Greasby fever hospital

This photo shows (left) the nurses' home and (right) the fever hospital.

The view is from Greasby Road; the front building was the nurses' home,

a covered passage connected that to the next building which was the

single-storey hospital.   Behind that was a separate mortuary building.

The wooden structure on the roof of the nurses' home housed the WWII air-raid siren.

This photo is undated, but is probably from the late 1960s or early 1970s. 

At that time the hospital building was in use as Greasby library.

Greasby fever hospital was built in 1879 by the Wirral Union at a cost of £1,666 for the eight-bed hospital, nurses' home and mortuary.

It was built to treat patients with smallpox or other infectious diseases.

Total hospital accomodation for all of Wirral at the time was 88 beds.

Vaccination against smallpox had become compulsory in 1853 and eventually the disease was virtually eradicated from Wirral.

In 1893 the buildings were leased to the Wirral Joint Hospital Board and were used as a convalescent home.

By 1923, the hospital/convalescent home had closed. 

The hospital building was rented as a private house;  the nurses' home became the local Rates Office and was also used by the Ministry of Food during the Second World War.  The upper floor was used as a district health centre for vaccinations and distribution of codliver oil.

The hospital building became a public library in 1958 (previously the library had been situated at the corner of Greasby Road and Well Lane).  The library moved to its present location in September 1986.  The hospital buildings were demolished in 1987.

Clovelly Court housing development now stands on the site (158 Greasby Road, facing the village green) of the fever hospital.

Clovelly Court 2004