• 1 Brunon-Ernst, Anne, « Introduction », Revue d’études benthamiennes, 19 (2021), http://journals.open (...)

1When one thinks about a potential link between utilitarianism and lunacy reform in nineteenth-century Britain, the element that spontaneously comes to mind is the connection between Bentham’s panopticon and the architectural conception of lunatic asylums. But even though, as Anne Brunon-Ernst puts it, “Bentham’s panopticon projects were widely circulated in penal reformist circles and contributed to the debate on how to build an efficient penal system”,1 its influence on asylum architecture was actually marginal.

• 2 De Champs, Emmanuelle, « Utilitarisme et liberté » and « Religion, politique et utilité chez Jeremy (...)

2The real connection between utilitarianism and lunacy reform is to be found much more clearly in the general context and conception of the “New” Poor Law. Jeremy Bentham's ideas resonated with reformers in general, regardless of party. For instance, Bentham was deeply involved in devising the “Poor Law Amendment Act” (1834) – even though he died in 1832, before the actual implementation of the system. It was precisely thanks to his support that Edwin Chadwick – Bentham’s private secretary – was appointed Assistant Poor Law Commissioner in 1832, and later as head of the Poor Law Commission, where he defended utilitarian values, and especially the ideal of general happiness as being superior to individual happiness. Bentham's postulate is that the search for pleasure and the desire to escape suffering are the motives for action of every rational being, and that the sum of all individual happiness must result in the greatest possible happiness for the greatest number. But if all action is automatically and inherently based on a selfish desire, then how can we instil in everyone a moral sense and altruism sufficiently developed so that everyone feels concerned about the happiness of the greatest number? It is on this point that the opinions of utilitarians themselves diverge, and that two schools of thought emerged. For some, who could be described as supporters of a "natural Benthamism", self-interest and freedom of personal action are to be privileged and will inevitably lead to "a natural harmony of interests". For others, on the other hand, all the obstacles that man must overcome alone are too great to hope for a truly free action that would lead to happiness, and this fully justifies the role of the State, which must ensure to each one the most favourable conditions possible for the realisation of their happiness. In this context of "artificial harmony of interests", the State ensures a role of protection and guardianship, to guide the citizen on the path to autonomy.2

• 3 Robert Owen, who was an industrialist, set out to make his cotton mill of New Lanark (in Scotland)  (...)
• 4 Siméon, Ophélie, Robert Owen’s Experiment at New Lanark. From Paternalism to Socialism (Cham, Switz (...)

4Hanwell Asylum was the first public asylum for the pauper lunatics living in the County of Middlesex. It opened its doors in 1831, in the South-West suburbs of London. In the late 1830s, more than 1,000 patients lived on the premises, making it the largest psychiatric institution in the country. The treatment applied there was based on the principle of “no restraint” or “non-restraint”, a method that aimed at giving freedom of movement to all patients. Its originality from a medical point of view was reinforced by its social and, indeed, political dimension, well beyond a strictly therapeutical field. From the year 1839 onwards, when Dr. John Connolly was appointed medical superintendent of the institution, the asylum was governed with the avowed aim to help male and female patients alike to receive proper instruction within the asylum school, which remained highly controversial and constantly threatened with closure. Conolly was well-known for his commitment to the cause of popular education, as a member of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, as well as for his support of the Chartist movement. He thus viewed education as a central element, going far beyond a mere distraction for the insane and truly constituting a tool for social insertion and a means of emancipation for the lower classes. His views on education were similar to a utopian socialist (or Owenite) conception of schooling, and Hanwell’s instructional amenities were a faithful replica of the New Lanark School3 founded in the early nineteenth century. Besides, Robert Owen (1771-1858) – now considered one of the founding fathers of British socialism4 came to Hanwell Asylum and visited John Conolly soon after he was appointed superintendent there, during the spring of 1839.

• 11 Bartlett, Peter, The Poor Law of Lunacy, pp. 1-7.
• 12 Gardner, James, Sweet Bells Jangled Out of Tune: A History of the Sussex Lunatic Asylum (St Francis (...)
• 13 Hodgkinson, Ruth G., The Origins of the National Health Service. The Medical Services of the New Po (...)
• 14 Turner, Trevor Howard, “Rich and Mad in Victorian England”, Lectures on the History of Psychiatry ( (...)
• 15 Ibid.

