Thoughts on insanity and its causes, and on the management of the insane : to which are appended observations on the report for 1850, of the Lunatic Asylum of the North and East Ridings of Yorkshire / By a Mechanic [W. Williamson].

  • Williamson, William.
Date:
1851
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Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Credit: Thoughts on insanity and its causes, and on the management of the insane : to which are appended observations on the report for 1850, of the Lunatic Asylum of the North and East Ridings of Yorkshire / By a Mechanic [W. Williamson]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    if nothing had occurred, which continued until I had finished my work, and I left him in a cheerful mood. Though in the foregoing case, I had the presence of mind both to divert and evade, yet to evade sometimes seems impossible. For though, we may often know that for the time being we have a dangerous patient to deal with, because as a rule, u out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speakethyet sometimes the atten dant finds himself w r eak-handed with a strong patient whose violent paroxysm is commencing without the usual previous indication; and thus taken by surprise it will sometimes require great moral courage for the mind of the attendant to be sufficiently calm, to work out momentarily the best mode of counteracting the threatened assault. As a last resource the attendant should always have either a shrill whistle or other mode of quickly calling more assistance. I remember referring to these difficulties and dangers, on conversing with one of the committee of an asylum who was advocating non-restraint. He replied, “ that if they hired attendants they should expect them to do as they were told; for, supposing a man entered the army he went with the full knowledge that he was liable to be killed.” I confess such a cold calculation was fit to make me shudder. I thought the best cure for those who had such views, w r ould be for them to become attendants for a few months amongst some such cases as I have seen, where the herculean strength seemed almost unearthly, where strong bedsteads, &c., which were screwed to the floor, were torn up and broken to pieces; so that one was reminded of Sampson and the gates of Gaza; and while destruction of property was thus going on, perhaps three or four shrewd and courageous attendants were kept fairly at bay. With all due deference to those w r ho would call me cruel, I should recommend any plans or apparatus by which the patient can be pinned in such case, and so kept until the violence of the paroxysm be subsided. But no doubt such apparatus is most to be preferred, which, being sufficiently preventive for the cases, also combines most ease and convenience to the patient, and will be better still in proportion as it can be so simpli-