86, 87. Greenwich and Chelsea Hospitals, and Pensioners,
The wise and benevolent design of founding an hospital for those brave men who have been disabled by age or accident, from serving any longer in the navy, is said, to the honour of the female sex, to have originated with that excellent woman, Queen Mary, the wife of King William the Third; and the founding of an asylum for invalid soldiers at Chelsea, was also attributed to a female, one of King Charles the Second’s favourites. The buildings at each place are more like palaces than hospitals, and great care is taken to render the objects of the institution comfortable in their situations. The hospital at Chelsea, with its appendages, covers above forty acres of ground. There are three hundred and thirty-six in-door pensioners, and an unlimited number of out-door pensioners, who receive an annual allowance of seven pounds twelve shillings and sixpence each. Greenwich Hospital admits two thousand three hundred and fifty pensioners, who are provided with lodging, food, clothing, and pocket-money; exclusive of about twelve hundred out-pensioners, who receive seven pounds each per annum. Both hospitals are situated by the water-side. At Chelsea, the pensioners have gardens and fields to walk in; and at Greenwich, there is a large and pleasant park.
THE END.
Joseph Rickerby, Printer, Sherbourn Lane.