7That lunacy reform was part of a wider social movement, as analysed by Peter Bartlett11, is hardly debatable. The first parliamentary enquiry concerning mental illness and its treatment was launched in 1807 and a new one was organised in 1815, more complete and with a more pragmatical view. Its mission was to control and examine the living conditions in asylums and madhouses, and to make various suggestions on how to improve the care of the insane, whether it be in public or private institutions. Two years later, the results of the investigation were published in a very long and detailed parliamentary report (600 pages) that clearly mentioned the “appalling degradation, inhuman treatment and neglect of pauper lunatics in public and private institutions”.12 According to the report, mental illness was rapidly becoming a central public health issue in Britain and should be treated as such and taken seriously. The rate of mental illness was constantly growing and in 1815 it accounted for 2.26 cases out of 10,000 for the whole population, which was deemed preoccupying. In 1844, this rate actually reached 12.66 out of 10,000, i.e. 6 times more than in 1815.13 It would be difficult to explain thoroughly and with absolute certainty why there was such an increase in mental illness in the 19th century and this remains a puzzling question. A few factors may still be of interest to account for this phenomenon. This could have been linked first to a shift in values, making the Victorian society less tolerant to individual behaviours and more normative. This explanation, attractive as it may be, is not entirely convincing though, as asylums’ records show that the reasons why people were sent to asylums in the Victorian era did not differ radically from what happened before, and admissions to asylums were often based on quite rational criteria (self-destructive behaviour, aggressive behaviour on the street, attempted murder, delusional speech, dementia). Another factor could have been the detrimental effects of the new modes of production on people’s physical and mental health, in a society that had been radically transformed by the industrial revolution and in which competition and hard work were essential: working in a factory for more than fourteen hours a day was logically likely to affect workers’ health and could lead them to various forms of self-destructive behaviour such as alcoholism. There was indeed great concern among alienists concerning the influence of what they called “circumstances” on their patients’ health. As three quarters of the population suffering from mental illness were poor, this factor in the increase of madness in the 19th century should not be underestimated and clearly placed this phenomenon as a central issue for the authorities in charge of poor relief. Urbanisation and industrialisation also contributed to a social “need to segregate a group of people unable to cope for themselves in such an organized world”.14 Trevor Turner rightly points out that “the mopish villagers of seventeenth-century England could not be expected to deal with the regulated working hours of the nineteenth-century factories”.15 This explanation is quite convincing and relevant in the sense that it rightly considers that the more demanding a society is, the more difficult it becomes for people who are not energetic, competitive or healthy enough to survive under such social pressure.

• 16 Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 7th Earl of Shaftesbury (1801-1885). He became Lord Shaftesbury in 1851, the (...)
• 17 Jones, K., Lunacy, Law and Conscience, p. 135.

8As mental illness became more and more central in public health concerns and policies, a new parliamentary inquiry was set up in 1827, with a young and recently-elected MP who was soon to become a prominent figure in British politics: Lord Ashley (later Lord Shaftesbury).16 The report was published in June 182717 and paved the way for a series of Acts of Parliament that reorganised the whole system and enabled Britain to enter a new age of therapeutic optimism and reconsideration of the way people should be treated and supported when they suffered from mental illness. It was also part of a more global reconsideration and reshaping of how to organize and rationalize poor relief. Following the specific legislation established after 1827, that defined how the mentally ill should be taken care of, eight new public asylums were built between 1828 and 1842 – which meant that there were now sixteen public institutions in England. But one may wonder why sending people to an asylum was seen as the only option available to cure the mentally ill or at least to take care of them. If we do consider that the County Asylums Acts were clearly embedded in the general legal context of the Poor Law, especially after it was amended in 1834, this choice then becomes quite logical and easily understandable. The law strictly favoured indoor relief over outdoor relief, meaning that if you were a pauper and wanted to be financially helped you had to go to the workhouse. Even though the mentally ill were not supposed to be officially part of this new scheme, as three quarters of them belonged to the lower classes the orientation that was given by the authorities concerning the assistance that was offered to them still had to remain compatible with the general principles of the New Poor Law.

• 18 Esquirol, Étienne, Aliénation mentale. Des illusions chez les aliénés. Question médico-légale sur l (...)
• 19 Gardiner Hill, Robert, Total Abolition of Personal Restraint in the Treatment of the Insane. A Lect (...)

9From a purely therapeutic point of view, the promotion of the asylum was based on the idea that isolation was an integral component of the treatment. This notion of isolation as a means to cure mental illness was recognised as deeply efficient by all English and French alienists18 at the time, and concretely meant that people should be placed in institutions where they would be deliberately isolated from their familiar background, i.e., their family and ordinary social environment, with the idea that this was the only way to enable them to regain energy and peace of mind. Thus, the intention was not primarily to exclude people from society but more to offer them a specific place in which they could be sheltered from external aggressions and would recover, an “asylum” in the basic and true sense of the term, “a Refuge from distress; an Asylum, not in name but in deed and in truth” as Robert Gardiner Hill put it.19

• 20 Showalter, Elaine, The Female Malady. Women, Madness and English Culture, 1830-1980 (London, Virago (...)

