Author Archives: lsstuhler

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About lsstuhler

Linda Stuhler is a Genealogy Geek from Rochester, New York, who loves to find out the facts. She has been researching her family tree for over twenty years and has accumulated an abundance of information on various subjects that she enjoys sharing on her blog at: https://inmatesofwillard.com/. She was responsible for the creation of the New York State Senate Bill S840, initiated in August 2011, which allows for the release of the names, dates of birth and death, of former patients who were buried in anonymous graves in New York State Custodial Institutions. The bill was changed from the original draft to S840A and does not work the way it was intended. It became a law on August 18, 2016, but it did not include provisions for a searchable database available to the public as New York State attorneys and the Office of Mental Health believed that if they did so, they would be sued. She is the author of "THE INMATES OF WILLARD 1870 TO 1900, A GENEALOGY RESOURCE."

1864 Oswego County Poor House

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“There are at the Oswego county poor house seventy-two inmates, and twenty-nine of them are lunatics. Twelve are males and seventeen arc females; eighteen are of American birth. The register of the institution does not show the first admittance of these insane. Twenty of these have been treated at the State asylum in various periods from a single month to nine years. Three males and six females are capable of labor; those who cannot work have some light amusement furnished to them, such as playing chequers, light sewing, &.c. Five require occasional restraint and one constant restraint. The means used are a leather cap, leather muffs, occasionally a dark cell, &c. The house is supplied with water and has a bath tub in it, in which the insane are required to bathe every week. There are bedsteads in all of the rooms, and only one sleeps in each bed. The diet table appears sufficient and wholesome. The males are confined in one ward and the females in another, and the superintendent or overseer, his wife and one female assistant take care of the insane. The rooms were clean and well ventilated. The house is designed to accommodate twenty-eight, but thirty-three have at one time been confined in it; but few of the mild cases are put with the sane paupers. The institution received recent cases, but to no considerable extent is the treatment directed to effect their cure. The amount appropriated for the medical care of the insane and the whole number of inmates is but one hundred and fifty dollars, inclusive of medicines. Oswego city cares for a few of its own insane without sending them to the county house.

The building at Mexico is 64 by 30 feet, three stories high, with suitable apartments for the insane, and also for culinary purposes. The location is healthy, and the rooms have generally a clean, wholesome look. The building is warmed by a furnace and kept comfortable in winter. The diet was not only sufficient but well cooked. There seems to have been a most commendable effort to send the patients of this county to Utica for treatment. Nearly all of the cases are now of a mild type, which is, perhaps, owing to the modification of the disease by early treatment. These incurables are kindly cared for, and if not all that might be, yet much is done to make them comfortable.”

SOURCE: Documents of the Assembly Of The State Of New York, Eighty-Eighth Session, 1865, Volume 6, Nos. 199 to 112 Inclusive, Albany: C. Wendell, Legislative Printer, 1865, Pages 207-208.

New York State County Poor Houses.

1864 Orleans County Poor House

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“The oldest resident of the Orleans county poor house is eighty years old, and was admitted to the poor house in 1841. The whole population is sixty-five, fourteen of which are lunatics; eight are males, six are females; eleven are native and three of foreign birth. Eight are mild cases, three violent; seven filthy; eight have been treated in an asylum. Three are capable of labor; the others have no employment; all are at times destructive to their clothing; one requires restraint by handcuffs. The building has water, but no bath tub. The building is of wood; the sleeping rooms, or cells, 6 x 9 feet, open out of a hall 9 x 36. No arrangement for ventilation. There is a coal stove for heating the hall, but no attention is paid to uniformity of heat or change of air. There are no accommodations for the various grades of insane; the males are in one ward, and the females in another. The attendants are from the sane paupers. In this county recent cases are sent to the asylum at Utica. All have changes of under garments, and all were provided with shoes and stockings during the winter. The house is designed to accommodate seventeen, but, for the last few years, there have been but fourteen, at any one time, in it. The medical treatment differs nothing from that which sane paupers receive, and the moral management is nothing.”

SOURCE: Documents of the Assembly Of The State Of New York, Eighty-Eighth Session, 1865, Volume 6, Nos. 199 to 112 Inclusive, Albany: C. Wendell, Legislative Printer, 1865, Page 207.

New York State County Poor Houses.

