and the final instalment;
The hospital is described in T. Bulmer's History and Directory (1887) as 'a very effective structure, with a white fire brick casing, adjoining the Mechanics' Institute' in Beaconsfield Street. It was designed to accommodate eight bed-patients in two wards on the upper floor while on the ground floor were a large committee room, a waiting room, dispensary, two consulting rooms, a kitchen and offices. During 1913 there were 82 in-patients and 620 out-patients. In 1896 a marble bust of Dr. Gilbert Ward was placed in the entrance hall, the doctor having died in 1894.
In 1922 the Thomas Knight Memorial Hospital was enlarged, thanks to the Red Cross and the blyth War Memorial Fund, which provided the money. The re-opening ceremony was performed by Viscountess Ridley. Finally in 1948 the Hospital was absorbed into the National Health Service. Mrs. Knight's £6000 is still earning interest for the work.
Returning to provision for the fever cases, the old Cottage Hospital seems to have continued in use as an isolation hospital from 1888 (when the Knight Memorial took over its other functions) until 1893, when the Blyth Port Sanitary Authority opened their Infectious Diseases Hospital at Old Factory Point (so named from a chemical factory manufacturing alkalis and vitriol which failed there in 1836). The Isolation Hospital closed about 1938.
Dr. Gilbert Ward not only established public medical services in Blyth and stood by to give aid during the terrible pit disaster at New Hartley in 1862. An F. R. C. S., he was Medical Officer for the Tynemouth Board of Guardians; District Vaccinator; Certifying Factory Surgeon; Registrar of Births, Marriages and Deaths for Blyth; and latterly Chairman of the Blyth Local Board. He was a Trustee of the Blyth Mechanics Institute, a founder of the Blyth Harbour & Dock Companyand later a member of the Blyth Harbour Commission. He owned shares in several Blyth ships. His son Dr. Henry De Bord Ward was Acting Surgeon and Medical Officer at the Knight Memorial Hospital and would doubtless have succeeded Dr. Gilbert had he not pre-deceased him in 1891. His daughter married Willaim Hannay Watts, a member of a local shipping family. On one occasion Dr. Gilbert had the honour of entertaining Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh, a son of Queen Victoria, at his home in Bridge Street.
On the day of Dr. Gilbert Ward's funeral police were out to control the crowds, many shops and places of business closed, blinds were drawn at the Hospital, the Mechanics Institute and the banks. Among the wreaths was one from the French Government.
Sources: John Wallace, History of Blyth (1869) & Kelly's Directory (1914)
