Originally called the ‘Brecon and Radnor Joint Asylum’ upon opening in 1903, this mysteriously forgotten hospital was effectively an entirely self sufficient village of its own. The decorated numbers '1900' stand above the doors of its main Victorian art deco building which was the first to house patients (12 wards, 6 male and 6 female) as well as an isolation ward, and farm ward with two further wards built at a later date. The main purpose of the hospital was made to cater for 352 patients but in essence it became the beating heart of the entire community of the Welsh town of Talgarth. In addition to the farm, the service departments included a tailor, baker, shoe maker, printing shops, kitchen, laundry and church. There were market gardens which consisted of about 8 acres and an additional asset was a steam powered lorry mainly used to haul coal and other goods from the railway station. The water supply was drawn directly from the Pwll-y-Wrach waterfall and fed to the hospital by gravity.
The first patients at the hospital were admissions mainly from the Brecon area but numbers also arrived from towns further afield such as Swansea and Shrewsbury. The name was changed in 1921 to the ‘Mid-Wales Hospital’ as it was the largest facility in the region of its kind. Referred to by those who worked and lived there as ‘Talgarth Asylum’, it initially intended to cater for 352 patients with numerous psychiatric illnesses. At one point after the Great War by 1925 there were 455, stretching the resources to the limit. Some of this overcrowding was attributed to by the effect that was to have on many men who served in the battles who suffered from shell-shock and other post traumatic disorders both mental and physical. Consequently wards east 7 and 8, and an X-ray department were added to cope with the increased demands, and the college of midwifery (see previous album) was built to train nurses and midwives to work towards the future of the facility.
In April 1940, 315 beds were made available for military patients to aid the war effort. Towards the later years of WWII the military section became a prisoner of war hospital, with air raid shelters converted into barracks that still stand today on the eastern side of the site. The war departments released most of their beds on 31 December 1946, but the after effects were felt for many years. The hospital was still very much a part of the revitalisation of the region in the years that followed. The college next door succeeded in preparing for the baby-boom era, and in December 1955 the number of patients had reached a peak of 496 after the implementation of the brand new National Health Service 7 years prior. Children born here were in some cases treated and educated within the grounds of the hospital.
The working farm remained until 1955 and the hospital still generated its own electricity until 1961. Some 155 acres of farmland however were sold in 1957 and 27 acres of Pwll-y-Wrach dingle transferred to the Forestry Commission. A number of improvements were completed during the next twenty years such as a new treatment block in 1965, and an occupational/Industrial therapy department in 1971, keeping the hospital at the forefront of new treatment in the mid-Wales region.
In 1974 the Powys Health Authority was created, assuming control immediately with matters changing again in 1993 with the formation of the Powys (NHS) Trust. Policy changes by the Conservative Government during this time saw the return of patients with mental health problems to the community, rather than isolation into such facilities, thus the need for such institutions as the Mid-Wales Hospital had declined drastically overnight. By 1994 the total number of patients averaged 140, whilst 179 could be catered for. The hospital or ‘the asylum’ as it was more locally known, had started to head towards decline, and with it the surrounding town became quiet. With it being such a large facility, it was undoubtedly the driving force of Talgarth for almost a century. The hospital closed for good in 2000 with some facilities being combined with nearby Bronllys, but from then onwards the story of the hospital ended.
Earmarked for development on numerous occasions over the next 17 years, the site was and still is abandoned and left to the mercy of the elements with next to no protection. Sold to a private owner some years after the facility closed, the much-publicised scandal came into effect when the new owner stripped the high quality Welsh slate from the roofs of each building, at an estimated worth of more than £1 million. Doing so had put the nail in the coffin for the hospital, as the rain set in and each cold winter brought more and more of buildings into devastating decay. To meet such an untimely end does not do it justice, nor does it accurately represent the debt that the town once owed to the lives it saved and the families it allowed to thrive here for so long. Perhaps the last true testament to Mid Wales Hospital is the hidden chapel that sits outside the front gates which served to care and assist soldiers suffering with shell shock during the First World War. A lone grave is located at the back of the church that reads 'Private John Lewis, 6 Battalion. Welsh Regiment. Husband of Mary Jane Lewis, of 8 Pant St, Danycraig, Swansea. Died 20/10/1915`. After being rediscovered long after the chapel and hospital had closed its doors, the Cambrian Patrol, an annual event organised and run by 160th Infantry Brigade now lay a fresh wreath here as part of a ceremony to pay respects to their fallen comrade, and it is the last grave still standing to commemorate those who fought for their country and owed the rest of their lives to Mid Wales Hospital..