1864 Orange County Poor House

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“The total number of the insane poor of the county of Orange is thirty-eight; twenty-five of them are in the poor-house at Goshen, and thirteen are cared for at an asylum in Newburgh. The county supports four at the Marshall Infirmary at Troy. A large majority of the whole number are of American birth. Of those at Goshen eight males and four females are capable of labor; the others are furnished with no amusement; only three are destructive to their clothing; the restraint used is by straight jacket or shutting in the cells. The house is without a bath tub, and all are not required to wash hands and feet daily. The windows may be dropped to obtain ventilation; [are they?] In all the rooms occupied by insane there are bedsteads, and straw bedding is used; the straw is changed once in two or three months. There is no regular system of diet, but ordinarily good fare is furnished, which is served at a common table to a part, and to others it is taken to their cells. No attention is paid to uniformity of temperature, nor are there any accommodations for the various grades of insane. The sexes are kept separated, but the only immediate superintendence is from an inmate of the poor-house. The rooms are kept comfortably clean. “Some of the male inmates are believed to have vermin” on them. The institution receives recent cases—several having been admitted in 1804, but no medical attention is bestowed with reference to the ultimate recovery of each case.

The building at Goshen was erected in 1850, and though adjoining the main building is separated from it. It is two stories high, of stone, and through the center in each story a hall extends, with windows at each end for light and ventilation. The rooms open from each side upon these halls. Each room has a window. Inmates are allowed the free use of the halls and of the yards.

In 1853 the town of Newburgh withdrew its paupers from the county, and provided for their maintenance by the purchase of lands and the erection of suitable buildings; a residence for the superintendent, and sane paupers, and a wing, communicating by a hall with the main building, for the insane. The building for the insane is two stories, of brick, with a hall through the centre, and rooms opening out on either side. Each room has a window, and a ventilation in the hall. There are here eighty-one paupers, of which thirteen are lunatics; six are able to do some labor. There are none who require constant restraint. The house has a supply of water, and three bathing tubs, and the insane are required to bathe their whole bodies once in each week, besides washing hands and face daily. The building is heated with a furnace, the temperature regulated by a thermometer; the inmates are comfortably bedded on husks or straw for bedding—each one having a single bedstead; they are also sufficiently and comfortably fed—the diet being changed every day in the week. There is no accommodation for the various grades of the insane, but in each ward there is an attendant for the males, and one for the females. The condition of the rooms are cleanly and neat. There are rooms for thirty-two, but eighteen is the highest number there confined. The institution does not take recent cases. All are kept comfortable. A physician visits the house about four times a week, but the insane do not receive treatment with reference to recovery.

Dr. Wm. P. Townsend, who visited these institutions, in a very able report, remarks “that the selection of persons to superintend these institutions is too often based upon considerations of business capacity to the exclusion of any apparent estimate of moral fitness.” And again, the management of the domestic, dietetic, and other internal arrangements, are most carefully studied, to the neglect or exclusion of the moral, mental, or even humane necessities of the unfortunate persons compelled by want, destitution, or disease to reside therein.

Questions of economy alone explain why such incompetent and morally unfit persons, “selected from the paupers,” are assigned to the immediate care of the insane poor. Even if they possessed sufficient capacity for the position, want of interest in the well-being of the lunatics, coupled with the well known infirmities of temper usually belonging to these individuals, should, except in rare instances, forbid their employment in the capacity of nurse. Dr. Townsend urges, however, that keepers should be exempt from the responsibility, since they have no authority in the selection of capable attendants.

“The asylum at Goshen is sadly deficient in means and appliances for promoting bodily cleanliness in the persons of its inmates.”

The population of Orange county in 1860 was 63,812, giving one insane pauper to every 1,680 of its inhabitants to be treated and provided for in our charitable asylums. These facts may well start the inquiry, what can be done to mitigate or improve their condition, or, if possible, restore to them reason enthroned, and capacity for self support? The moral impossibility of giving the insane proper care, or suitable medical treatment, under the present system of county houses is set forth by Dr. Townsend, the inadequate compensation to physicians, and the necessity of doing something to improve the present state of things, is set forth; and yet, imperative as this necessity appears, the lunatics in Orange are better cared for than in most of the other counties.”

SOURCE: Documents of the Assembly Of The State Of New York, Eighty-Eighth Session, 1865, Volume 6, Nos. 199 to 112 Inclusive, Albany: C. Wendell, Legislative Printer, 1865, Pages 205-207.

New York State County Poor Houses.

