Sydney POTTER/Leah Ellen GWILLIAM (General)

by Jefff , West London, Middlesex, Wednesday, May 08, 2019, 21:39 (2025 days ago) @ Bridewell

I have found out that Hill House although listed as a workhouse had a small infirmary located in a separate block at the north of the main workhouse and also isolation wards stood at the rear.

Yes, this is stated in the Monmouth entry for the "Workhouses" website that was linked within a previous post on this thread. Since Victorian times many of not most of them had a hospital of some form attached. In those times this was often the best chance lower and working-class people had of getting medical treatment, as doctors were often too expensive; eg by the late 1800s it was quite normal for expectant single mothers to book themselves into the local workhouse infirmary, expecting to then discharge themselves a few days later after their baby was born.
Many of the major NHS hospitals in cities around the UK were originally workhouse infirmaries, and so it's not unusual for them to have also had isolation wards back in the times when infectious diseases like TB were so common.

For clarification in case you didn't see it, this is the aforementioned old thread which mentions the Workhouses website.
https://forest-of-dean.net/fodmembers/index.php?id=45502
see
http://www.workhouses.org.uk/Monmouth/