The Horrific Story of Bethlem Insane Asylum | Short Plainly Difficult Documentary

Do you like this revived series? Have any suggestions for future videos, let me know in the comments. This weeks outro video https://youtu.be/1OT-2reBUBc

The phrase "going around the bend" came from Bedlam. That was because Bedlam was reached by going along a curved road, so if you "went around the bend" it meant that you'd gone completely mad.

I learned to drive in the grounds of the Bethlem Royal Hospital back in the 80's. My mate was a groundsman there, and he used to let me drive his van around the hospitals roads. One of the roads was on an incline, so i could practice hill starts. After a few weeks of messing around on the roads of the hospital - totally unsupervised, I took my test at the West Wickham driving test centre and passed first time! Not something you could get away with these days I bet. Not been back there since then, but from what i see in your video it looks pretty much the same as I remember it. Though I don't recall there being a museum back then.

Hi John, I ran across an article in an old book that I thought might be worthy of a video. In 1880, a tornado flattened Marshfield, Missouri, killing 99 people in less than a minute. The survivors, even the uninjured, began to show signs of extreme apathy and were unwilling to describe the event. The term "shell shocked" was not coined until 1915 but the Marshfield cases were the first medical mention of the affliction that we now call PTSD.

“I actually enjoyed my stay at the various Bethlem Hospitals, especially the pubs and brothels, although drilling into my head was most uncomfortable.” —-Lord Stanley Edmund Edmund, Mrs.

As someone who's been in IT, the spilling of the coffee and the defeated "Shit." really hit home, and is indeed a very familiar feeling🤣

I have been admitted to psychiatric hospitals on several occasions, sometimes detained under section two of the Mental Health Act. Whilst modern units are a world away from Bedlham, they still have quite far to go. There is litlte or no theraputic intervention beyone medication - they do however still use ECT. You rarely get to see a psychiatrist or therapist and, by and large, the main staffing presence on the ward is provided by Health Care Assistants, who have limited nursing training. They are brilliant and caring. 'Qualified' nurses tend to spend most of their time in the nursing office doing paperwork. When my mental health crisis starts to recede, the biggest experience I have on the ward is utter boredom. There is nothing to do other than watch TV or walk up and down the ward. The hospital I was in had very restricted visiting hours and there was nowhere private to have a visitor. When I have been in hospital under a section, I was not allowed to leave the ward unless I was given Section 17 leave. Problem was, to take my Section 17 leave and get off the ward for a short while, I needed to be with a member of staff. Generally, no one was free to escort me off the ward, so my leave was worthless.

I was a healthcare professional up until quite recently. One hospital I worked in was Mayday Hospital in Croydon. I lost count on the number of patients I transferred over to the Royal Bethlem Hospital in the 90's. Not enough was known or even talked about mental health unlike today. I often wondered what became of those patients who were having a psychosis and a mental health crisis. I too have been affected by a mental health crisis, largely impart to Covid19. My 32 years as a nurse have come to an end, and there are things I have seen recently, that can not be unseen. Take care of your own mental health. If no one has told you recently, you are enough, and that you are loved just the way you are.

Given my sad state of mental health, I want to state EMPHATICALLY that being locked in a small room for all or most or even part of a day does NOT help! People need healthy interactions, some sort of healthy natural place to go to to just relax a half hour or hour or three. I have checked myself into a mental health facility, lasted about 9 days, and then was internally yelling "get me out". A stupid schedule that didn't take in that some people have different sleep schedules (I am a night person, and being made to go to bed at 10pm just meant I tried to be quiet for 3 or more hours so I didn't disturb my room mate.) THEN they limited the coffee. I don't like coffee, but after about 3 hours of sleep, I needed the caffeine to survive the boring classes during the day. Some of the staff would look the other way while additional pots were made, some would not. The only thing I learned from all that was that I was the ONLY person in the building who had never used cocaine. Surprising, given I couldn't figure out how any of them could afford it. We were all poor, barely affording food and rent, so how did they afford the drugs??? I don't know, I probably don't want to know. Oh, and I also learned alcohol is actually the worst to detox from. They sent people who drank a lot to the hospital before they would treat them, because it is that bad to detox from. I don't know all the details, but I am sure you can find them.

😆 You caught me with the "alms not arms" bit. You definitely knew what we'd hear.

Penn State had a class called 'The History of Madness and Mental Health' that taught a lot of this in the daily lectures. Loved the new perspective and insights. Definitely big on the legacy scale.

Glad you've decided to revive this series, even if you don't go outside London there's enough to keep you going for a while! Not one place but perhaps the necropolis railway? The bit with the yellow star was chilling. And endlessly amused that whilst looking at the development of mental health treatment you still managed to find an engineering disaster.

Please never stop doing “Here on this map” bit! Just the perfect icing on the dope cake that is your video!

Many years ago I went to a mental hospital along with some horses so that the patients could have a ride. Two attendants came out with a patient secured between them. He was in a straight jacket. As they passed he looked at me. I can still see those eyes after all these years. He was stark raving mad. One lap of the lawn and he was taken back inside. Everyone else was almost silent for a while. Then the horse I had had a pee and the spell was broken. That poor, poor man, there was no hope. There but for the grace of God - go any of us.

Hey Jon - look-up Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania here in the States. It's one of the most haunted places in North America. Crazy stuff happened there. Keep up the great work! Love your vids. 👍👍👍 "Those incarcerated in this prison were subjected to both physical and psychological torture. Some of the famous methods used here included the ‘Mad Chair’ where prisoners would be strapped tightly in and be left sitting completely motionless for days without food and water – often driving them to insanity. Other methods included clamping their tongue with the ‘Iron Gag’ which would cause severe pain and bleeding if they tried to speak, and throwing prisoners into ‘The Hole’ where they could be kept in a dark pit for weeks at a time."

It's interesting looking at the old maps and see where the names of places we go to & hear about on a regular basis come from. Moorfields, Spitalfields, were once fields.

The history of UK county asylums and asylums in general is fascinating in general. Really interesting video! Also liked the Boards of Canada / Protect & Survive flavoured music at the end.

Today I learned: Not being a Thespian, I'd never heard the term "tread the boards" before today. Thank you for being a teacher, John!

I been in and out psychatric Hospitals too.1. stay had me traumatized from the start as they set me off strong Meds I've been given before without any Substitute or Help. Also they used Beds with Restraints beside Meds. I managed that once. 15 Years ago now. Biggest Problem I see ever again is Boredome and Loneliness due to Understaffing and under/missqualification induced mishandling. Other ones where different in handling Crisis and even did want me to go down slow off Prescribed Meds on a Dose that was just cute in my Opinion and former Experience.. I still have Problems with certain Hospital settings because of my 1. full Stay, out of free will, didn't had the Chance making 'Friends', so didn't understand why I was 'punished' and for what. The Meds I took in Crisis where strongly addictive physically, restricted norm. for over 18 only, so they just not gave them indifferent to the Consequences. Couldn't make much Trouble anyway, unable to move much from the Cramps.

THe Killing Floor 1 Bedlam map was heavily, heavily based on both the building and the 1946 movie, from memory it was based more off the actual building than the film, with a bit of fictionalizing and tweaking to suit KF's story, but walking around it even when all was quiet between waves, knowing the history of the real hospital, always was very, very creepy. Well done, Tripwire Interactive, well done. Given how London centric KF1 was, I don't doubt that's the actual building in the KF1 map as well now I think about it and see the pictures though. Anyone who owns the original Killing Floor and has the Bedlam map and a few spare ours able to check how accurate the map is?