1864 Ontario County Poor House

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“Dr. John B. Chapin, of Brigham Hall Asylum for the insane, says: “The location of the county house is healthy; the grounds are ample. The department of the county house devoted to the insane comprises the first floor of two wings adjoining the main building. There are two day rooms for females, and one for males. The increased demand for females has caused the erection of additional accommodations for their care. The day rooms arc about 33 by 10 feet. The sleeping rooms are partitioned from these day rooms by open upright bars; the sleeping rooms are 6 by 7 feet; windows on one side of the room in two wards furnish the means of ventilation. The windows are intended to be out of reach, and too high for observation out of doors. They evidently afford ample means of escape. There are no means for classifying patients. The attendants seem to be superannuated paupers. There are no means for properly treating recent and curable eases. The means of escape are abundant, and the disparity of the sexes may be owing to this circumstance. The class of insane now confined are mostly demented persons, who have occasional paroxysms of excitement; they sit with their feet crouched under them, and bent over in the appearance of hopeless dementia. During the summer ventilation is good; in the winter there is probably lack of fresh air and heat. The floors were clean; the walls needed abundance of whitewash. The general appearance of the insane and of the department was cleanly, and there was a disposition on the part of the keeper to do what his means permitted for the comfort of his charge. More efficient means should be adopted to prevent escapes. A suitable attendant should be employed for the care of the insane; a daily inspection by the keeper should be made, and a bath room prepared for more frequent ablution.”

The population of the poor-house is one hundred and seventy; twenty-nine are lunatics—the ratio being one in six; twenty-one are females, and eight are males. The dates of their admission are not to be obtained. Five are filthy; a large number are demented; only two have been treated in the State asylum; five are capable of labor; those who do not work have no amusement; the violent are restrained by a leather muff and by seclusion. The building has a full supply of water for domestic purposes, but not for bathing. The rooms are heated by a coal stove in the hall, and ventilated from windows on the side of the building opposite the cells; all have bedsteads and bedding, and are apparently comfortably fed. There are no accommodations for the various grades of the insane; pauper attendants are employed to take care of the lunatics. The condition of the rooms for cleanliness and ventilation in summer is fair. But two or three had shoes in the summer; [how many were without them in the winter?] The county receives recent cases. Five have escaped during the year who were not returned. There is no sufficient provision for medical treatment, and none is directed to each case with reference to its ultimate recovery.”

SOURCE: Documents of the Assembly Of The State Of New York, Eighty-Eighth Session, 1865, Volume 6, Nos. 199 to 112 Inclusive, Albany: C. Wendell, Legislative Printer, 1865, Page 204-205.

New York State County Poor Houses.

1864 Onondaga County Poor House

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“No report.”

SOURCE: Documents of the Assembly Of The State Of New York, Eighty-Eighth Session, 1865, Volume 6, Nos. 199 to 112 Inclusive, Albany: C. Wendell, Legislative Printer, 1865, Page 204.

New York State County Poor Houses.

1864 Oneida County Poor House

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“There are 560 inmates in the poor house of Oneida county, ninety-seven of whom are insane; forty-three are males, and fifty-four females. Fifty-five are natives and forty-two are of foreign birth. Within the year four have died, nine have been discharged and two have absconded. Sixty of the whole number have been treated in the State asylum, and been returned as incurable or for some other reason. Most of the number have been received into the county asylum since 1850, though the admittance of one dates back to 1843.

About forty of the whole number are capable of performing some labor, half of whom are males. None of the females labor out of doors. Those who are unable to labor have out of door amusements, such as “pitching quoits, playing ball, swinging, fiddling, dancing and singing.” The females are amused with books and papers. Fourteen require occasional restraint from destructiveness to their clothing; for this purpose leather muffs, straight jackets, cold baths and fixed chamber chairs are used. Thirteen are filthy; five are past seventy years, and one is eighty-eight. The building has a full supply of water, and one bath tub in each department, and beside daily ablution, the insane are required to bathe weekly. The building is heated by furnaces, and every room is ventilated from the ceiling. There are no basement cells. The building is of brick, two stories and a basement, with ceilings of ten feet; the single rooms are five feet by nine, and the double one seven by eleven feet, and the sitting room halls twelve by sixty-four feet, and all well lighted. In no case does more than one sleep in a bed; the ticks are filled with straw: sheets, quilts and straw pillows constitute the bedding. The fare is wholesome and simple; the patients all come into the dining hall to the table and are waited upon by attendants.

In the winter all the rooms are heated, and a comfortable temperature is maintained. The building has five wards, and allows of some accommodation for the various grades of the insane. It admits of complete separation of the sexes, and the whole is under the care of a man and his wife, with female assistants. Perfect cleanliness is maintained and good ventilation.

