Hartwood Hospital

Last updated

Hartwood Hospital
NHS Lanarkshire
Hartwood Asylum - geograph.org.uk - 372207.jpg
Hartwood Hospital
North Lanarkshire UK location map.svg
Red pog.svg
Shown in North Lanarkshire
Geography
Location Shotts, North Lanarkshire, Scotland, United Kingdom
Coordinates 55°48′36″N3°50′55″W / 55.8099°N 3.8485°W / 55.8099; -3.8485
Organisation
Care system Public NHS
Type Psychiatric
History
Opened1895
Closed1998
Links
Lists Hospitals in Scotland

Hartwood Hospital was a psychiatric hospital located in the village of Hartwood near the town of Shotts in Scotland.

History

The hospital was designed by John Lamb Murray to accommodate 500 patients and opened as the Lanark District Asylum in 1895. [1] [2] :38 The complex included staff-houses, gardens, a farm, a power-plant, a reservoir, a railway-line and a cemetery. [2] :32 Two large separate blocks were added in 1898, a tuberculosis sanatorium was completed in 1906 and a nurses' home was opened in 1931. [1]

Its first medical superintendent was Dr Campbell Clark. [3]

Its sister facility, the Hartwoodhill Hospital, which was designed by James Lochhead as a 'mental deficiency' hospital, was erected on the east side of Hartwood Road in 1935. [2] :32 However during the Second World War psychiatric patients from Bangour Village Hospital were evacuated there. [2] :33

The Scottish Union of Mental Patients was set up by mental patients at Hartwood Hospital in July 1971. [2] :38 At that time some 27 patients signed a petition to "redress of grievances and better conditions" at the hospital. [2] :38 After the introduction of Care in the Community in the early 1980s, the hospital went into a period of decline and closed in 1998. [1]

Although briefly used by Lanarkshire Television as a film studio, the Hartwood Hospital buildings subsequently fell into disuse. [1] There were major fires in 2004 and 2016 leaving the building substantially damaged. [1] Hartwoodhill Hospital, the sister facility, subsequently closed as well in February 2011. [4] In November 2025, a large fire caused substantial damage to the hospital's former Nurses' Home structure. [5]

In February 2020 it was reported that portions of Matt Reeves's The Batman were being filmed at the location, with the site dressed as Gotham Orphanage. [6]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 "Hartwood Hospital". Historic Hospitals. Retrieved 23 January 2019.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Gallacher, Mark. "From mental patient to service user: deinstitutionalisation and the emergence of the Mental Health Service User Movement in Scotland, 1971-2006" (PDF). theses.gla.ac.uk/. Glasgow University. Retrieved 26 July 2017.
  3. "Obituary: Archibald Campbell Clark, MD, F.F.P.S.G." BMJ. 14 December 1901. Retrieved 24 February 2020.
  4. "Minutes of meeting" (PDF). North Lanarkshire Health and Care Partnership. 11 March 2011. Retrieved 23 February 2020.
  5. "Major fire rips through derelict nursing home at old Hartwood Hospital site". 14 November 2025. Retrieved 17 November 2025.
  6. Craig Williams (22 February 2020). "Former psychiatric hospital near Glasgow turned into 'Gotham Orphanage' for The Batman filming". GlasgowLive. Retrieved 24 February 2020.