Catalogue description Hove General Hospital

The records listed here relate to both the Dispensary and the Hospital, and they are arranged so far as possible by the managing authority, up to and from 1948

Voluntary dispensary and hospital 1809-1948

HB/58 Northern Branch house visitors' reports 1888-1944

HB/59 Plans and drawings of Brighthelmston Dispensary c 1840-68

HB/108 Minutes of Board of Management 1834-64; 1917-47

HB/109 Sub-committee minute and report books 1851-1937

HB/110 Annual reports 1820-1947

HB/111 Financial records 1852-1935

HB/118 Visitors' book, Hove Hospital 1890-96

HB/120 Rules and regulations 1937

HB/162 Photographs c 1912-47

HB/163 Brighton Dispensary: papers relating to its establishment and its history 1809-1909

HB/164 Sussex General Infirmary: papers relating to its establishment 1811-25

HB/165 Brighton, Hove and Preston Dispensary: instructions to staff 1886-1910

HB/166 Brighton, Hove and Preston Dispensary: nursing certificate counterfoils 1897-1928

NHS hospital 1948-

HB/112 Brighton and Lewes HMC: Group 4 House Committee minutes 1963-74

HB/113 Medical staff committee minutes 1946-69; 1975

HB/114 Newspaper cuttings book 1928-50

HB/115 Registers of nursing staff 1939-77

HB/116 Minutes of nurses' procedures meetings 1966-73

HB/119 Handbooks, etc, received from other organisations 1950s-c 1977

HB/167 Hospital plans and note concerning room usage 1952-53

Hove General Hospital, 1932-1990s

Hove Hospital, 1918-1932

Brighton, Hove and Preston Dispensary, 1885-1948

Classes HB/58 and 59 were received from the Royal Sussex County Hospital; classes 108-116 were transferred by Hove General Hospital, May 1985 (A4461) and October 1988 (A5148)

Hove General Hospital, at its closure in the 1990s, was the last surviving component of Brighton's first medical charity. The Brighthelmston Dispensary was founded in November 1809 and opened in January 1810 in three rooms over a warehouse in Nile Street, to provide medical care for the poor. In 1811 it was removed to 112 North Street where, in November 1812, was added the Sussex General Infirmary, with ten beds, under the same committee of management. After a brief stay in Duke Street, in 1819 both institutions moved to 25 Middle Street (see HB/59/2). In 1813 the governors started a subscription list for a county hospital, and in 1828 the Sussex County Hospital was opened, with its own governing body. The Sussex General Infirmary thereupon closed and its medical staff and equipment transferred to the County Hospital's newly built premises in Eastern Road (for the Royal Sussex County Hospital, see HB/28 etc.)

The Dispensary moved to purpose built premises in Queen's Road in 1849 (see HB/59/3, 4). The work of home visiting was now organised on a district basis and in 1860 a Western Branch was set up at 4 Farm Road, Hove. The charity became known as the Brighton and Hove Dispensary, and the Queen's Road building as the 'parent establishment'. In 1885 the Northern Branch was built in Ditchling Terrace, on the corner of Upper Lewes Road, and the title of the Brighton, Hove and Preston Dispensary was adopted

For the Western Branch, new premises were built in Sackville Road and opened in 1888. Four beds for in-patients were provided and more were added as funds were raised from appeals and donations. In 1918 the name Hove Hospital was given to the in-patient part of the branch. Admissions to the hospital was by subscribers' letters of recommendation. The hospital became the most important aspect of the charity's activities and the Queen's Road building was closed and sold in 1931. From 1932 the charity was named the Hove General Hospital (including Brighton, Hove and Preston Dispensary)

Hove General Hospital became part of the National Health Service in 1948, under the Brighton and Lewes Hospital Management Committee