The institution does not provide for recent cases; they are sent to the State asylum in Utica. All have shoes and stockings, and some change of clothing, the same as sane paupers. The building is designed to accommodate about ninety patients. A physician is employed who visits the institution twice every week or oftener if necessary, but the treatment has no reference to ultimate recovery. The pauper insane are probably better cared for than in almost any of the other counties of the State excepting New York and Kings. The occasion of this may doubtless be attributed to the liberal influence that is exerted over the public mind by the State asylum at Utica. The fact that it makes no pretentions to the care of recent cases is most commendable, and the portion who first receive treatment at the State asylum is therefore large.”

SOURCE: Documents of the Assembly Of The State Of New York, Eighty-Eighth Session, 1865, Volume 6, Nos. 199 to 112 Inclusive, Albany: C. Wendell, Legislative Printer, 1865, Pages 203-204.

New York State County Poor Houses.

1864 Niagara County Poor House

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“One in four and three-quarters of the inmates of the poor house of Niagara are insane, there being eighty-nine inmates, of whom twenty-one are lunatics. Nine of them have received treatment in an asylum. Ten are of native and eleven of foreign birth. Seven are males and fourteen are females. Twelve are confined to the house; fourteen are mild cases. Three males and one female are capable of doing some labor; six are destructive to their clothing, and the same number are restrained either by straight jackets or leather muffs. The whip is sometimes, though rarely, used to enforce discipline.

The yard is supplied with cistern and spring water; there is one bathing tub. There are basement cells in the building with cement floors, but they are not often used. The bedsteads are of wood, not fastened to the floor; one sleeps in each bed; three sleep on straw without other bedding. Such as are able come to the table with the sane paupers.

The building is heated with a furnace, but no attention is paid to the uniformity of heat or ventilation. Rooms with barred doors and grated windows, cells and wards, furnish the only means of grade for the insane. The apartments, with one or two exceptions, were very clean. The sexes are separated but the attendants are paupers. All had changes of under clothing and shoes, but not all had stockings. Twenty-five is the full number that the house is designed to accommodate. Recent cases are received; four were received in 1864. The medical attendance has no reference to ultimate cure, nor is compensation for medical service rendered with such a view.”

SOURCE: Documents of the Assembly Of The State Of New York, Eighty-Eighth Session, 1865, Volume 6, Nos. 199 to 112 Inclusive, Albany: C. Wendell, Legislative Printer, 1865, Page 202.

New York State County Poor Houses.

1864 Montgomery County Poor House

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“The population of Montgomery county poor house is eighty-three, ten of whom are lunatics. None of them are capable of labor. Nine are males and one female; seven are of native and three of foreign birth. Eight of this number have been treated in the asylum. They have been severally admitted since 1849. Five of the number are under thirty years of age. Three are destructive and one requires occasional restraint by muff and strap, or cold bath. The house has a supply of water, but no bath tub; the hands and face are “partially” washed daily. The bedding is straw in ticks on bedsteads, one sleeping in each bed. One sleeps on straw without other bedding. The diet is plain and substantial. The rooms are heated by a stove in the main hall. The rooms are generally clean, and the atmosphere of the rooms good. Their garments are changed every week; three had shoes and one had neither shoes or stockings during the winter. Fourteen can be accommodated in separate cells, but thirteen is the greatest number confined there. One escaped during the year who was not returned. The institution receives recent cases but they do not receive care with reference to their ultimate recovery.”

SOURCE: Documents of the Assembly Of The State Of New York, Eighty-Eighth Session, 1865, Volume 6, Nos. 199 to 112 Inclusive, Albany: C. Wendell, Legislative Printer, 1865, Pages 201-202.

New York State County Poor Houses.

