Medical dates:

Medical character:

In 1880 the Chertsey Union Poor Law Guardians built an isolation hospital on a piece of land east of its workhouse in Murray Road.

The Fever Hospital opened in 1881.  It had 38 beds in three small wards - two of which were for scarlet fever patients and one for those with diphtheria.  A separate iron hut was kept available for smallpox cases.

In 1908 the Hospital came under the management of the Chertsey, Walton-on-Thames and Weybridge Joint Hospital Committee.  It continued to treat patients with scarlet fever or diphtheria, as well as those with enteric fever (typhoid).

In 1930, following the abolition of the Boards of Guardians, the Chertsey Union workhouse was taken over by the Surrey County Council.  It became Murray House.  The Fever Hospital remained under the control of the Joint Hospital Committee.

During the 1930s more land was purchased and the Hospital extended.

In 1948 the Hospital joined the NHS under the control of the Woking and Chertsey Hospital Management Committee, part of the South West Metropolitan Regional Hospital Board.  It had 66 beds in cubicle wards and was renamed Ottershaw Isolation Hospital.  It had its own ambulance, operated by the Regional Hospital Board.

In 1950 a ward was opened for elderly people living alone but in need of care and attention.

In the 1950s vaccination and sulphanilamide and other antibiotics became increasingly available. The number of patients with infectious diseases needing hospital treatment fell.  However, an outbreak of poliomyelitis occurred in 1952.

By 1953 the Hospital contained 26 beds for elderly ladies undergoing rehabilitation and occupational therapy.

In 1964 the Hospital had 39 beds for chronic cases and 11 fever beds.

Following a major reorganisation of the NHS in 1974, the Hospital came under the control of the North Surrey District Health Authority, part of the South West Thames Regional Health Authority.

In 1983 it had 49 beds.

By 1990 it had become a hospital for the aged sick, with 97 psychogeriatric beds and 32 day places.

The Hospital closed in 1993.


Present status (May 2011)

The site was sold in 1994 to Bellway Homes.  It was redeveloped in 1996 as a gated private estate with new roads - Grey Place, Clevedon Gate and Spinney Oak.

An NHS facility for learning disabled people - Bourne House in Brookfield Close - was built on the south of the site, by the former tennis court.