A YORKSHIREMAN treasures vivid memories of the unusual first holiday he spent in Southport more than 60 years ago.
For three weeks in late 1945, 11-year- old Sheffield lad Jack Hoyle was a patient at the North of England Children’s Sanatorium in Hawkshead Street. And despite its imposing exterior and warnings of an “awful” reputation, Jack describes his stay as “a great experience and adventure”.
Now 73 and living in Grimsby, Jack told LookBack that he owed his first stay beside the sea to a nasty bout of wartime malnourishment.
He said: “A few weeks before I went my mum had said to me, ‘you’re so thin I could easily play a tune on your ribs’. Years of wartime rations and food shortages had left us without a great choice of food variety.”
Taken to a doctor for examination, Jack was referred to the Children’s Sanatorium on the grounds he “needed feeding up”.
Initially, his reaction was one of excitement. But this turned to trepidation when, on arrival at Chapel Street station, his father asked a passing woman directions to the Sanatorium.
“She gaped at Dad and said ‘You are surely not taking that nice boy to such an awful place,’” remembered Jack.
The old Victorian building itself on Hawkshead Street was far from welcoming.
Jack said it looked “cold and sombre”, with bars on its upstairs windows and surrounded by a high wall.
Inside, while it was “rather cold and draughty”, Jack saw “a play area full of lovely brand new toys of many kinds.”
He continued: “However I was told that we could only play with them on rainy days, the reason for this was that it was important for us to get fresh air and exercise – usually while kicking a ball in the park.”
Once, while out with other patients, Jack saw a prominent local businessman being pushed in a wheelchair.
The elderly man was Bob Martin, the entrepreneur behind the range of pet products that were produced in the town.
Also among Jack’s vivid memories of his stay were a visit by the then Mayor of Southport, Mr S. Ernest Charlton, and a journey by horse and dray – the only transport the Sanatorium had.
After a Catholic Mass held to celebrate harvest festival, Jack and another boy were given a ride back to Hawkshead Street on a horse and dray, “driven by an old man with a waxed moustache”.
Jack said: “Our job was to carry and load all the produce from the service onto the dray and bring it back to the home – some treat!”
After three weeks at the Sanatorium, Jack had put on 3lbs and was judged able to return to his parents.
“It had been a great experience and adventure, which I have never forgotten,” he said

Picture courtesy of Merseyside Record Office, Liverpool Libraries

Patients at the North of England Children’s Sanatorium in Hawkshead Street, around 1908

Patients and nurses outside the Sanatorium, with its horse and dray, as remembered by Jack Hoyle

Children playing with a range of toys, including a rocking chair, inside the Sanatorium

A line drawing of the Sanatorium by Mellor & Sutton Architects of London Street

THE exact origins of the Sanatorium on Hawkshead Street remain unclear, although a Mary Smith is known to have been instrumental in its foundation.

Records indicate Miss Smith first rented a house in School Street, Southport, in the 1850s for use as a treatment centre for children. That facility closed around 1858, but she went on to rent another house in Hawkshead Street for the same purpose – with a Hungarian homeopathic doctor, Dr John D'Arnin Blumberg, as the new Sanatorium’s medical officer.

It transferred to larger, purpose-built accommodation on Hawkshead Street in 1878.

Further extensions in 1938 allowed for the treatment of about 150 children at the same time, who came from across the UK but mainly from Northern England.

The Sanatorium was funded on a voluntary basis until it was taken over by the NHS in 1948, and renamed the Children's Convalescent Hospital. Numerous changes ensued, and by the time of the establishment’s closure in 1971 it was caring for the elderly rather than children.

Do you remember the old Children’s Sanatorium on Hawkshead Street? Share your memories below

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