Portland House, Whitchurch nr Ross on Wye
Contact Details
T: 01600 890 757
www.portlandguesthouse.co.uk

Portland House was converted from a private dwelling to a guest house
in the 1970s. The House has its own history and was part of a much
larger establishment having been the local hospital and doctor's quarters.
In the early nineteenth century it was also called the Whitchurch Lunatic Asylum.
So you don't have to be mad to stay there but it helps!

At the end of the 19th century it became a young gentleman’s academy before
being sold as a private dwelling .

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Ἀριστοτέλης A Gloster Boy in the Forest of Dean ><((((*>

Whitchurch Asylum was at Portland House.
It was run by Samuel Millard, who lived there with his wife and family and appears on 2 censuses, for 1841 and 1851. In 1841 there are just 8 patients, listed only by their initials; by 1851 there are 54, also listed only by initials, with ages, but with places of birth given as N(ot)K(nown)- presumably to preserve their anonymity. About half are men and half women. It may be possible to check the admissions of some patients, if they fall within the remit of the local Poor Law Union. Private patients may not be traceable.
There are entries for Samuel and his wife on this site, in the parish records. Curiously their children seem to have been baptised as adults.
It seems to have been a private, licensed asylum, and appears from about 1855 (perhaps earlier), up until 1860 in the Quarter Sessions Records for Hereford, in terms of its license and the appointment of magistrates to act as 'visitors'. It was, in fact, only licensed to take '40 inmates, 18 men and 22 women of whom no more than 35 are to be private patients'.
In Dec 1859, Samuel Millard died, and was buried at Whitchurch. Judging from the 1861 census, his wife closed the asylum, since it appears as a private house and her occupation is given as 'proprietress of house and land', still with a large family and a substantial number of servants. There are, however, no 'lunatics' listed. My guess would be that they were transferred to the 'Joint Counties' Asylum at Abergavenny, since Herefordshire, at that stage, had no asylum of its own. A quick look at the 1871 Census for the Joint Counties Asylum, shows several pages of inmates, with full names, ages and places of birth; there are a number from Whitchurch, Goodrich and surrounding villages. The Whitchurch Asylum is still listed in a trade directory of 1868, but I suspect that this is because the editors had failed to update their information.
Mrs Millard died in 1875, in Brompton Middlesex, but is buried in Whitchurch.
Their second son, William, eventually also qualified as a doctor, specialising in the treatment of the insane and by about 1864 became the superintendent of the Eastern Counties Asylum, based in Colchester. He wrote a number of books on the subject, advocating training and education for inmates.