This postcard photograph was taken by Frederick Pearse in around 1905 and shows the Andover Cottage Hospital in Junction Road.

This was the first hospital in Andover in the modern sense.

Like many local institutions created in the 19th century, it was the product of a body of local improvers, private benefactors and interested parties who wanted to create new amenities for the general benefit of Andover’s residents.

The need for a hospital was generally agreed in the 1870s when a fund was announced at the annual venison or buck feast.

William Gue, a former builder of East Street and mayor of the borough in 1870 and 1871, bought this site opposite the workhouse for £1500, Sir Charles Pressley donated £1000 and Henry Thompson, another ex-mayor, gave £500.

Other smaller donations were soon received and building work started in 1876.

Architecturally, it was an interesting building with much thought given to the exterior decoration, with its red and white brick-courses and diamond patterns, an assortment of gables, ornamental crosses and the whole topped with crimped ridge tiles.

Very much of the period it was designed by the prominent architect William White of Wimpole Street, London.

No doubt White’s involvement was owing to the influence of locally-born Dr George Vivian Poore, who went on to great success in London and whose own practice was also in Wimpole Street.

Poore was a frequent visitor to his hometown and as an enthusiastic proponent became one of the new hospital’s medical officers.

The hospital was constructed by Henry Annetts, a local builder of Chantry Street whose intertwined initials can still be seen on some large Victorian houses in Weyhill Road, opposite Lynwood Drive.

These were built a decade earlier during the development of Andover Newtown as it was then termed.

The hospital was opened in August 1877 and although 28 patients were treated that year, the hospital was closed for two months because the assistant nurse Miss Hamilton came down with scarlatina and the place had to be fumigated.

Although the hospital was run by a local committee and various fund-raising events and subscriptions helped to swell the coffers, attendance was not supposed to be free and anyone being treated was expected to pay a reasonable amount, although this seems to have been variable, based on ability to pay and the mood of the committee at the time.

There was also a rule that any potential patient had first to be nominated by a subscriber, but when faced with an emergency it seems that neither the committee nor the medics could contemplate refusing treatment.

Financial problems were a constant feature in the first 20 years of the hospital but it muddled along and local people who could afford to donate, whether patients or not, were often cajoled to put their hand in their pocket.

From 1897, matrons were at last paid; the voluntary nature of the position meant that there had been six in the preceding seven years.

The new century meant new demands and old standards were not deemed good enough. There were complaints about ventilation, the building was overcrowded and the theatre was unsuitable for more complicated operations; meals were served cold and the wards badly located.

Not only that, the river and the railway were too close and there was much talk of a new building.

In the end, the committee decided to enlarge the present building and a few years later heating was also installed, while an X-ray machine arrived in 1916 at a cost of £600.

However, the town was growing and the sentiment after the First World War was in favour of a new hospital to serve the needs of the town and to adequately commemorate those who had died in the conflict.

Fundraising was both sustained and successful, so much so that after a concentrated seven year-effort, a new hospital emerged, with the old cottage hospital being sold to Hampshire County Council for £2,000.

The cottage hospital had been open for nearly 50 years and had treated over 5,000 patients.

It was of its time, basic and limited to the medical knowledge and abilities of the day but it served its purpose well.

For a small town, Andover was advanced in having such a facility as early as it did.

The old building continued after 1926, when the War Memorial Hospital finally opened, as a county council general health centre and clinic, mainly concerned with the welfare of young children.

It continued in that role until the early 1970s, after which it seems to have been quietly abandoned.

Becoming increasingly run down, it was finally demolished at the end of February 1992 and I am grateful to Sydney Hylan of Tidworth who took some photographs and also thought to date them.

New buildings were constructed and are now, as River House, part of Alabare’s learning and accommodation centre for 16-21-year-olds.