10As asylums were now conceived as a genuine therapeutic tool (even though the reality could sometimes be less glorious than the original intentions), a reputation gradually emerged throughout the century of Britain as a progressive country in terms of patients’ rights and as the centre of lunacy reform in the world. Elaine Showalter confirms that “from the 1830s to about 1870, experiment in the humane management of madness put English psychiatry in the avant-garde of Western medical practice and made English lunatic asylums a mecca for doctors and social investigators from all over the world”.20

• 22 Crammer, J.L., “English Asylums and English Doctors: Where Scull is Wrong”, History of Psychiatry, (...)
• 23 Miller, Edgar, “Variations in the Official Prevalence and Disposal of the Insane in England Under t (...)
• 24 Wright, David, “The Certification of Insanity in Nineteenth-century England and Wales”, History of (...)
• 25 Hodgkinson, Ruth G., The Origins of the National Health Service, p. 3.
• 26  Abel-Smith, Brian, The Hospitals 1800-1948. A Study in Social Administration in England and Wales (...)
• 27 Article 27 of the Poor Law, in Roberts, Andrew, Mental Health Timeline, A Middlesex University Reso (...)

12Although the asylum officially became the preferred solution for the care of the insane, it seems that the number of patients housed in workhouses in 1844 was in fact greater than the number of residents in asylums: 3,579 insane persons were in public asylums, as opposed to 4,080 in workhouses, with the remainder divided between private asylums (2,559) and 'care' at home, most often provided by their family and friends (3,940).22 Patients were usually kept in the workhouse in order to save money, since “the cost of keeping an insane person in the asylum was always appreciably larger than looking after the same individual in the workhouse”,23 and sending people to a lunatic asylum was in fact “the most expensive option open to poor law authorities”.24 Theoretically, however, the mentally ill were not supposed to be cared for in workhouses. Indeed, the denial of outdoor relief to able-bodied paupers, one of the basic principles of the law, did not apply to the sick, nor to the mentally retarded, who were expressly excepted from the prohibitory order”.25 For this category of population, indoor relief should in principle remain an option, and if it was not possible for them to stay at home, it was recommended that they be “accommodated in separate buildings away from the punitive establishment for the able-bodied[...]”26 Article 27 of the Act provided that aid might be granted to “any adult person who shall from old age or infirmity of body be wholly unable to work, without requiring that such person shall reside in any workhouse”.27 As far as mentally ill people were concerned, article 45 clearly stated the following principle:

• 29  Bynum, William F., “Rationales for Therapy in British Psychiatry”, in Scull, A. (ed.), Madhouses, (...)
• 30 Browne, William Alexander Francis, “The Moral Treatment of the Insane; a Lecture”, Journal of Menta (...)
• 31 Ibid., p. 313.

14The notion of “moral treatment” is in some way a reference to all “therapeutic efforts which [affect] the patient’s psychology”.29 Scottish alienist William Alexander Francis Browne underlines that “there is a fallacy in conceiving that Moral Treatment consists in being kind and humane to the insane. It is this, and a great deal more than this”.30 He defines moral treatment (or “moral management”) as “every mode by which the mind is influenced through the mind itself; in contradistinction to medical treatment, in which the mind is acted upon remotely by material agents, and through the body”.31 There are still elements in the application of moral management that do affect the body as it tends to focus on improving the living conditions of patients and their comfort on a daily basis, perhaps even more than on the idea of a fruitful and therapeutic dialogue between the patient and his doctor:

• 33 Skultans, Vieda, Madness and Morals: Ideas on Insanity in the Nineteenth Century (London, Boston, R (...)
• 34 Charland, Louis C., “Benevolent Theory: Moral Treatment at the York Retreat”, History of Psychiatry(...)
• 35 Bynum, W. F., “Rationales for Therapy in British Psychiatry”, p. 37.
• 36 Clark, Sir James, A Memoir of John Conolly, M.D., D.C.L., Comprising a Sketch of the Treatment of t (...)
• 37 Tuke, Daniel Hack, Chapters in the History of the Insane in the British Isles (London, Kegan Paul (...)

15According to Vieda Skultans, what seems to be essential in moral management is the will to re-establish or reinforce the control that any individual can have over himself and his actions ("self control"). Skultans sees this as part of a pattern of values characteristic of the Victorian era and popularised by an author such as Samuel Smiles.33 Moral treatment is indeed based on a fundamental desire to “encourage autonomy”,34 and not to enslave patients; it is “simultaneously a triumph of humanism and of therapy, a recognition that kindness, reason, and tactful manipulation [are] more effective in dealing with the inmates of an asylum than [are] fear, brutal coercion and restraint, and medical therapy”.35 It is also systematically associated to what Lord Ashley called the non-coercion system ,36 another term for “non-restraint” or “no restraint”: “by this term is technically meant the non-use of mechanical restraint of the limbs by the strait waistcoat, leg-locks, etc.[...]”.37

