Petition to save Wellcome Centre for the History of Medicine, UCL

Carole Reeves, my co-author on "The Children of Craig-y-nos" project without whom there would not have been a printed book now has a new battle on her hands: to save her Department.

Incredible though it seems they are planning to close the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine, University College London, where Carol is the Outreach Historian.

She has launched a blog and campaign to save it: friendsofwtchom.blogspot.com/

And this is the link to the online petition. Please help her and sign.


www.petitiononline.com/mod_perl/petition-sign.cgi?WTCHOMs

Short list- Wellcome library

(Photo: Dan Tsantilis)

Here's a photo of "The Children of Craig-y-nos" team short listed for book award- medical journalist of the year, general category,-at the presentation ceremony in the Wellcome Library at the Wellcome Trust.

They are ( from left to right) book designer Marc Riley, co-authors Dr Carole Reeves, Outreach Historian, and Ann Shaw with Malcolm Shaw who digitised and restored all the photos used in the book.

Death of David Perrott

It is with great sadness I have learnt of the death of David Perrott.
David was a "plaster bed"patient for two years in 1950. He lived out on the balcony and during the summer he was given goggles to protect his eyes and in the winter he had vaseline rubbed on his face for he lived out on the balcony all year round, even in sub-zero temperatures. In addition he was given ear muffs to wear.

He was told that he would never have children and never be able to work. He did both.

David lived in Abercrave, only a few miles from Craig-y-nos Castle.



His son, Ryan Perrott wrote the following comment after the story first appeared on this blog, 14 February 2007.

"This is my father, looking as happy as ever! i'm glad he did have a child and was able to work,as we have had an amazing journey so far and wish it to continue on and on and on!!he is an amazing man,who is a blessing to me and my family!!

Footnote: Ryan was the first person I met when I began this project in January 2007 with a visit to Craig-y-nos Castle. The South Wales Evening Post carried a small feature on my search for the "lost childen of Craig-y-nos" and Ryan was the first person I interviewed on that Saturday afternoon in January sitting in the bar of Craig-y-nos Castle, a world away from the harsh hostile sanatorium regime we both remembered as children.

I shall always remember him, how he pulled out of his wallet this carefully folded photograph of his father, barely a square inch in diameter. He kept it with him all his life because he wanted to tell people of the remarkable story of his father's survival ...

Medical Journalist award- London

Carole and Ann taken in Carole's office at the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of medicine, UCL

Well, we didn't win an award for the "Children of Craig-y-nos" but, along with four other runners-up, we received a certificate
commending us "for excellence in communicating medical and health information in a book for the lay reader".

The prize was awarded to "Medic: saving lives - from Dunkirk to Afghanistan by John Nichol and tony Rennell - a very worthy winner.

Children of Craig-y-nos - short list

“ A powerful story told in words and pictures assembled from first-hand accounts…reveals shocking details of children’s lives in a Welsh TB hospital.”

That’s what the judges say about “Children of Craig-y-nos”.

Well, I guess I never thought of it in that light. To me who spent four years in Craig-y-nos as a child it seemed normal. I didn’t know anything else.

It is only now with a distance of more than 50 years I realise in writing this book, along with Carole Reeves, that it was far from normal.

There are five books short-listed for the Open Book Award and the winner will be announced on Tuesday evening at a special presentation to be held at the Wellcome Foundation.

The others on the shortlist ( General readership, category) include “Manufacturing Depression, the secret history of a modern disease” by Gary Greenberg, “An Infinity of things: how Sir Henry Wellcome collected the world” by Frances Larson and “Medic: saving lives – from Dunkirk to Afghanistan” by John Nichol and Tony Rennell.

So you see the field is very strong…the miracle is that we have even got as far as the short-list!

I will be travelling by train from Scotland to London tomorrow…

"Children of Craig-y-nos" short list

The short list is out. We are one of five in our category. It looks very strong....fingers crossed.

