Matlock and Matlock Bath Images: Matlock: Smedley's Hydro, Extending the Hydro

"For the first few years of our practice we averaged from two to three hundred patients per. annum, and these mostly at our free hospitals, Lea Mills. ... But for some years our want of bedrooms has kept the numbers about stationary. We have so repeatedly tried medical assistants and failed, that we were unwilling to increase our accommodation. The last year, 1867, however, we had to refuse so many that were hopeless of cure or relief by any other means, that we decided to build a new wing to our Establishment, and trust to Providence for help. Now, March, 1868, the building, 200 feet long, 50 feet wide, and four storeys high is being rapidly completed. Every appliance and convenience our long experience has taught us will be brought into operation".
John Smedley
Riber Castle, 2nd March, 1868.
From Preface from another edition (p.351-2).

Our third enlargement of Institution, p.347

The above mid 19th century engravings and quotations have been taken from:
Smedley, John "Smedley's Practical Hydropathy, 15th ed.", James Blackwood & Co., Paternoster Row, London. By the time this edition was published Mr. Smedley had died and the business had been taken over by Smedley's Hydropathic Company (Limited)
Image scan and information Copyright Ann Andrews and is intended for personal use only.