• 38 For an in-depth study of Hanwell Asylum, see Dubois, Laurence, L’Asile de Hanwell : un modèle utopi (...)
• 39 Walton, John, “The Treatment of Pauper Lunatics in Victorian England: The Case of Lancaster Asylum, (...)
• 40 An approach to treating mental illness in the 19^th century influenced by humanism and a belief that (...)
• 41 Suzuki, Akihito, “The Politics and Ideology of Non-Restraint: The Case of the Hanwell Asylum”, Medi (...)
• 42 Ibid.
• 43 Ibid., pp. 2, 5-6.
• 44 Ibid., p. 6.
• 45 Ibid, pp. 2, 5-6.
• 46 Tebbutt, Francis, Letter to the Magistrates of the County of Middlesex, from the Rev. Francis Tebbu (...)
• 47 Suzuki, A., “The Politics and Ideology of Non-Restraint”, p. 10.
• 48 Tebbutt, F., Letter to the Magistrates, p. 27.

16What makes Hanwell Asylum so unique and at the same time so typical in the Victorian psychiatric landscape is the fact that it remained a benchmark in the treatment of the insane for nearly thirty years, and served as a model for many other institutions, particularly in England.38 If non-restraint was actually seen as a controversial form of treatment in the 1830s and remained difficult to impose upon a large number of institutions (for safety reasons among others), the fact that it proved successful at Hanwell, the largest asylum in the country, represented a genuine revolution for British alienists and radically changed the paradigm for the treatment of the insane. Non-restraint then rapidly became the norm, a sort of psychiatric orthodoxy recognised all over the country. The evidence lies in the fact that in the middle of the 1840s, only 5 asylums in England applied a policy of non-restraint for their inmates. From 1854 onwards, 27 out of the 30 public asylums in the kingdom had adopted this system, and 9 out of the 14 private madhouses were also part of it.39 Two years later, only one public asylum remained that had not turned to non-restraint and moral management.40 The success of the system at Hanwell Asylum is both Conolly's and the Justices of the Peace's achievement in supporting non-restraint as a gesture towards the poor and the insane. Akihito Suzuki proposes a properly political reading of the action taken in Hanwell; he believes that “the role of the county magistrates of Middlesex was as vital as that of the medical head”,41 and that non-restraint is part of an overall reform of asylum management, entirely “initiated, planned and executed by the magistrates”.42 According to him, what was at stake here was the fact that they wanted to find their own place in relation to the central government, in a form of confrontation and competition with the government, both on the issue of asylums and on that of prison reform,43 and to demonstrate that local authorities were as competent as central authorities, if not more so. In this context, magistrates presented themselves as “agents of modernization and allies of the reformers”.44 At Hanwell, two magistrates played a leading role in the implementation of the non-restraint policy: John Adams and Charles Augustus Tulk, who, although of different political persuasions – one was a Tory, the other a Whig – agreed on the measures to be taken to reform the asylum. John Adams, “a sergeant-at-law and the chairman of the magistrates from 1839 to 1844”,45 was actively supportive of Conolly: it was on his initiative that Conolly visited Robert Gardiner Hill at Lincoln Asylum – a pioneering institution – before he took up his post to see how the system worked on the ground, and he gave him daily advice and encouragement. It is said that John Conolly, in his early days, wrote him up to three letters a day, in the greatest secrecy.46 Adams also published more than twenty articles in favour of non-restraint in The Lancet (under the pseudonym "A Looker-On").47 He was perfectly aware of the support he was giving, and even stated privately that “Dr. Conolly had much to contend against in the committee, and that if it were not for him, […] [he] would not be able to go on[...]”.48

• 49 Suzuki, A., “The Politics and Ideology of Non-Restraint”, p. 7.
• 50 A society founded in 1810 for the purpose of translating into English, publishing and publicising t (...)
• 51 Suzuki, A., “The Politics and Ideology of Non-Restraint”, p. 8.

17Charles Augustus Tulk, on the other hand, was more discreet; he seemed to be less present in the daily life of the asylum or at Conolly's side, but he still provided him with valuable institutional support, and was undeniably a strong ally. Indeed, Charles Augustus Tulk was a former Whig MP, “liberal in his religious views” and very close to Joseph Hume, “the radical People’ s MP”.49 He was president of the Swedenborg Society50 and patron of the poet William Blake,51 so he must be considered as an important figure, not just locally.

• 52 Ibid., pp. 3 and 17.

18The role played by the magistrates, in particular Adams and Tulk, cannot be underestimated, and Akihito Suzuki's analysis is highly relevant in that it sheds light on Hanwell's experience in a way that takes the general context into account and demonstrates the extent to which it would be meaningless to consider it from a strictly therapeutic point of view or as the work of a single man. However, to infer than Conolly is a “mere cog of a huge bureaucratic machine”52 , as Suzuki does, seems difficult to justify. To see Conolly as a sort of pawn, manipulated by the magistrates, is to forget that Conolly was also strongly politically committed, as a supporter of the Chartists and of popular education, that he was an Owenite sympathiser, the former mayor of Stratford and a lifelong participant in the public sphere.