Short-listed - book award

Just heard that our book, "The Children of Craig-y-nos" has been shortlisted for the annual medical journalists book award.
We will know on April 27th at a reception in London if it has been successful.

Still, I am more than pleased to get on the short-list.

Talk on Craig-y-nos

Dr Carole Reeves of The Wellcome Trust Centre for the Hisotry of Medicine, UCL tells me that her talk yesterday reduced some people to tears!
And she has been asked to do one again at the Royal Free Hospital to the infectious diseases group.

She says: "The hospital sees lots of patients with TB, which as you may know, is a serious problem now in London."

And we all think this is a disease of the past.

World TB Day -"The Children of Craig-y-nos"

Dr Carole Reeves, my co-author of "The Children of Craig-y-nos" will be talking this afternoon at a seminar on World TB Day organised by University College of London.
Carole, Outreach Historian with The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine was instrumental in helping to get the book written and published, the culmination of a two year community based project.

New Zealand - and Craig-y-nos

Caroline Boyce , ex child patient and neighbour of mine in Scotland, wrote an article in the Oldie magazine about her childhood experiences in Craig-y-nos and she has just received the following email from Joyce Fleming in New Zealand whose late husband was a patient there in the 1930's.

Joyce says:

"I believe this was the same place in which my late husband spent his childhood from the age of 5 to 12 because of TB hip problems, around 1930-37".


If you were there, or had a relative who was there and would like to contact Joyce then I am sure she would love to hear from you.
Her email addredss is: joycef@xtra.co.nz

Scion House exhibition - Stirling

(from left to right) Mary, Ann and Caroline on the balcony of Craig-y-nos Castle

I was surprised at the public interest in the six photos I showed from the "Children of Craig-y-nos" project in my recent exhibition in Scion House- Stirling University Innovation Park. I only put them in as an after thought ( Malcolm's suggestion). I didnt think anybody would be interested because the work is so deeply rooted in Wales and Welsh medical history.

But I was wrong. Everyone I spoke to who looked at them were able to tell me of their own personal stories , dark tales from the past where they had relatives who had this disease that was not spoken about.

"Oldie" magazine- Caroline Boyce ( nee Havard)

This is a copy of Caroline's article in this month's "Oldie" magazine:

Caroline Boyce- Oldie magazine

(From left to right) Mary , Ann ( in bed) and Caroline on the balcony of Craig-y-nos Castle.

Caroline Boyce ( nee Havard) has her story in this month's
"Oldie" magazine" (Go to the link in the side panel on "Whats in.." the magazine this month.)

She tells me it gave her quite a turn when she picked up the magazine and read it in print.

Well it came as something of a shock to me too when I bought a copy today from WH Smith and opened it to find a photo of Mary, Caroline and myself in Craig-y-nos.

It is as if our history has been finally validated now its out in the common domain.

Caroline has written an excellent account which I shall put up on the blog ( once I have figured out how to put it into the correct file format for the web)


"The Children of Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves ( price £9.99) published by The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine, UCL.

Book sales- "Children of Craig-y-nos"

Many folk are asking me how the sales of the book are going.

Well, over 800 copies of "The Children of Craig-y-nos" have been printed.

But there's a problem - neither Borders in Swansea ( yes I know they have now gone defunct but they were still in business when they ordered the books) nor the Welsh Book Council ( naughty! naughty!) have paid a penny.

They owe the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine, UCL several hundred pounds.

Dr Carole Reeves tells me she has written to them repeatedly and got no response.

She says Borders was particularly devious.
Clair Robinson, their Sales & Marketing Supervisor of Borders Books, Swansea rang Dr Reeves to say t they'd had 'hundreds of requests' for the book and could she send a batch urgently.

She claimed it would take too long to go through the normal wholesaler channels and she didn't want to disappoint her customers in Swansea.

So books were sent off to Swansea and that is the last that Carole heard from them.

