed. This may go on for days or weeks until the fever breaks so they require constant bathing, changing of clothes and bed clothes. There were no IV fluids in those days so trying to get the patients to drink even a little was difficult.

Also in the Medical Officer of Health's 1912 report he makes reference to measles imported from Fort George where an epidemic was raging. No notification was published about the epidemic when the regiment (Seaforth Highlanders) was temporarily disbanded and all the soldiers sent home resulting in the disease breaking out in nine different areas of the island. The MOH makes a very telling comment about the methods of the military! Nowadays measles is a troublesome childhood illness and there is very effective immunisation for it but back then it could result in death.

The MOH's report in 1914 stated that infectious diseases had claimed 168 deaths and still the only accommodation for such illnesses was the Mossend Fever Hospital with beds for 12 patients and a house accommodation for a small number of suspected victims of those in contact with infectious diseases. He states that further measures required to combat all such infectious diseases requires a sanatorium and hospital with at least 32 beds. He also asks for a TB officer who could have charge of the sanatorium.

During the years of the war there is very little mentioned in the document about Mossend Hospital. It states that the claims on lives by disease within the islands were overshadowed by the carnage brought about by the war. Therefore there were no reports from the MOH during the war and until 1920. There is no reference to the Iolaire either. This 1920 report stated that the hospital building was in a very bad state and as there had been an exceptional call for accommodation at Mossend the hospital was strained to its utmost and had occasionally to find extra accommodation.

By this time the Lewis Sanatorium (a TB hospital later known as the County Hospital) was built at Willowglen with 25 beds. Would this be the extra accommodation I wonder? It can be imagined that the inadequate staff in residence were sorely tried by the conditions under which they had to work. There were 41 cases of infectious diseases and five children with TB treated in 1920. By this time tuberculosis was becoming rife throughout the island and very often patients didn't seek treatment until it was too late because of being ashamed of having the disease. 1923 saw the greatest number of deaths from TB ever recorded. The report also wonders about the number of young people emigrating at that time on the Metagama. How many of them were suffering from undiagnosed TB?

In 1929 the TB Sanatorium was extended and the Mossend Hospital is mentioned less in the document. This extension was opened by the Secretary of State for Scotland, Major Walter Elliot which raised the number of beds to 50 (the maximum number of beds at the Sanatorium was eventually to reach 75).

The 1933 MOH for Lewis report is written by Dr R. Stevenson Doig . The document makes reference to him as a "dedicated and pugnacious champion in the cause of elimination of infectious diseases, especially TB. Many now living remember the unresting doctor who was instrumental in reducing the tubercular scourge in Lewis to small proportion then its elimination." How true, those of us of a certain age remember Dr Doig diligently going from school to school testing us with heaf tests and then if required with the BCG immunisation, and always with a kind word and a twinkle in his eye.

Around this time the convalescent house at Mossend was no longer in use and it was made into a house for Dr Doig and his family. In the document Dr Henry Doig (Dr Doig's son) has written a letter which includes plans reminiscing about the hospital and house. He describes two 6 bedded wards (see rough plan) with a kitchen and nurses' quarters. It had brown linoleum floors and the laundry was done in a boiler outside the main building, a large iron cauldron on a brick fireplace! He says that in the 1930's the hospital was run by Mrs (sic) Macrae and a Mrs Mackenzie was a member of staff. Stornoway Historical Society research reveals that Mary Ross Macrae from 57 Keith Street was the Matron from a date prior to 1931 and that Sophia Diana Mackenzie from 31 Anderson Road was the Assistant Nurse. Further research relates that Sophia's mother was the Mrs Kate Mackenzie referred to earlier, matron of the Mossend Fever Hospital for over 25 years until 1916. The 1901 Census confirms these fndings and lists under Mossend Fever Hospital Catherine Mackenzie, 49, Fever Nurse, born Stornoway and Sophia Mackenzie, 20, Assistant Nurse, Daughter, born Glasgow. In addition the census lists Malcolm Macleod, 39, patient, coachman (not domestic), born Lochs and Mary Macleod, 36, patient, born Scalpay.

The 1911 census reveals that Catherine and Sophia Mackenzie remained in position and that two patients from Lochs were in residence on census night. They were James Mackenzie, aged 45, a handspun weaver and Murdo Kennedy, aged 16, a student. Catherine and Sophia Mackenzie died in 1941 and 1961 respectively and were interred at New Sandwick Cemetery.

The Society has also found that the year 1931 is highly significant in that there was a change of management for the Red Cross Sanatorium or Lewis TB Hospital as it was also referred to at times. From that year and until 1948, when the National Health Service came into being, it was run by Ross & Cromarty County Council. In a document written in 1987 by the late Willie John Macdonald (Butcher) for the now defunct Sandwick Historical Society, he stated that the last death due to TB at Mossend Hospital was in about 1931. The Society has found that Robert Watson from 4b Melbost died in the Mossend Fever Hospital on Christmas night 1932 aged 18 and it would appear that, in all likelihood, Mossend was used as a back up facility to the Sanatorium.

Subsequently, the Society has found that Christina Alice Maciver, a nurse practitioner from the Church of Scotland Manse, Kinloch, died of pulmonary tuberculosis and tuberculosis meningitis at the Mossend Fever Hospital on 1 May 1942 aged 22.

Mary Ross Macrae died on 27 June 1944 aged 67 at the County Hospital. She died suddenly as the result of a poisoning accident when serving as Matron at the County Hospital (Infectious Diseases). Doctors Doig and Tolmie were summoned but their efforts were to no avail. She was the only surviving daughter of Donald and Isabella Macrae (nee Nicolson). A single career nurse, she lived with her brother. Their late father had been a master baker in the town. It should be noted that the Mossend Fever Hospital closed officially as a hospital upon the establishment of the National Health Service in 1948 but it is believed to have been disused for some time before that. In 1987 Jessie Macrae from 3 Branahuie was interviewed about her spell in hospital as a 17 year old with typhoid fever. She caught typhoid fever from a patient she was nursing at the time and she remembers being taken to hospital by an ambulance driven by Angus Macleod (Angus Janitor) who I believe was the first ambulance driver on the island. Unfortunately the interview did not mention the year she was ill but it was almost certainly the 20's as Angus became the Town Hall caretaker in 1931 and The Nicolson Institute janitor in 1944. She was a patient for six weeks and for two of these was unconscious and delirious.

She describes only three nurses and matron had to clean the floor like the nurses did. "Mrs Mackenzie did all the cleaning up, laundry and nursing - she was just a dog's body but she was sitting with me when I came round after two weeks."

These descriptions give us an idea of what the hospital was like and how essential it was to those that were ill. The staff must have been tremendously overworked with very little pay. It is to them I would like to dedicate this short article and to remember the hospital's history, be it ever so small and with such poor facilities.

Burgh Medical Officers of Health

1890-1906 Charles Mackenzie Macrae
1906-1907 Donald J. Macdonald
1907-1918 Donald Murray
1920-1930 Agnes Ellen Porter (later Miller)
1930-1965 Robert Stevenson Doig
1965-1975 Donald Roderick Macaulay

References

l. Burgh of Stornoway Local Authority Public Health Minute Book
2. Public Health Letter Book
3. The Mossend Fever Hospital document

My thanks to:

Malcolm Macdonald, Ken Galloway and Colin Afrin of Stornoway Historical Society
Sandy Matheson, Honorary President, Stornoway Historical Society
David Powell and colleagues in Tasglann nan Eilean Siar