• 53 Lawson, John, and Harold Silver, A Social History of Education in England, (London and New York, Ro (...)
• 54 Sutherland, Gillian, in Thompson, F.M.L. (ed.), The Cambridge Social History of Britain, 1750-1950,(...)

19His involvement in education for his male and female patients at Hanwell is one of the best illustrations of his personal convictions, sometimes expressed against the magistrates ruling the asylum, as they had some reluctance to invest in the education of these poor people who were the majority of the asylum's patients. This was in line with the classic mindset of the authorities responsible for implementing the Poor Law, who were “frequently hostile to the idea of educating paupers” .53 The education of the poor was indeed a controversial issue in the nineteenth century, and “by no means everyone was convinced either that the working class should be educated or that government should have a hand in the process”.54 It was not uncommon to think, then, that if the poor were to be satisfied with their lot, it was necessary to keep them in ignorance, as Paul Sangster points out:

• 56 Armytage, W.H.G., Four Hundred Years of English Education (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1 (...)
• 57 Wardle, David, English Popular Education 1780-1870 (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1970), p (...)

20This is not to say that John Conolly's motivations were not genuinely therapeutic, for he saw the benefits of education as a valuable adjunct to treatment. However, his commitment was not without a certain political and social significance, and it was probably in this respect that he came up against the institution's administrators. He could not fail to be aware that poverty, as much as insanity, was an obstacle to education and as a former active member of the “Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge”, he undoubtedly adhered to this ideal of “salvation through science” .56 It is also known that for Chartists, especially those who identified with the so-called 'moral force' movement, education was an essential element in a “programme which naturally favoured any extension of educational opportunity to members of the working-class”.57 For Conolly, the relationship between the democratisation of education and the extension of suffrage was crystal clear:

• 59 Clark, Sir J., A Memoir of John Conolly, p. 4.
• 60 Remarks by his son-in-law, Henry Maudsley, himself a psychiatrist, in 1866, when Conolly died, quot (...)
• 61 Wood, Laura Christine, “John Conolly and the Historical Interpretation of Moral Management,” Master (...)
• 62 Founded in 1826 by Lord Brougham, the aim of this organisation was to publish popular scientific or (...)
• 63 A Mechanics' Institute whose creation also seems to have been supported by the Unitarian Chapel of (...)
• 64 Conolly, J., “A Lecture on the Attractions and Advantages of Knowledge”, p. 32
• 65 Ibid, p. 5

22When he lived in Stratford-upon-Avon, John Conolly was particularly active locally in social and political life, becoming an alderman and then mayor of the town.59 He set up a hospital and a dispensary for the poor, and “being a reformer by nature and a hearty liberal in politics, he ardently devoted himself to every measure of progress” .60 According to his biographer, James Clark, it was at this time that he met Dr George Birkbeck, who introduced him to Lord Brougham, “the great Whig politician who was deeply involved in social improvement activities” .61 Conolly then became involved with the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge,62 attending their meetings and writing a few articles for their publications. He was also involved in the development of Mechanics' Institutes, to which he made a long-term commitment, including a public speech at the opening ceremony of the Mechanics' Institute in Leicester,63 in February 1834. In this speech entitled “A Lecture on the attractions and advantages of knowledge”64 , John Conolly declared himself “an enthusiast in the cause of popular education”.65

• 66 Maudsley, Henry, “Memoir of the late John Conolly”, Journal of Mental Science, 12 (1866) p. 166.
• 67 Stern, Edward S., “Three Nineteenth-Century Psychiatrists of Warwickshire”, Journal of Mental Scien (...)
• 68 Suzuki, Akihito, Madness at Home: The Psychiatrist, the Patient and the Family in England, 1820-186 (...)
• 69 Stern, E.S., “Three Nineteenth-Century Psychiatrists of Warwickshire”, pp. 187-188.
• 70 Scull, A., Social Order/ Mental Disorder, p. 186. However, after leaving Hanwell, John Millingen pu (...)
• 71 Letter from John Conolly to Thomas Coates, dated 26 August 1839, Society for the Diffusion of Knowl (...)