Says Carole:" Despite follow-up e.mails, invoices and telephone calls from our Finance Officer, this amount is still outstanding. Despicable really.

Same goes for the Welsh Book Council. They have never even bothered to acknowledge her correspondence even after she sent them one free book and 20 as requested.

Same goes for Welsh Books Council. Daffyd Jones is the contact there.
" I was promised a contract to supply the Welsh Books Council, which I have never received despite follow-up letters and a phone call from you. They have had one free viewing copy and 20 books, " says Carole.

The book is on their website but I have received no reimbursement for sales. I have asked them to return all unsold books plus money from sales / or send a contact. Nothing. Not even an acknowledgement of my correspondence," says Carole.

I have rung the Welsh Book Council myself on several occasions to try and hurry things along and I have been assured by Daffyd Jones that the matter was in hand.



What I would like to know is :who funds the Welsh Book Council? isn't it time somebody took a close look at this organisation?

I am passing this on to the Western Mail and Evening Post in the hope that they might be able to "name and shame" them into paying up.

If you want to buy a copy of the "The Children of Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves (price £9.99) you can do so through Waterstones or online: Amazon.co.uk

Book launch photos- late photos from last May

Cynthia Mullan of the Sleeping Giant Foundation, introducing the launch of the book" The Children of Craig-y-nos".
This locally based oral history charity provided invaluable support and help throughout the project.




Clive Rowlands, former Welsh rugby star and ex child patient at Craig-y-nos, officially opening "The Children of Craig-y-nos" book launch in the newly refurbished Glass Conservatory of Craig-y-nos Castle.





Most of the people attending the book launch were ex child patients.



Co-authors of the book Ann Shaw ( left) and Dr Carole Reeves, Outreach Historian with The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine, UCL, signing copies.


Ann Shaw ( nee Rumsey) left and Caroline Boyce (nee Havard) in Scotland.

Photos supplied by Caroline Boyce.

Caroline was herself a patient in 1949-50 and this was her first return visit to Craig-y-nos. She became a teacher and on retirement moved to Scotland with her husband, Paul, in order to be near their family.
She lives about 15 miles from Ann Shaw though they only discovered they were neighbours as a result of this project.

Copies of "The Children of Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves,published by The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine, UCL, price £9.99 are available from all good bookshops or online from Amazon.co.uk.

Sue Wilson, Sydney Australia

This has just appeared on the BBC Mid-Wales web-site:

"Very interesting project- I recently watched a programme on ABC tv about a farm set up in Molong in Australia for children brought out from the UK to have the chance of a better life in Australia after WW11. The abuses there were kept secret for so long, but for many a chance at healing the memories has begun.
Fri Dec 4 11:26:37 2009 "

Ivy Stokes - St Brides

I pick up the phone in Scotland. It's a call from Newport in South Wales and a lilting Welsh voice asks about St Brides.

It's Ivy Stokes, searching for her missing Welsh history, time spent as a child in this TB sanatorium on the Pembrokeshire coast.

Did I know of anyone there? She would love to be able to talk to someone who had shared her experiences.

Ivy was a patient Kensington hospital 1941-45 age 10 years.

I give her David Pearce's phone number . He runs a blog for ex-patients.


I do not normally carry stories about other sanatoriums but Ivy's account is so similar to the Craig-y-nos experience that I thought it worth telling it here although I am sure David will be running it on his blog too.



Ivy Stokes asked her granddaughter if she would help her search on the internet for Kensington Hospital.
“ I would love to meet someone who was there the same time as me,” says Ivy, age 77 from Newport.

“I was there as a 10 years old from 1941 for three and a half years. After I left my mother wouldn’t let me keep in contact with any of the other children. TB was all “ hush hush “ in those days and she was afraid of bringing it back into the house again.”


Now suffering form osteoporosis and arthritis she finds herself thinking about those early days as a child in plaster out on the balcony in Kensington hospital.

“I remember shivering from cold and how we used to pray for it to rain so that we would be wheeled back indoors again.”

