Henry CUNNEKY
Henry Cunneky (sic)
According to the 1881 UK census, Henry was born c1826 in Lough, Ireland.
There are only a few records found for Henry online, so his Irish surname was almost certainly written phonetically by the workhouse/asylum clerks. Without the correct spelling, Henry’s life before he entered the workhouse is unknown.
At roughly 41 years old, Henry suffered a mental health crisis or physical breakdown while working as a hawker and was admitted as a pauper on 7th March 1867 into the Peckham House Asylum. This was a major private “Licensed House” in South London that contracted with local unions to take in pauper lunatics when public county asylums were entirely full. After 16 months, Henry was deemed “Recovered” and discharged on 15th July 1868 back into the community.
This image below shows the column headers from the far-right side of the Lunacy Patients Admission Registers. These sub-columns were used by the clerks to record the final outcome or reason a patient left the asylum.
When a patient’s line was filled out, a clerk would put a tick mark or date in one of these four columns:
- Recovd. (Recovered): The patient was deemed mentally well and cured, allowing them to be formally discharged back to their home or community.
- Reld. (Relieved): The patient’s condition had significantly improved or stabilized, but they weren’t fully cured. This often meant they were well enough to leave, or they were being transferred to a workhouse or a different type of care facility.
- Not Impd. (Not Improved): The patient’s mental health state remained unchanged. Ticks here usually meant the patient was being transferred to a different asylum better suited for long-term care.
- Died: The patient passed away while actively residing in the asylum facility.
Henry relapsed just 3 months later and was admitted on 12th October 1868 into the Colney Hatch Asylum where the clerk spelt his name as “Conneky” (with an “o”). He was discharged as “Recovered” again on 31st May 1869.
On 19th November 1870 Henry was once again admitted but this time into the Middlesex Lunatic Asylum, known historically as the Hanwell Insane Asylum in Norwood, Middlesex.
When the 1881 census was taken, Henry was recorded as still being a 55-year-old patient in the Middlesex Lunatic Asylum. He was unmarried and had previously worked as a hawker. His birthplace was noted as being in Louth, Ireland. His total stay here was for twenty years before he was discharged as “Relieved” on 4th February 1890.
From there Henry was sent to the Essex County Lunatic Asylum, also known as Brentwood Asylum. He was still classed as “not improved”.
On 26th April 1892, Henry was transferred from the Brentwood Asylum to the Cane Hill Asylum in Coulsdon, Surrey, where he stayed, “not improved”, until 28th January 1896.
Henry was on his final asylum journey that had spanned across Middlesex, Essex and Surrey when on 14th May 1902 he was admitted into the care of Horton Asylum in Epsom, Surrey.
Henry Cunneky was aged 77 when he died there on 18th April 1903. His body was buried in grave 208 in the Horton Estate Cemetery on 23rd April.