23At the same period of his life, an opportunity arose: Conolly, through the SDUK, had remained closely linked to Lord Brougham, to whom “he entertained a great and sincere admiration”,66 and had become close friends with Thomas Coates, the society's secretary. This had a major influence on his (short) academic career, as it is widely believed that he only gained a position as a Professor of the Practice of Medicine at University College London thanks to the “influence of Lord Brougham, one of the joint founders of the University” .67 Suzuki considers that this position represented “a huge jump for a provincial general practitioner”,68 and that this type of promotion would have been unthinkable without the high patronage of Lord Brougham. Edward Stern, however, qualifies the importance and prestige of the position, and recalls that “the men appointed to the fourteen initial chairs were all young and obscure, and mostly from over the border, since the emoluments were small – the total University outlay on all salaries being only £ 7,500 – and security tenuous”.69 He also speculates that Conolly owed the position not only to Brougham but perhaps more to the support of Samuel Parr, parson of Hatton, with whom he was very close in Stratford until his death in 1825, and who was actively involved in the initial project to establish the university. After three years of teaching, Conolly relinquished his chair of medicine at the University of London and returned to being a simple physician in the town of Warwick. In 1838, he applied for the position of medical superintendent at Hanwell Asylum. However, to his dismay, his application was rejected in favour of John Gideon Millingen’s, a retired army surgeon with no knowledge whatsoever of mental illness70. Conolly would discover the following year that it was precisely his progressive ideas and commitment to popular education that had cost him the job.71

• 72 Stern, E.S., “Three Nineteenth-Century Psychiatrists of Warwickshire”, p. 188.
• 73 The Warwick Advertiser, The Examiner and The Chartist, Sunday, 19 May 1839.

24Following this disappointment, Conolly moved to Birmingham, to try again to establish himself as a general practitioner, with no greater success than usual, although he did manage to teach at Queen's Hospital.72 But the position of superintendent at Hanwell, vacated prematurely by Millingen, became available again less than a year later, and this time Conolly was selected.73

• 74 “Hanwell Asylum Register of Officers and Servants”, Hanwell Asylum Records, London Metropolitan Arc (...)

25In Hanwell's staff records, the official date of his employment is 2 May 1839,74 and this date marked a real turning point in John Conolly's previously rather chaotic career.

• 75 Seed, John, The Role of Unitarianism in the Formation of Liberal Culture, 1775-1851: A Social Histo (...)
• 76 Hewett, Philip, Understanding Unitarians (London, Hibbert Trust, 1992), p. 7. Many Victorian reform (...)
• 77 The term, which can be confusing, especially in French, is to be taken here in the sense of "favour (...)
• 78 Suzuki, A., Madness at Home, p. 75.
• 79 Chartism was a political and social movement that developed throughout the country from 1837 to 184 (...)

26What is particularly striking in the image given of him by his contemporaries is that Conolly appears to be a perfectly consensual figure, part of a respectable philanthropic movement, which seems close to the evangelical movement because his actions were endorsed by Lord Ashley, and his political opinions are regularly concealed. His religious convictions are sometimes mentioned: Conolly was a Unitarian, which is quite consistent with his commitments, as it is known that “unlike many of the new evangelical dissenters, Unitarians inherited a tradition of loyalty to the Whigs”,75 and that the humanist current that underpins Unitarianism insists on a deep belief in progress and promotes “human effort, social planning, education” and “human rights”.76 Authors such as Akihito Suzuki and Scull have noted, in hindsight, that “[Conolly’s] personal belief in liberal77 ideology played a major role […] from the beginning of his career he had been moving in Whig and liberal circles”,78 but it is extremely rare that his contemporary biographers mention his political views. To learn more about them, it is necessary to read he testimony of Conolly's sworn enemy, Reverend Francis Tebbutt, former chaplain of Hanwell Asylum and dismissed at Conolly's request because their views were too diametrically opposed to be able to work together. Tebbutt clearly mentions Conolly’s support for the Chartists79 and his affinity with Robert Owen:

• 81 Queenwood (1839-1845) was the only British intentional community established with Robert Owen's end (...)

27While one must be cautious about the veracity of Francis Tebbutt's statements, given his hostility to Conolly, it must be acknowledged that the reliability of the verifiable information given in the rest of his testimony, and the accuracy of the details provided about William Pare allow a certain amount of credibility to be given to his statements. It is not insignificant that John Conolly, newly appointed to Hanwell Asylum, should have chosen to invite Robert Owen and William Pare, founding member² of the utopian community of Queenwood.81

• 82 Owen, R. D., Threading my Way, p. 198.
• 83 Ibid.
• 84 Report of the Annual General Meeting of the Proprietors of the University of London (23 Feb 1831), (...)
• 85 Circulars for the University of London, Medical courses available at the university for the year 18 (...)
• 86 Owen, R.D. Threading my Way, p. 198.
• 87 Receipt for shares in the University of London, £ 50 single shares in the University of London: one (...)
• 88 William Lovett (1800-1877), co-author of the People’s Charter, representative of the 'moral force' (...)
• 89 Dolléans, Édouard, Robert Owen, 1771-1858 : individualisme et socialisme (Paris, F. Alcan, 1907), p (...)
• 90 Suzuki, A., “The Politics and Ideology of Non-Restraint”, p. 7; Owen, R.D., Threading my Way, p. 19 (...)