She also remembers being strapped to the bed.
“ It was for my own good. It was to make me keep still”.


She remembers being in the Girl Guides, and the day World War 2 ended.
“There was a party. Everyone kept saying” the war has ended the war has ended.”


On returning home at 13 half years of age she went back to school for six months.

“ Nobody talked about TB then. It was all “ hush hush”. But it leaves a mark on you as a patient. I keep myself to myself. I am quiet. I am not a good mixer.

“I got a job in a factory sewing shirts. Then I got married and had two children. Now I have six grandchildren.”

If you were in Kensington in the early 1940s then Ivy would love to hear from you.

Her phone number is: 01633 768651

Reunion - in dancing class!

(From left to right) Doug and Joyce Herbert, Roy Harry and Val Filby.

Two boys who were in Craig-y-nos during the war met up again - in a dancing class in Cwmavon!!

Roy Harry says:
"We recently joined a new dancing class in our village. There were no familiar faces, until Doug & Joyce Herbert walked in.

We couldn't place them immediately but then remembered we had met them at the first Craig y Nos reunion.

If we hadn't met at the reunion over two years ago in Craig-y-nos we would not have realised that we were together in ward 1
during the war! "

Roy Harry gives a very moving account of how as a child of three he had a gastric lavage and Doug Herbert tells how he was force-fed cabbage until he was sick.

Both stories are in the book:"The Children of Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves, price £9.99. available from all good bookshops and online from Amazon.co.uk

Dr Frank Wells-First Medical Superintendent at Craig-y-nos

Chris Willey, from Gloucestershire, grandson of Dr Frank Wells the first medical superintendent at Craig-y-nos, discovered our web-site and contacted me to see if we have any information on his maternal grandfather.

I could only refer him to our book "The Children of Craig-y-nos" and the research carried out by Carole Reeves.

She discovered that Dr Wells was appointed in 1921 but left in 1926 due to illness to be replaced by two young Scottish women doctors, Dr Lizzie Robertson Clark and her assistant Dr Sarah Walker.

He qualified at St Mary's hospital, London, in 1911.

Chris says:" I never knew him as he died before I was born but my mother used to play at the castle as a child (she was born in 1915 so I assume it would have been in the early twenties) especially in the theatre where the opera singer Adelina Patti sung."

Chris added in another email:

"About twenty five - thirty years ago I took my mother (who died in 2001) down to Craig-y-nos. We were very fortunate that when we were there a person who worked there struck up a conversation with my mother, the end result being that he showed us all round the place. Obviously quite a lot had changed but she recognised a lot. Her biggest thrill was to be shown around the theatre where she used to play as a child.

Frank Wells was a medical missionary in Southern India and shortly after he married he and his wife went out to India. My mother was actually born there (in 1915) and at the age of 5 the family returned to England for my mother's education. I believe Craig-y-nos was his first UK appointment on his return.


This visit to the Castle was, I believe the only time she went back there since her childhood but she used to speak about her time there with very fond memories - she adored her father, her relationship with her mother was of a much more "formal" nature."


"The Children of Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves, published by The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine, UCL, price £9.99p

Norma ( nee Bryant) Neads - 1945

I have just had an email from Simon Neads whose mother, Norma (nee Bryant) was in Craig-y-nos in 1945 for seven months. She was five years of age.


He says:
"My mother was only allowed one visit a month from my grandparents.
My mother had her 5th Birthday at Craig-y-nos. My mother remembers her preacher visiting from Cwmaman (her village). Her bed was placed on the verander with a sun hat and only underwear to have all the fresh air.

My mother also remembers snow on her bed. The staff used to plait her hair with calica. My mother had her tonsils out in hospital, she remembers the bathroom and the big table in the middle of the ward. My mother recently visited on her 70th birthday, and was taken around and saw the ward.
It was very emotional for her."


"The Children of Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves is available from Waterstones or online from Amazon.co.uk