On This Day, 19 July 1918

Evening Despatch

Friday 19 July 1918

TREATED AS PAUPERS.

ARMY MENTAL CASES TO GO TO WORKHOUSE INFIRMARY.

A discussion arose at Walsall Board of Guardians to-day relative to a suggestion from the Pensions Committee that a soldier requiring temporary treatment should be admitted to the Workhouse Infirmary.

The Clerk said he though it had been laid down that under no circumstances should mental cases – this was a mental case – from the Army go into the Workhouse.

Mr. Barnett also said that if a soldier was sent to a mental institution he would go as a private patient, if sent to the Workhouse he would go as a pauper, and there was a strong objection to it.

Mr. Sanders said it was in the man’s own interest to come into the Workhouse Infirmary, as he might possibly require only temporary treatment, and it was decided to accept him into the institution.