1864 Monroe County Poor House

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“The Monroe County Insane asylum is, by a special act of the Legislature, made a separate and distinct institution from that of the poor house, and is under the control of the board of supervisors of the county. It is a three story brick building, the basement being 10 feet ceiling, and the other two stories 12 feet each. The single rooms are 5 x 10 feet, and the double rooms 8 x 10 feet. The windows are 2 x 7 feet. There are four rooms without windows opening out of doors. The building is heated by stoves; and in winter the temperature is maintained uniform by the indication of a thermometer. The lunatics are confined in four separate wards; four occupy the same room. The whole number confined during the year is 105; but the number has been reduced by patients discharged, deaths and absconding, so that only 74 have been in confinement at any one time: 46 were males, 59 females; 38 American, 67 of foreign birth; 54 were mild, and 18 were filthy; 27 had been treated in the State asylum. Ten males and ten females were capable of labor; but those who could not labor were unprovided with occupation or amusement. Fifty-four human beings, with at least some intellect in action, though not guided by reason, shut up in one building, with neither occupation or amusement! The only restraint resorted to, aside from handcuffs, is close confinement and cautious showering. This asylum has one bath tub, but not a full supply of water. The lunatics are required to wash daily. All the rooms have single iron bedsteads; some are fastened to the floor. Only one sleep in a bed, and the bedding is comfortable. The diet is respectable. About two-thirds come to a table; the remainder are served in the wards or their rooms. The sexes are kept separated, and all are under the care of the warden and his wife, assisted by two females. The rooms are clean, and the air in the upper rooms good. All had shoes during the winter. This asylum, recently erected, was designed to accommodate 48 patients; 74 are crowded into the space designed for 48 to occupy! Three escaped during the year, who have not returned. The supervisors appoint a physician, who visits the institution twice every week, and oftener if necessary, but with reference only to the physical condition of the inmates. Dr. Thomas Arner remarks of the building, “Its design is for the physical welfare of the insane poor, without reference to their ultimate recovery. * * * The personal cleanliness of the inmates, and that of the wards and sleeping apartments, the quantity and quality of food, together with the admirable discipline adopted and maintained, are all that can be desired, and reflect the highest praise upon the warden and others, upon whom devolves the care of this unfortunate class of people. There are deficiencies of an important character still to be provided for, in order to render the institution in all respects complete. In its present capacity the building is designed to accommodate forty-eight persons only, eleven of which number are provided for in the basement. The impropriety of crowding seventy-four insane persons into this limited space, some of which is damp and unhealthy, needs no remark, (it needs the severest censure from all humane citizens.)” Increased capacity is essentially necessary to the physical welfare of the inmates of this institution. There should also be a more bountiful supply of water, increased facilities for bathing, and for cooking, and for washing, enlargement of the dining halls, and better provision for exercise in the open air. The question whether, in an institution of this character, the treatment adopted should have in view the ultimate recovery of the inmates, cannot at the present be easily determined; and its solution properly rests with those upon whom devolves the responsibility of their care. The following facts are submitted:

All the insane formerly confined in the poor house (under the old system) have very much improved in every respect, by cleanliness and kind treatment, since their removal to the asylum.

Cases that have been returned as incurable from the State asylum at Utica, have afterwards improved to a marked degree, and in two or three instances nearly well.”

SOURCE: Documents of the Assembly Of The State Of New York, Eighty-Eighth Session, 1865, Volume 6, Nos. 199 to 112 Inclusive, Albany: C. Wendell, Legislative Printer, 1865, Pages 200-201.

New York State County Poor Houses.

1864 Madison County Poor House

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“The statistics from Madison county reveal a most deplorable condition of the insane poor. It is shocking, it is shameful.

The poor house contains ninety-four paupers, twenty-five of whom are insane. They are, with three exceptions, of American birth. The records of the institution do not show the dates of their admission. Inspection shows that fifteen of this number are filthy in their habits, and that only five have ever been treated in an asylum. Nine are capable of doing some labor. The remainder have nothing to do; fourteen are destructive to their clothing. The house has no bathing tub, the insane are not even required to bathe at all, and the violent insane not even to wash their hands and face. It is idle to describe the building, it is heart-sickening to describe what is in it. Eighteen sleep on straw, without bed or bedding; the straw is changed once a week. The food is distributed in tin dishes. No uniformity of heat in winter seems to be aimed at. The mild cases have their liberty during the day. Not so the violent. The only care they receive is from the hands of incompetent paupers. Those confined in the cells are extremely filthy, most of them not using vessels, and their excrements are mixed with the straw on which they lie. Their straw is changed only once in a week; and these lunatics, with their “bodies besmeared with their own excrements, not allowed to come daily to the open air, eating in the same filthy apartments, are not washed from one years end to another.” The cells in which they are confined are only 4 x 6 feet, with a ceiling of 7 feet, and open into a hall, so that they can have no ventilation. “A bad stench” issues from them; and in this stench the lunatics are forced to live—live a life more terrible than a hundred deaths. Three males were in a state of nudity; the females wore only chemises; but the mild cases are clothed like other paupers. Fourteen had neither shoes nor stockings during the winter!!

This vile prison is designed to make confirmed maniacs of twenty-five persons; that is, it pretends to have accommodations for twenty-five, and their treatment would only serve to make them incurable. The books do not show what is the greatest number confined there at any one time. They are not visited by a physician, and receive no care with reference to their ultimate recovery.

Cannot the voice of humanity be awakened? Shall not legislative authority be exercised for their relief?”

SOURCE: Documents of the Assembly Of The State Of New York, Eighty-Eighth Session, 1865, Volume 6, Nos. 199 to 112 Inclusive, Albany: C. Wendell, Legislative Printer, 1865, Pages 199-200.

New York State County Poor Houses.