View report page

27
and administrative points, which, no doubt, will be duly regarded
by the Managers should the hospital at any future time be
re-opened.
Mr. Power's Report on Folham Hospital.—In my last
annual report I referred to the fact that the Local Government
Board had delegated to Dr. Thome Thome and Mr. W. H. Power,
two of their Medical Inspectors, an enquiry into the allegations
made against Fulham Hospital to the effect that the hospital was
the cause of the spread of small-pox in the surrounding district.
The actual enquiry was conducted by Mr. Power as part of a
more general "enquiry relating to the use and influence of
Hospitals for infectious diseases," the object being to ascertain
"whether such hospitals are, and if so by what means, instrumental
in causing the spread of infection in the localities in which
they are situated?" Both the general report by Dr. Thome and
the special report on Fulham Hospital by Mr. Power have long
since been submitted to the Local Government Board, who have
thought it desirable, for sufficient reasons doubtless, to delay the
publication of them, probably pending the completion of the
enquiry by the Royal Commission, to which reference will be made
later on.
THE FULHAM HOSPITAL CASE.
In my last Annual Report I referred to the fact that an
Association originally formed with the object of getting Fulham
Hospital restricted for the use of patients belonging to the
Borough of Chelsea, had been stimulated by the failure of the
Managers of the Asylums Board, in respect of their "Appeal
No. 2" to the House of Lords in the Hampstead Hospital case,
to commence proceedings, with a view of closing the Hospital
altogether. A Writ was consequently served upon the Managers
in June, "at the suit of John Graham, Robert Gunter, and
Richard Pickersgill in respect" of the hospital, and in August
an application was made, before Mr. Justice Bowen, for an
interim injunction to close the hospital against the reception of
patients, pending the trial of the action. It was unsuccessful, but
the Court of Common Pleas having granted an extension of time