World Within Walls project: Inside St. Davnet's Event

This event was run as part of Heritage Week and was funded by the HSE as part of the World Within Walls project. It was delivered by Stair: An Irish Public History Company and was supported by the Monaghan County Heritage Office.

The World within Walls project aims to bring to life the memories and history of St. Davnet’s former psychiatric hospital in Monaghan town. This institution played a major role in the town, the community and the lives of many living in the area and as such is of huge historical importance and interest. The Inside St. Davnet’s event aimed to make these memories and history real through providing a typical living experience of the institution at a point in time – 1920s.

We were delighted with the turn out the at ‘Inside St. Davnet’s’ event this weekend. The 1927 recreation of the patients’ menu was fully booked out in advance while almost 200 people turned out to take part in the guided tour. Our History Hub was busy for the day with people coming in to learn more about the hospital and also to work with our artists to create paper flowers in memory of the patients who passed through the asylum.

The 1920s meal commenced at 1pm and guests were escorted by our ‘nursing staff’ to either the male or female side of the dining room.  This was done in order to reflect the gender segregation, a striking feature of asylum life. Not only did the male and female patients eat apart but they received differing portion sizes; male patients getting larger potions than the women. Guests at the meal were also given a small extract from a case history – these were constructed from archival research on the site and used the language and phrasing of the epoch although all identifying features were altered to protect the identity of the patients. The case history included people who found themselves suffering from TB, others who were under observation for dangerous behaviour with others on the way to recovery and doing well.

Medical historian Dr. Anne Mac Lellan, the lead researcher on the World Within Walls project, gave a talk on what life would have been like in 1927 and read some extracts from the minute books and the inspector’s report for that year. “At that time St. Davnet’s was known as Cavan and Monaghan District Mental Hospital. According to the report the patients seemed clean and in good health although  overcrowding was becoming a real problem and the mental hospital was oversubscribed in both male and female wards”.

After the meal finished architecture historian Dr. Niamh Nic Ghabhann began her tour of the complex examining the layout and architecture of the site, exploring how these impacted on life at the mental hospital.  It was interesting to learn how St. Davnet’s was based on a pavilion model which aimed to move away from the more prison like radial layout that was used in earlier asylums. The original intention of Monaghan District Asylum (which was renamed as Monaghan Mental Hospital in 1924) was to provide accommodation and care for patients; balancing care with the need for control. As time progressed and overcrowding became an issue the buildings couldn’t function in the way in which they were intended and personal space was a luxury that was not afforded to many patients.

Those in attendance heard how the complex changed and developed over the years, from its construction in 1869, right up to the modern community services. It is clear from looking around the site today that huge changes have taken place. Some buildings lie empty while many have been taken over by outpatient facilities and other public services. In the last 50 years the approach to treatment of mental health has changed so dramatically that the institutional care no longer dominates. St. Davnet’s Hospital and staff were at the forefront of the move towards community care. Developments at Monaghan such as the token economy aimed to provide long term patients which the skills to be able to return to the community, such developments paved the way for the closure of its wards.

The St. Davne’ts complex is now more open to the local people, it is not uncommon to see people from the town in the ground walking their dogs enjoying the beauty and serenity of the campus. This would have been unthinkable in the 1920s when the walls were strong and the gates locked.