Despite having its own mortuary patient’s that died whilst resident at Hortham were not buried there. Asylums of the Victorian era quite famously used to bury or cremate patients in dedicated grounds within or nearby. At nearly Somerset Mendip Hospital near Wells, for example, they interred roughly 3000 patients marking them only with an iron marker inscribed with a number.
I have struggled to find records of where patients were placed to rest due to the fact that patient records are held privately for 100 years after their death. I have spent months trying to find out where patients would have gone after passing, the nearest church in Almondsbury, has no record of burials of patients there, nor has Almondsbury cemetery. I then started looking at ones further afield like Greenbank, Arnos Vale and finally Canford cemetery. From publicly available records I have only found two former patients, one called Abigail Nichols who sadly passed away aged only 10 years old in 1971. Her father, Peter Nichols was a famous playwright, he actually wrote a black humoured play about his own experiences raising a child with Cerebral Palsy called A Day in The Death of Joe Egg which broke the social norms of the time. A book was published of extracts from Peter’s diary; Peter Nichols Diaries 1969-77. There’s an extract published by the guardian; Waiting for Abigail.
The second patient I’ve found public records on are Walter Lancelot Edwards. His death intestate notice was published in the London Gazette in 1969 to advise of his passing. I don’t know anything about Walter other than he was buried with his mother and father in Canford cemetery.
