Over the course of nearly 150 years, Mile End Hospital has been a workhouse infirmary, a military hospital, and a therapies hub. Today it outpatient and community-based services, supporting the larger general hospitals in Barts Health NHS Trust.
Mile End Hospital was originally known as Mile End Infirmary, which opened in 1883.
The 'Board of Guardians of the Poor of Mile End Old Town' (an early form of local authority) built a workhouse at Bancroft Road between 1858 and 1859. Before the creation of the welfare state, workhouses provided accommodation for those who were living in poverty and unable to work or pay for housing. Within a few years, over 500 adults and 170 children were living at the workhouse, many of whom were chronically ill or disabled.
In 1881, the Mile End Old Town workhouse closed, and many of the workhouse buildings were demolished to make way for Mile End Infirmary. The new Infirmary, providing beds for 500 patients, was opened in March 1883. The institution was taken over by the military authorities during the First World War. During the military occupation, the facilities of the hospital were considerably improved. In 1930, when the Hospital passed to the control of the London County Council, it had 550 beds.
A Nurse Training School was established in 1892.
It initially admitted ten new 'probationers' (trainee nurses) a year, for a three-year training programme. In 1924, it began providing midwifery training. It later became part of Princess Alexandra School of Nursing and Midwifery.
Between the creation of the NHS in 1948 and the 1970s, nurses and midwives from the Nursing Sisters of St John the Divine in Poplar (the inspiration for the TV series 'Call the Midwife') trained and worked with colleagues from Mile End.
From 1948, under the National Health Service, Mile End Hospital was managed jointly with other hospitals in the local area.
In 1968, it was transferred to the management of the London Hospital, and became known as The London Hospital (Mile End).
The Bancroft Unit for the Care of the Elderly opened at Mile End in June 1990, and in 2005, the Tower Hamlets Centre for Mental Health was opened on the hospital site. Following several reconfigurations of community health services throughout the 1990s and 2000s, Mile End Hospital was incorporated into the newly formed Barts Health NHS Trust in 2012.
Today, Mile End is a community hospital providing a host of outpatient and community based services
Discover the histories of our hospitals
Find out more about the historic collections, spanning from 1137 to the present day, held by the Trust Archives. They include objects and records relating to staff, patients, buildings and management of the hospitals in the current Barts Health group, as well as numerous other hospitals, institutions, charities, organisations and individuals relating to health care and training in the City and East London. Please contact the archives to make an appointment.