Catalogue description Turner Memorial Home of Rest, Dingle

1. Registers of Patients

1 vol. 1884 - 1940

2. Lady Superintendents Report Books

(6 vols), 1892 - 1962

3. Medical Officers' Journals

(3 vols.), (1927) - 1960

4. Chaplains' Journals

2 vols., 1892 - 1978

5. Financial records

7 vols., 1885 - 1972

Turner Memorial Home of Rest, 1884-, Dingle, Liverpool

Access will be granted to any accredited reader with the exception of items, reference 362 TUR 1/1 (register of patients) and 362 TUR 3/2 and 3/3 (Medical Officers' Journals). These records contain sensitive personal information and are closed for 100 years under Section 1 (Principles 1, 2 and 7) of the Data Protection Act, 1998.

Accs. 3542, 4465

These records were originally deposited in March 1981 by Mr. L. Holden of Brabner, Holden and Co., solicitors to the Home's Committee, 41 North John Street, Liverpool. L2 6RX (Acc. 3542).

All the volumes were withdrawn for exhibition purposes in November, 1985. In January 1988 they were returned by the Secretary to the Management Committee, Mr. Keith Housley of Brabner, Holden and Co., 1 Dale Street, Liverpool. L2 2ET (Acc. 4465) minus the following two volumes which had formed part of the original deposit.

Lady Superintendent's Report Book, 1917 - 1927

Medical Officer's Journal, 1927 - 1937

In the following list numbers have been assigned to these missing volumes in the hope that they will be found and restored to the next of the deposit.

• Dingle, Liverpool

The Turner Home, Dingle, was opened in 1884, built by his widow as a memorial to Charles Turner, M.P., and their only son, Charles William, who had died in his twenties.

Charles Turner (1803 - 1875) had come to Liverpool as a young man, from Hull, via London. In a comparatively short time after his arrival in Liverpool "... he had attained a position of considerable importance among the commercial community here". In time, he became chairman of organisations such as the British Shipowners' Association, Royal Assurance Company, Pacific Steam Navigation Company. He was also the first chairman of the new Dock Board (Mersey Docks and Harbour Board). He was a J.P. and served on the town council from 1850. In 1852 he was elected as one of the Conservative M.P.'s for Liverpool but, with his fellow Liverpool M.P. was shortly unseated because of allegations of bribery by their agents. He wasreturned again in 1861 as Conservative member for S.W. Lancashire, a seat which he held until his death. His Liverpool home was the Dingle Head mansion, off Dingle Lane and he also had a seat at Ferriby in Yorkshire, where he was interred (see Daily Post, 16th October 1875, p 4, cols. 5 and 6, p 5 cols 4 and 5). His widow Anne, died at Eastbourne in August, 1902 (see Liverpool Courier, 11th August, 1902).

In April, 1882 Mrs. Turner gave £40,000, with an endowment, to establish the Home for incurables on the Dingle Head estate, to be named in memory of her late husband and son. The Home was opened in 1884. It had been designed by the architect Alfred Waterhouse (1830 - 1905) in a style variously described as Tudor in Renaissance Gothic. Robert Griffiths in The History of ...... Toxteth, 1907, p.67, described it as a "princely monument .... an ideal home of rest, nestling peacefully in the seclusion of shady bowers ..... remarkable for its chaste picturesqueness .... the material used, red sandstone ..... ". The Home had its own chapel, with high timber roof, aisles and perpendicular east window. In the entrance hall was a white marble statue by (Sir W.) Hamo Thornycroft (1830 - 1925) "representing with life-like fidelity", Charles Turner and his son studying a plan of the building looking out towards the Mersey and beyond.

The original aims of the Turner Home were to provide accommodation and residential care for chronically sick men and boys. In its early days there was some criticism of the Home because admission was confined to male " .... incurables belonging to the Church of England and able to pay seven shillings per week". Because of these restrictions "... half-a-dozen lonely and miserable inmates have a magnificent building all to themselves. "(see Mrs. Charles Turner's "Folly" in Liverpool Review, 22nd August, 1885, pp. 10, 11). Such exclusive rules were relaxed and the Home is now open to all chronically sick or disabled men "irrespective of race or religion". Many changes have taken place in the organisation, running and administration of the Home and these are described in the following:

The Turner Home: a Brochure, 1984 (ref. H362.61 TUR).

Turner Memorial Home: newscuttings to date

Some architectural details of the Home are given in:

Liverpool Heritage Bureau Buildings of Liverpool, 1978, p. 169

N. Pevsner The Buildings of England: South Lancashire, 1969 p. 247

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