28Even if it is very difficult to know for sure how Robert Owen and Conolly met, the most obvious lead again seems to be that of Lord Brougham, who was very close to Robert Owen as mentioned by his son, Robert Dale Owen, who emphasises the fact that Lord Brougham remained loyal to Owen until the end,82 including the years when Owen was ostracised by the ruling classes.83 Robert Owen's correspondence also includes a report of the annual general meeting of the Proprietors of the University of London84 and a circular from the University concerning the medical curriculum for the year 1831-1832,85 just after Conolly's departure. Indeed, Robert Owen, who also knew Jeremy Bentham very well from his days as his business partner in New Lanark,86 was a shareholder of the University of London.87 It is also possible that the link was made through Chartism, as former Owenites figured in this movement (although Owen himself was opposed to the extension of franchise), notably William Lovett ,88 leader of the 'moral force' Chartists.89 It is not impossible that Robert Owen also knew one of the above-mentioned asylum's magistrates, Charles Augustus Tulk, a former Whig MP, through a mutual acquaintance, Joseph Hume, “the radical People's MP”.90

• 91 Harrison, J.F.C., Utopianism and Education: Robert Owen and the Owenites (New York, Teachers Colleg (...)
• 92 Harrison, J.F.C., Robert Owen and the Owenites in Britain and America: The Quest for the New Moral (...)
• 93 Harvey, Rowland Hill, Robert Owen, Social Idealist (Berkeley, University of California Press, 1949) (...)
• 94 This concern for adult education is commonly found in socialist projects for society, notably in Ét (...)
• 95 Lawson, J., and H. Silver, A Social History of Education in England, p. 292.

30When one looks for traces of Robert Owen's influence on Conolly, assuming that Owen's visit to Conolly at Hanwell Asylum a few weeks after he took office was necessarily significant, it is undoubtedly in their relationship to education that we find them, and it is on this theme that the two men most visibly converge. Given what we know about the aims of education at Hanwell, the way lessons were conducted and the teaching practices based on pleasure, exchange and encouragement, Robert Owen's influence on Conolly's fight for education seems clearly identifiable. The innovative and respectful pedagogical practices, the permanent insistence on playfulness and enjoyment, are the most striking and singular elements of the experiment carried out, and the similarities with an Owenite conception of education are sufficiently striking to confirm Conolly's links with radicalism and Owenism. JFC Harrison considers that “few social reformers have accorded education such a central place in their philosophy as the Owenites. They spoke in lyrical terms of what could be achieved by it and attributed vast power to its influence”.91 For them, school represents “the steam engine of the moral world”.92 Owenites are of course deeply opposed “to the use of the whip and other coercive methods practiced by the teachers of their day”.93 They also advocate for the opening of schools for all children and the organisation of courses for adults.94 According to some historians, their activity represents “the most deeply rooted popular education movement of the century”.95

• 96 Owen, R.D., Threading my Way, pp. 114-115.
• 97 Podmore, Frank, Robert Owen: a Biography (London, Hutchinson & Co, 1906, vol. 1), p. 159.
• 98 Owen, R.D., Threading my Way, p. 114.

31It is difficult to define with certainty the extent to which the mode of education at Hanwell Asylum was consciously and deliberately copied from an Owenite model, or to what extent the influence may have been more unconscious and diffuse. The profile of John Conolly, a member of the SDUK, close to Chartism, moving in liberal, radical and Owenite circles tips the balance in favour of the former. His links with Lord Brougham further strengthen the credibility of this hypothesis, as Lord Brougham, impressed by the New Lanark school, set up a committee in London around 1818 to promote the development of a network of Infant Schools on the same model throughout the capital.96 The founding members of this committee included one of Owen's associates, John Walker, but also Henry Hase, Lord Lansdowne, Thomas Babington and Zachary Macaulay.97 They opened a school in 1819 in Brewers' Green, Westminster. To carry out his project, Brougham hired a teacher from New Lanark, James Buchanan, who was originally a weaver, but whom Owen had trained to become the schoolmaster in New Lanark.98

• 99 Suzuki, A., “The Politics and Ideology of Non-Restraint”, p. 13.
• 100 Showalter, E., The Female Malady, p. 112.
• 101 Ibid., p. 45.

32According to Akihito Suzuki, Charles Augustus Tulk, when he was at the head of the asylum’s committee, designed Hanwell Asylum on the model of “the utopian factory of Robert Owen, who reportedly once came to see Conolly at the asylum”.99 That Tulk was no stranger to Robert Owen's theories and practices is not impossible, but it seems quite logical, given Conolly's intellectual and political background, that Conolly himself may have had a desire to create a form of utopian community on the New Lanark model in the asylum. Elaine Showalter also considers that “Conolly saw asylum reforms as the beginning of social reform and utopian harmony”100 and that Owen’s influence is obvious:101 

• 103 Showalter, E., The Female Malady, p. 46.

