A Kingston Album. Marion Van de Wetering

      Cutting ice on the bay, 1894.

      Queen’s University Archives #PG-K 163-4. Mrs. de L’Panet collection.

      John Palmer Litchfield was a reporter whose time masquerading as a doctor landed him in an Australian debtors’ prison in the early 1800s. Upon leaving prison, Litchfield set sail for Canada, where he met John A. Macdonald. In 1854, Litchfield leased Rockwood Villa, built by George Browne for John Solomon Cartwright on his estate outside Kingston. By using Macdonald’s name, and the skills he had learned to pose as a doctor in Australia, Litchfield was also able to obtain a licence to operate an asylum for Kingston’s elite.

      Litchfield then campaigned long and loud for the government to establish a public asylum at Kingston, thus treating the elite separately from the criminals with whom they were currently housed in the penitentiary. In the fall of 1856, the government acquiesced. However, the actual construction was delayed by three more years. In the interim, the Villa’s stables were refurbished to shelter twenty-four female inmates who transferred from the penitentiary. The stables continued to house female inmates until 1868.

      Although the new asylum was built, using local limestone, by convict labour, supposedly providing a considerable savings over contracting out the work, the government complained continually about the cost of guards to oversee the labour. Work slowed to a crawl as Litchfield fought for enough money to complete the facility. Finally, after observing that operating costs could be curtailed if the insane at Kingston Penitentiary could also be housed in the new asylum, Litchfield got his wish. The building was completed in the spring of 1859 (125 years keeping people healthy, 1981).