You have brought back memories with your last entry!
When I was a student nurse there and lived in the nurses home - we were sometimes called out [when off-duty] & given boots and torches to search for patients [inmates].
The older nurses would always say " s/he will be in the lagoon ". They were usually right.
The lagoon/blue lagoon/clay pit, or brick pit [as it is variously known] was the end of many people, who died there intentionally or otherwise. I dont even know the numbers of people who died there - but I would guess in the hundreds rather than dozens?
Search: Blue Lagoon Arlesey ........................... ..............and you will find it is a tourist spot. However beautiful, I could never go there now as to me it is a place of sadness.
Everyone must have worked in the pits or at the asylum in the early 20th C?
Lots of people drowned there - one day they may be recorded but I doubt it.
Herfordshire and West London: Brown [Kent in early 19th C]; Blackwell. McCarthy [Clonakilty, County Cork - searching for needles in the haystack!] and LOSTY [Dublin]
Cathy, sorry for the long delay replying,been away for a while.i too started my working life at the hospital in 1965 as a apprentice chef !.it was a great place to work then,: good sports /recreation facilities,cinema ,dances, etc.what i saw as well the patients seemed well cared for.lots of local families worked there both full and part time.best regards jim. ps, i spoke with my two elderly cousins yesterday and they informed me that living next door to William and Rosina Bowskill(our grandparents)was Williams unmarried brother ;Peter Bowskill.i have tried and cannot find him anywhere,have you any thoughts ideas,they would be most welcome,thanks again Jim.