Implementing the 1913 Mental Deficiency Act: Competing priorities and resource constraint evident in the south west of England before 1948

Social History of Medicine

Volumn 16, Issue 3, 2003, Pages 403-418

  Dale, Pamela ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF EXETER   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

Class; Control; Eugenics; Gender; Institutional and community care; Marriage; Mental deficiency policy; Motherhood

Indexed keywords

EID: 3843091464     PISSN: 0951631X     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1093/shm/16.3.403     Document Type: Review

References (39)

1. M. Thomson, The Problem of Mental Deficiency: Eugenics, Democracy and Social Policy in Britain c. 1870-1959 (Oxford, 1998); M. Jackson, The Borderland of Imbecility: Medicine, Society and the Fabrication of the Feeble Mind in Late Victorian and Edwardian England (Manchester, 2000); D. Wright, Mental Deficiency in Victorian England: The Earlswood Asylum 1847-1901 (Oxford, 2001); D. Wright and A. Digby (eds), From Idiocy to Mental Deficiency: Historical Perspectives on People with Learning Disabilities (London, 1996); P. Bartlett and D. Wright (eds), Outside the Walls of the Asylum: The History of Care in the Community, 1750-2000 (London, 1999); P. Horden and R. Smith (eds), The Locus of Care: Families, Communities, Institutions and the Provision of Welfare since Antiquity (London, 1998).
2. M. Thomson, The Problem of Mental Deficiency: Eugenics, Democracy and Social Policy in Britain c. 1870-1959 (Oxford, 1998); M. Jackson, The Borderland of Imbecility: Medicine, Society and the Fabrication of the Feeble Mind in Late Victorian and Edwardian England (Manchester, 2000); D. Wright, Mental Deficiency in Victorian England: The Earlswood Asylum 1847-1901 (Oxford, 2001); D. Wright and A. Digby (eds), From Idiocy to Mental Deficiency: Historical Perspectives on People with Learning Disabilities (London, 1996); P. Bartlett and D. Wright (eds), Outside the Walls of the Asylum: The History of Care in the Community, 1750-2000 (London, 1999); P. Horden and R. Smith (eds), The Locus of Care: Families, Communities, Institutions and the Provision of Welfare since Antiquity (London, 1998).
3. M. Thomson, The Problem of Mental Deficiency: Eugenics, Democracy and Social Policy in Britain c. 1870-1959 (Oxford, 1998); M. Jackson, The Borderland of Imbecility: Medicine, Society and the Fabrication of the Feeble Mind in Late Victorian and Edwardian England (Manchester, 2000); D. Wright, Mental Deficiency in Victorian England: The Earlswood Asylum 1847-1901 (Oxford, 2001); D. Wright and A. Digby (eds), From Idiocy to Mental Deficiency: Historical Perspectives on People with Learning Disabilities (London, 1996); P. Bartlett and D. Wright (eds), Outside the Walls of the Asylum: The History of Care in the Community, 1750-2000 (London, 1999); P. Horden and R. Smith (eds), The Locus of Care: Families, Communities, Institutions and the Provision of Welfare since Antiquity (London, 1998).
4. M. Thomson, The Problem of Mental Deficiency: Eugenics, Democracy and Social Policy in Britain c. 1870-1959 (Oxford, 1998); M. Jackson, The Borderland of Imbecility: Medicine, Society and the Fabrication of the Feeble Mind in Late Victorian and Edwardian England (Manchester, 2000); D. Wright, Mental Deficiency in Victorian England: The Earlswood Asylum 1847-1901 (Oxford, 2001); D. Wright and A. Digby (eds), From Idiocy to Mental Deficiency: Historical Perspectives on People with Learning Disabilities (London, 1996); P. Bartlett and D. Wright (eds), Outside the Walls of the Asylum: The History of Care in the Community, 1750-2000 (London, 1999); P. Horden and R. Smith (eds), The Locus of Care: Families, Communities, Institutions and the Provision of Welfare since Antiquity (London, 1998).
5. M. Thomson, The Problem of Mental Deficiency: Eugenics, Democracy and Social Policy in Britain c. 1870-1959 (Oxford, 1998); M. Jackson, The Borderland of Imbecility: Medicine, Society and the Fabrication of the Feeble Mind in Late Victorian and Edwardian England (Manchester, 2000); D. Wright, Mental Deficiency in Victorian England: The Earlswood Asylum 1847-1901 (Oxford, 2001); D. Wright and A. Digby (eds), From Idiocy to Mental Deficiency: Historical Perspectives on People with Learning Disabilities (London, 1996); P. Bartlett and D. Wright (eds), Outside the Walls of the Asylum: The History of Care in the Community, 1750-2000 (London, 1999); P. Horden and R. Smith (eds), The Locus of Care: Families, Communities, Institutions and the Provision of Welfare since Antiquity (London, 1998).
