Hill House

Earlier the doctor's house, it was 'sold... to Mrs. Gaussen, who has nearly re-built the place'. Alicia Fenton Gaussen was the daughter of William Henry Bayley of the Madras Civil Service, and the widow of James Robert Gaussen (d. 1870), surgeon with the Royal Artillery.In WWI, the house became a hospital: ‘The Red Cross Detachments were mobilised in 1915, and undertook to equip and run Hill House Hospital, Lyndhurst, which was generously handed over with a nominal rent by Canon Oldfield and his family. Equipment was given or lent, by the residents of Lyndhurst, and the hospital was opened on 24th March 1915, with 23 beds. The Hospital was run by a Committee of Management, with Colonel C. Heathcote, of “Beechwood”, Bartley, as Chairman.Patients were received from the Royal Victoria Hospital, Netley, for the first six months, and later from the New Zealand General Hospital at Brockenhurst. Dr. Gurney-Dixon and Dr. Syer Barrington White, were Voluntary Medical Officers at the Hospital. A Ward was reserved for Canadian and Portugese wood-cutters employed in the Forest, and for soldiers from the Bombing and Trench Mortar Schools established in Lyndhurst.A total of 1,016 patients were treated; the cost of care per in-patient was £4 2s 9d. The Hospital was closed on 31st July 1918.’