Ross MacFarlane on the floating Seamen's Hospital at Greenwich

In the 19th century, from the 1830s onwards, the various 'Dreadnought' hospital ships were moored on the river Thames, between Greenwich and Dartford. They were a place where sailors could be quarantined and treated for diseases and injuries acquired at sea, while the rest of London was also protected from the quarantined sailors.

In 1872 the last hospital ship was taken to the breakers yard, and a land Hospital established. In the 1890s a branch of that hospital was set up near Royal Albert Dock, across the Thames, which became the site of the first London School of Tropical Medicine.

This video is from Medical London, a book and project about 2000 years of health and sickness in the capital city, featuring seven self-guided walks. The Seamen's Hospital at Greenwich. is a point of interest on the fourth walk, 'Tall Ships and Tropical Diseases: Medicine and the British Empire in Greenwich'.