Brief History of Pontefract Dispensary and Pontefract General Infirmary

Pontefract Dispensary was founded in 1812 in Sessions House Yard, later moving to Baxtergate before its final location in new purpose-built premises in 1880. Dr William Wright, Surgeon to the Dispensary and public health doctor, died in 1877 and he bequeathed the Hermitage Garden to the town for the building of a new Dispensary. The money for the build was raised by public subscription, and the foundation stone was laid on Friday 7th May 1880 by Pontefract’s MP, the Rt, Hon. H.C. E. Childers MP, Secretary of State for War. The Dispensary was officially opened by the Mayor, John Rhodes on Wednesday 8th December 1880. It was built over the entrance to the Hermitage, but access was maintained through the building’s basement as specified in Dr Wright’s will.

In 1891 a two-bed accident ward was added, which treated 1,475 patients in its first year. An extension to the building was opened in 1907, including an operating theatre and new wing. In 1911 the King Edward VII Memorial Fund was opened and the Memorial Wing was completed in 1923, comprising two wards, a laundry and mortuary. The official opening was in February 1925 by Her Royal Highness Princess Mary. The wards were demolished after closure of the Dispensary in 2011, but the Southgate entrance, laundry and mortuary survive.
By the 1920s the name Pontefract General Infirmary had been adopted and the hospital expanded down the Friarwood Valley throughout the 20th century. The Hydes Hospital for children was built in the 1930s, paid for by a bequest from Wilfred Hutton Hydes. The fund still exists as the Hydes Hospital Trust (106387), providing grants for the benefit of children's health. PGI was a voluntary hospital, paid for by subscription, donations and requests up until July 1948 when it was absorbed into the NHS.

A large development of medical and surgical wards designed by John Poulson was opened by Princess Margaret in 1966, and In the 1970s there were further extensions onto the south side of Friarwood Lane, including a maternity unit, elderly care and psychiatric beds. In 1991 additions were made to Poulson's medical wards and a new A&E which was opened by Princess Anne. Before it closed in 2011, PGI was a district general hospital of nearly 500 beds.

By the late 1990s it was apparent that hospital services across the Wakefield District needed reconfiguring for the 21st century. PGI and Pinderfields General Hospital merged as a single hospital trust in 1997 and a private finance initiative for the building of new hospitals in Pontefract and Wakefield was progressed. Major hospital services were to be centralised in a new Pinderfields Hospital in Wakefield and a new outpatient hospital built in Pontefract. The new Pontefract Hospital was opened in 2010, and the new Pinderfields Hospital in 2011. The Pinderfields and Pontefract Hospitals NHS Trust merged with Dewsbury Healthcare Trust in 2002 to become the Mid Yorkshire Hospitals NHS Trust.