Whittingham Hospital

Whittingham Hospital is a former psychiatric institution in Whittingham near Preston, Lancashire, composed of several large red-brick buildings from the late 1800s. The site once included long connecting corridors between ward blocks, a railway station, cemeteries, chapels, and farm areas spread across open countryside.

The hospital opened in 1873 to house people with mental illness from across Lancashire and grew over decades with added wards and sanatoriums to become one of the largest psychiatric facilities in Britain. Parts of the site served wounded soldiers during both world wars before the hospital closed permanently in 1995 and was prepared for housing development.

The site lies between several small villages near Preston and is mainly reached by rural roads. Most of the original buildings have been demolished or redeveloped, so access to the historic structures is limited and mainly residential streets now occupy the area.

Staff members built a working EEG machine from leftover wartime materials in the late 1940s, which was used for brain research on patients. The site also had its own railway station from 1887 into the 1950s that transported supplies and briefly carried passenger trains.