33It seems that Conolly had “found an outlet for his liberalism in creating the experimental community of Hanwell”,103 rather than extending his political activities into the outside world, or taking a more official and active stand for the Chartist movement, which he otherwise supported.

• 104 Harrison, J.F.C., Utopianism and Education: Robert Owen and the Owenites, p. 156.

34It may seem strange or too bold, even incongruous, to compare a pauper lunatic asylum (Hanwell) to a factory (New Lanark). This comparison is indeed strange if one considers the asylum as a separate structure, strictly medical and disconnected from social realities. It is much more rational when we accept the idea that the Victorian asylum is one of the ways of caring for the poor, in the same vein as the workhouse, and is part of a wider programme, governed by the Poor Law authorities. Nor could New Lanark be considered as a mere factory, but rather, as J.F.C. Harrison points out, as “a genuine attempt, even though rudimentary and clumsily paternal, at community organization”104 The reality of an institution such as Hanwell Asylum cannot be understood without taking its medico-social dimension into account.

• 105 Morton, Arthur Leslie, The Life and Ideas of Robert Owen (London, Lawrence & Wishart, 1962), p. 26.
• 106 John Bost, 1817-1881. His real (French) name was Jean, but as he spent much of his time in England, (...)
• 107 Baron, Michel, John Bost : la cité utopique (Carrières-sous-Poissy, La Cause, 1998), p. 43.
• 108 The institution was created in the village of La Force. The asylum founded by Bost, "La Famille", t (...)
• 109 Baron, M., John Bost : la cité utopique, p. 31
• 110 Ibid., p. 9.
• 111 It can be assumed, without certainty (even if this is the thesis supported by Suzuki), that Charles (...)

35If John Conolly never publicly acknowledged the inspiration that New Lanark and Owen may have represented for him, it may have been because he found himself in charge of Hanwell Asylum at a time when Robert Owen, initially a respected upper-class philanthropist, had become much less respectable, because of his socialist, even communist theories, which were perceived as a danger by the elites.105 Hanwell Asylum was actually not the only mental hospital to have been designed on the New Lanark model, because a French Protestant minister by the name of John Bost,106 influenced during his stays in Great Britain by “people who were sympathetic to Owen's thinking”,107 created in 1848, in France (in the Dordogne),108 an institution for psychiatric care, where “everything is open onto gardens, everything is flowered as in a park. John Bost did not integrate any walls, fences or closed doors”.109 According to Michel Baron, “from the outset, we sense that John Bost's ambition was not only to take charge of the world's misery but, based on this misery, to set up a utopian place where an ideal city could be achieved”.110 That Conolly had a similar ambition at Hanwell is entirely plausible, given his political convictions and appetite for all forms of social progress. It is not surprising, however, that he was secretive about his deep-seated ambitions, for it must be remembered that John Conolly was not the sole master of Hanwell, and it is highly unlikely, if not impossible, that he would have been followed by all the magistrates if he had presented his plan for asylum reform in terms of the creation of a utopian community based on an Owenite model.111

• 112 Sir James Clark, 1788-1870, physician to Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1860.
• 113 Thompson, F.M.L., The Rise of Respectable Society: A Social History of Victorian Britain, 1830-1900 (...)
• 114 Carré, Jacques, La Grande-Bretagne au XIX^e siècle (Paris, Hachette, « Les Fondamentaux », 1997), p. (...)
• 115 Dawson, Christopher, “The Humanitarians”, in Grisewood, Harman, Trevelyan, G.M., Russel, Bertrand e (...)
• 116 Jones, Dorsey D., Edwin Chadwick and the Early Public Health Movement, p. 61.
• 117 Ibid.

36Appearances may be deceptive, and John Conolly is often portrayed, particularly by his contemporaries, whether it be his friend and biographer Sir James Clark112 or observers, as a consensual figure of philanthropy well integrated into the Establishment. The enthusiastic support of Lord Ashley, who constantly sang his praises and publicly defended his non-restraint methods, might suggest that Conolly's work was fully in line with the evangelical trend: evangelical reformers were involved, alongside Utilitarians, in reforms concerning asylums and the care of the mentally ill. Evangelicalism was characterised by a call to public and political action, in areas as varied as church building and Bible teaching, but also the prevention of cruelty to animals, prison reforms and the abolition of slavery.113As Jacques Carré points out, the evangelical movement is generally associated with the defence of the oppressed.114 It is therefore not surprising that they should have been involved in lunacy reform. For Lord Ashley, an “evangelical aristocrat”,115 the desire for reform was not “a matter of principle, but the recognition of specific evils as a result of a keen social conscience”,116 and he himself was sometimes seen as a Benthamian utilitarian.117 More often than not, the boundaries between utilitarianism, evangelicalism, radicalism or utopian socialism in public action were blurred, and John Conolly’s figure may rightly be seen as a perfect illustration of those intertwined networks.