6. M. Thomson, The Problem of Mental Deficiency: Eugenics, Democracy and Social Policy in Britain c. 1870-1959 (Oxford, 1998); M. Jackson, The Borderland of Imbecility: Medicine, Society and the Fabrication of the Feeble Mind in Late Victorian and Edwardian England (Manchester, 2000); D. Wright, Mental Deficiency in Victorian England: The Earlswood Asylum 1847-1901 (Oxford, 2001); D. Wright and A. Digby (eds), From Idiocy to Mental Deficiency: Historical Perspectives on People with Learning Disabilities (London, 1996); P. Bartlett and D. Wright (eds), Outside the Walls of the Asylum: The History of Care in the Community, 1750-2000 (London, 1999); P. Horden and R. Smith (eds), The Locus of Care: Families, Communities, Institutions and the Provision of Welfare since Antiquity (London, 1998).
7. Thomson, The Problem of Mental Deficiency.
8. Ibid., p. 272.
9. Ibid., pp. 297-8.
10. Ibid., p. 1.
11. Jackson, The Borderland of Imbecility.
12. Wright, Mental Deficiency in Victorian England.
13. Ibid., p. 194.
14. D. Garland, Punishment and Welfare: A History of Penal Strategies (Aldershot, 1985).
15. E. Goffman, Asylums: Essays on the Social Situation of Mental Patients and Other Inmates (New York, 1961).
16. P. Cox, 'Girls, Deficiency and Delinquency', in Wright and Digby, From Idiocy to Mental Deficiency, 184-206.
17. Thomson, The Problem of Mental Deficiency, pp. 236-8.
18. D. Wright, ' "Childlike in his Innocence": Lay Attitudes to "Idiots" and "Imbeciles" in Victorian England', in Wright and Digby, From Idiocy to Mental Deficiency, 118-33.
19. University of Exeter Library, RWCI Collection, box 31. Copies of speeches Superintendent C. W. Mayer made to local voluntary associations, 1935-39, Figures taken from address to AGM of Dorset Voluntary Association, 30 March 1936.
20. Wright, Mental Deficiency in Victorian England, pp. 46-67.
21. The early history of Starcross has been the subject of work by David Gladstone. D. Gladstone, 'The Changing Dynamic of Institutional Care: The Western Counties Idiot Asylum, 1864-1914', in Wright and Digby, From Idiocy to Mental Deficiency, 134-60.
22. Wright, Mental Deficiency in Victorian England, p. 90.
23. Thomson, The Problem of Mental Deficiency, p. 120.
24. Ibid., pp. 28-9.
25. University of Exeter Library, RWCI Collection, box 29. Correspondence from file marked Plymouth Voluntary Association. Lee to Mayer, 5 August 1938. Additional details from registers of admission and discharge.
26. University of Exeter Library, RWCI Collection, box 29. Correspondence from file marked Plymouth Voluntary Association 2. Organizing Secretary to Mayer, 10 June 1934 and 25 July 1934.
27. Thomson, The Problem of Mental Deficiency, p. 31.
28. J. Macnicol, 'Eugenics, Medicine and Mental Deficiency: An Introduction', Oxford Review of Education, 9 (1983), 177-80; idem, 'Eugenics and the Campaign for Voluntary Sterilization in Britain Between the Wars', Social History of Medicine, 2 (1989), 147-70.
29. J. Macnicol, 'Eugenics, Medicine and Mental Deficiency: An Introduction', Oxford Review of Education, 9 (1983), 177-80; idem, 'Eugenics and the Campaign for Voluntary Sterilization in Britain Between the Wars', Social History of Medicine, 2 (1989), 147-70.
30. Devon Record Office (hereafter DRO), 153/5/1/1, minutes of Devon Mental Deficiency Committee meeting, 22 November 1917, 113d.
31. Report of the Joint Committee of the Board of Education and Board of Control on Mental Deficiency, 1925-29 (Wood Report), 3 vols, 4 pts (London, 1929).
32. DRO, 153/5/1/1, minutes of Devon MD Committee, 9 September 1926, 476.
33. DRO, 153/5/1/2. Devon MD Committee 20 November 1935, discussion of 'A short summary of the administration of the Mental Deficiency Acts 1913-27 in the County, in relation to institutional accommodation", presented by Chairman, J. R. Harper.
34. 28 DRO 153/5/1/1, minutes of Devon MD Committee, 16 February 1926, 449; 19 May 1927, 514; 8 September 1927, 522. Also DRO 153/5/1/2, minutes of Devon MD Committee, 11 September 1930, 651; 8 September 1932, 724.
35. 29 DRO 153/5/1/2, minutes of Devon MD Committee, 10 November 1932, 740.
36. DRO 153/5/1/2, minutes of Devon MD Committee, 9 February 1933, 751; 18 May 1933, 767; 17 May 1934, 18. Report of the Departmental Committee on Sterilization (Brock Report) P.P. 1933-34 (Cmd. 4485) XV.
37. Thomson, The Problem of Mental Deficiency, pp. 180-1.
38. University of Exeter Library, RWCI Collection, box 36, minutes of sub-committee, 24 February 1948, 179, and joint committee, 30 March 1948, 193. Also minutes of RWCI joint committee, 26 October 1943, 691, and sub-committee 21 February 1944, 13.
39. Thomson, The Problem of Mental Deficiency, p. 297.