Temple Street hospital has always occupied a special place in the hearts of Irish people, particularly in December when staff and visitors make special efforts to delight and entertain the patients.
Every year, there is carol singing on the wards and on Christmas morning, the Lord Mayor pays a visit. These traditions began during the late Victorian period when the sisters, in an attempt to meet the heavy cost of running the hospital, opened their doors every year for a Christmas tree fete.
"Every ward was tastefully wreathed with holly and ivy," the Freeman's Journal of December 29th, 1891, reported, "and the walls were hung with bright pictures and coloured mottoes."
The Christmas fete was usually held just prior to new year and the centrepiece was a huge evergreen tree which occupied pride of place in one of the two large wards – an old drawing room that once formed part of the Earl of Bellomont’s city mansion.
As part of the preparations, the hospital’s 60 or so inpatients were dressed in red flannel night-jackets and each cot was decked out in white counterpanes and warm blankets. From early morning, they eagerly awaited the arrival of a throng of visitors – usually led by the wife of the Lord Lieutenant and her vice regal entourage and followed by the Lord Mayor, police commissioners and other dignitaries.
Fete day was very busy for Temple Street. Every year, upwards of 500 visitors thronged around the little cots, and various entertainments were laid on for the patients. On December 29th, 1893, the Freeman's Journal reported that: "In the convalescent ward, a magic lantern entertainment was given by Mr Lawrence of O'Connell Street. All the scenes were of a humorous character, and it was a treat to hear the screams of delight with which they were received by the children."
Many of the visitors handed out sixpence pieces but the younger children had to be watched carefully since they were liable to eat them. Once the various dignitaries had visited all the wards, it was traditional for the Lady Lieutenant to distribute toys from the large Christmas tree.
Some of the gifts were donated by wealthy patronesses such as the Marchioness of Derry, who included a card for each patient, the Royal Family at Windsor Castle, or by the German Empress Augusta of Saxe Weimar Eisenach, who was responsible for providing most of the toys in 1890 – rather poignantly it seems, as she died on January 7th of that year.
Sweetmeats and fruit
Blissfully unaware of how great or small their visitors were, the children tucked into a meal of sweetmeats and fruit.
Santa
joined the festivities but wore a green rather than a red costume and after the toys had been handed out, a concert was usually held around a piano in the largest of the halls. At the same time, tucked out of sight in the wooden dispensary, the sisters arranged a separate Christmas visit for the poor inner city children – an event that stood a world apart from the lavish parlour room spectacle:
“Last Tuesday [their diary for 1915 reads], we invited a hundred of the real poor who had no dinner to get at home to a dinner party which comprised boiled mutton, bacon and cabbage and potatoes galore and to wind up, a huge plum pudding which had been boiled in an enamelled bucket. We all felt very happy although very tired when we saw the last of our poor little guests depart, each having received a nice toy, fruit and sweets to take home.”
In later years, the nuns decided that it would be better to give food to the local mothers so that they could cook their own Christmas dinner at home but such charity was quite costly and only added to the hospital’s seasonal expenses.
The boilers were coal-fired as were the hearths in all the wards. Through their advertisements, the mother superior encouraged the public not to forget “in the distribution of your Christmas Alms, the Hospital and Home for Sick Children”.
The regional secretaries of the Moy Mell Children’s Guild were similarly asked to send in “warm hood capes for use in the garden” and “combinations, cotton or woven”.
Some Irish doctors felt that children would be better served by being catered for in special wards in the country’s adult hospitals, particularly in the interest of avoiding cross-infection, but shortly before Christmas 1885, Drs Thomas More Madden and J. McCullough told the Spenser Commission (which had been established to investigate hospital accommodation) that sick children deserved to be treated in a special environment of their own.
Acting on their recommendation, Temple Street was allowed to continue its life-saving work and in 1890 it was certified by the Royal University of Ireland as a teaching hospital. Thus, despite the odds, the fledging institution was able to remain open and, in 1895, it received further assistance when the Countess Cadogan chose the Christmas fete as an ideal time to announce the commencement of a fundraising bazaar to be held in the Rotunda gardens every year.
Long-standing tradition
In 1902, Dr Madden died after sustaining an injury in a yachting accident. Because he had been so important to Temple Street in its formative years, his family decided to honour his memory by continuing a long-standing tradition.
Each December, the smell of pine filled the front hall as a batch of fir trees, fresh from the family estate in Tinode, Co Wicklow, were unloaded by horse-drawn cart. In 1912, these were decorated for the first time with festoons of garlanded electric light bulbs.
Christmas cards were another Edwardian novelty. In 1911, the Countess of Aberdeen sent 80, one for each inpatient with an unusual crib design. By that time, the annual distribution of sixpences and sweetmeats of Victorian times had been replaced by an upsurge in gift-giving. Then, as now, it was the toys that evinced the most interest. “A young fellow was weeping copiously,” one visitor recalled. “We later found him sitting in a chair by the fire, a smile on his little face. Poor little fellow! He had never seen so many toys before in his life.”